This is the second and final instalment of my reply to the community feedback on this pre-proposal for renewal of GRIP.
Part II
- Payment in General
- Compensation for meetings
- GRIP members must stay in their lanes
- GRIP needs a tweak or two
1. Payment in general
If the community sees value in GRIP and concludes it’s worth renewing, a fair payment mechanism is needed. In keeping with the egalitarian ethos of our DAO, my view is that GRIP members should be paid at an equal rate: $100 an hour seems reasonable. This recognizes that we value folks’ time and contributions the same.
But we are open to considering other reasonable, fair payment solutions.
To @Caesar’s point, if GRIP is to determine how much to pay its members, I agree that PNF should have authority to seek clarifications before payments.
As to the work that was done to date, GRIP expects payment as approved by the DAO - based on PEP-45. I recognize that PEP-45 did not specify that funding applied to work required to set up GRIP and run it. However, it’s implicit in the proposal’s adoption that such work is included.
For GRIP work, if any, pending the renewal vote and a possible change of payment mechanism, the $100 hourly rate will apply. (No more meetings.)
2. Compensation for meetings
As noted, by approving GRIP, the DAO implicitly approved compensation for the work involved in setting it up, which included our first two meetings. A third meeting was held for team input on optimizing our operations.
Of the 133.2 hours billed by GRIP for its three-month trial - gulp - 23.9 hours, or 17.9 percent were for meeting participation. Time in meetings, per GRIP member, ranged from 1 hour to 4 hours.
@b3n says: “Charging for internal meetings is unfathomable to many.” @Jinx also expressed concern.
Reflecting on the appropriateness of billing for attending meetings, I messaged GRIP members, before posting this pre-proposal, to canvass their views.
[quote = “@zaatar”]
— 02/20/2023
BILLING FOR ATTENDING MEETINGS: Should we reduce or eliminate fees for attending meetings? Billing $1000 to the DAO for an hour-long meeting with 10 participants seems greedy. Some compensation, however, is appropriate because (1) it’s our time, and (2) it’s a necessary part of running GRIP. Perhaps it should be more of an honorarium. Say $50 per hr. or per meeting (we could limit them to an hour going forward). Thoughts?
[/quote]
I got three replies:
[quote = “@Qspider”]
Depends on your perspective. We’re not having meetings every day. We’ve only had 3 meetings I think in the last few months or whenever we started but they were very productive. Normally you get paid in the workplace; it’s company time on meetings. Doesn’t seem greedy to me but I don’t recall the budget we’re working with. I don’t think we had 10 participants but if it becomes an issue I suppose we can work something out.
[/quote]
[quote = “@RawthiL”]
Yeah, charging for meetings seems greedy, but it’s a job that’s required for the grip to function. I don’t have a strong opinion on this, it’s OK if we don’t charge them but is not too greedy to ask for some amount for that time…
@zaatar —
what about $50 per hr?
@RawthiL —
yeah, it’s ok to charge less for something that has no direct impact
[/quote]
The general sentiment among GRIP members appears to be that some compensation for this time is appropriate. I assume that PNF members attend meetings as part of their work and that these are part of the work for which they get paid. Or, when there’s a reimbursement PEP for work on development of a tool that helps the network, that work might include meetings.
What do other community members think? We’re listening.
(Pending further discussion on this, I will defer GRIP’s bill for these hours. That drops GRIP’s billable hours from 133.2 to 109.3.)
3. GRIP members must stay in their lanes
GRIP team members can bill only for work related to their defined roles. The renewal proposal will make this clear.
Accordingly, the economic and technical specialists will be able to bill only for assistance within their respective areas; unless otherwise specified, the editor will be able to bill only for copy editing, proofreading and writing (including infographic text); the graphic artist will be able to bill only for infographic work. As per PEP-45, GRIP members also will be able to bill for their work in creating summaries of competing viewpoints on complex proposals that have been formally launched.
(In view of the above, my bill for 5.1 hours for feedback on Bruce Yin’s translation pre-proposals, including an hour-long Zoom meeting with Ming, is being withdrawn. This drops GRIP’s bill for its three-month trial to 104.2 hours.)
4. GRIP needs a tweak or two
Let’s not forget that GRIP is an experiment. There was no playbook to follow. So it’s only natural that GRIP might not get it right the first time and may need to adapt. It is hoped that the discussion around this pre-proposal will help show what tweaks need to be made to secure GRIP’s place in the DAO-governance toolkit.
GRIP welcomes all suggestions.
Post-script: GRIP is very grateful to MSA, Caesar, Ben and JInx for their valuable (unpaid 
) feedback on this pre-proposal.