Single Transferable Vote System for Project Managers

BolehVPN

BolehVPN

Well-known member
I know that Dash is looking at implementing the appointment of Project Managers instead of voting directly on proposals. Basically transitioning from direct democracy to representative democracy. Of course this has pros and cons but I suspect that this can get political especially if there are several people vying for the post.

The way I see the project manager vote happening is:
A proposal is made for a certain project
Project Managers are voted in for the project
There may be several project managers vying for this project manager post.

Instead of having the first past the post system which is to see who has the most votes, although it would introduce programming complexity, I think some thought should be made into using a STV system.

Basically instead of voting for one candidate, masternode owners rank the project managers in the order they wish. They can also choose to only vote for one without ranking the rest. This way let's say their preferred candidate doesn't get the vote, their second choice will then take their votes.

The benefits of STV are real and make for a more fair and accurate representation of the wishes of the masternode owners and I think would reduce the drama. Do take the time to watch this video and tell me what you guys think.

 
Hold on.
BolehVPN said:
I know that Dash is looking at implementing the appointment of Project Managers instead of voting directly on proposals.
Click to expand...
Instead of?
BolehVPN said:
Basically transitioning from direct democracy to representative democracy.
Click to expand...
Very fudy man.
BolehVPN said:
more fair and accurate representation of the wishes of the masternode owners
Click to expand...
Current system is as fair and accurate as it gets, the vote count represents EXACTLY the wishes of MNOs.

Maybe you mix up two separate things.
1. Vote delegation. Suggested by Evan somewhere.
2. Employers, employees and PM. See here.
 
Vedran Yoweri said:
Hold on.

Instead of?

Very fudy man.

Current system is as fair and accurate as it gets, the vote count represents EXACTLY the wishes of MNOs.

Maybe you mix up two separate things.
1. Vote delegation. Suggested by Evan somewhere.
2. Employers, employees and PM. See here.
Click to expand...


Oh great, now even BolehVPN is a concern troll spreading FUD??? You guys have no respect. Good riddance.
 
Vedran Yoweri said:
Hold on.

Instead of?

Very fudy man.

Current system is as fair and accurate as it gets, the vote count represents EXACTLY the wishes of MNOs.

Maybe you mix up two separate things.
1. Vote delegation. Suggested by Evan somewhere.
2. Employers, employees and PM. See here.
Click to expand...

I liked @BolehVPN's post and hoped it might actually provoke some thoughtful discussion... it's definitely not FUD.
 
Maybe its time to revisit some of the drawings Evan did for us earlier, so we all understand more clearly how the general flow, the Projects and the Project Managers relate to each other
and to the masternode network (which are the masternode owners) :

General Flow
bZt1SeD.png


Project Managers
TbQprNM.png


Projects
TsZjK2G.png
 
Cool, so basically some projects can have a project managers and employees voted in? Can there be more than one project manager?

Let's say if there is one post and five candidates, MNs can only vote for one candidate yes? If that's the case, my suggestion is more on being able to rank my candidates in the order we feel we want should we wish to do so. So instead of let's say voting just for Terra, I would say okay I vote Terra first but if not, would go for Setzer then Reim then Cyan in that order. Or if I just want to vote for Terra only that's fine too. This can also work where there's a few spots for the same position for eg if the project has two project manager spots and the ranking then would also facilitate this.

Just imagine if there's 10 candidates but two project manager positions, the traditional way to do it would be to say okay let everyone vote for the candidates and the top two people with the highest votes would get these two positions. This means that MNs can only vote one project manager in although they may like another candidate in a close second and this wish is not reflected since they can only vote for one. The other way is to have two separate votes for each project manager position but this is really messy and i think unworkable because let's say you support Terra, do you vote Terra in for both positions?

The STV system allows these sort of scenarios be it single position or multiple positions and for the wishes of the MN operators to be more accurately represented instead of just a simple binary yes/no.

I'm happy to be corrected if my understanding is wrong but just thought that this would be a fairer system to elect people into posts.
 
Last edited:
Hey @qwizzie and @BolehVPN ,

Good discussion! I will be happy to join from time to time :).
First of all, please remember that nothing is written in stone and setup proposed by Evan is a proposal and can be modified if we can find a better solution. So let's do it together :)

I think that a situation with two project managers coordinating one project is very unusual and not recommended in our decentralized environment. This would create unnecessary confusion in the project team.
In my opinion if there is a big project that requires more than one project manager, it should be considered a program. To resolve complexity issue, the following actions could be applied:
- Program is led by one Project Manager (called Programme Manager in such case)
- Program is divided into few pieces (projects) and each project has its own Project Manager
- Project Managers report to Programme Manager
- Programme Manager report to the Network

I need to think more about the idea of voting for PMs. ATM it doesn't look to me like a best solution for our system. Let me explain why - usually PMs are specialized in their areas of expertise and should be assigned to projects they feel comfortable with. E.g. a brilliant PM with a deep expertise in PR and marketing projects, would not be the best choice for infrastructure migration project - even if the network would give him/her 100% of their votes, it simply won't make him/her an expert in this area.
There are some flexible and multidisciplinary PMs but there are not too many of them - usually people are focused on one or two disciplines. PM is a critical role for each project, therefore it would be better to let PMs make a decision internally and assign the best available person.
 
Last edited:
Great discussion Boleh. I'm not technical so I don't fully understand how the code is going to be done, but if you think about it, the new system is not that much different than the present one. Consider that we have a Core Team which receives 1176 DASH per month. The money goes to one of Evan's wallets, and he then distributes it amongst the team members as he sees fit (and as they agree to internally). The network doesn't care if Kot gets paid more than Daniel (he doesn't); salary negotiations are between the employees (team members in this case) and the team leader (the guy who gets the proposal money, Evan in this case).

It's the same with the Dash Slack proposal that got funded for a couple of months. The money went to the proposal owner, who then "hired" community members to fill the desired roles and paid them according to whatever negotiations they had internally.
 
Mind you I'm really not sure what Evan is proposing that's why kinda winging it and just want to get some clarity to how I understood it from the scattered info I've got here and there.

First of all @kot, I totally agree that two project managers is very strange and probably would lead to awkward situations.

As for the election of PMs, I think we should actually first begin with coming up with a much more detailed recommended template format for proposals to be submitted. Some of the proposals are poorly documented and the milestones are not very clear.

It shouldn't be mandatory to follow the template format especially for really small reimbursements or for larger projects where the format may not be suitable but I think it should serve as a starting point so that proposals are better thought out and crafted. A lot of proposals just ask for a big upfront sum without breaking down how they intend to spend it and honestly, unless it's just a small project that doesn't really require detailed breakdowns, people should really have a plan on how they plan to spend money. In my experience there are a lot of people who are well meaning but when it comes to utilizing funds, they're really shoddy at it.

For example this is a very rough draft but at the very least:

Proposal Name:
About the Proposer and their Team:
Description of Proposal:
Deliverables and Milestones (with Timeline):
Frequency of Progress Reports:
Breakdown of how the funds would be utilised:
Potential Risks and Challenges:

In this way although the format is not mandatory, especially for larger proposals, any omissions could serve to have MN Operators think a bit harder about it as to why it was not answered. In a way it's about having at least making sure proposals have some teeth and thought put into them. These are not unreasonable requests especially in proposals which are not mere reimbursements.

Now as for the current budget system, one of the biggest issues is once the proposal is funded, there tends to be little oversight or monitoring and yet the payments keep on coming through. This is where the PMs were supposed to come in to rein in control and take responsibility of the project and ensure that work is being done but what happens to non performing PMs? Should there be an ability for a vote to 'take over' an existing 'contract' or are we just cancelling the existing one and coming up with a new one?

At the same time I'm also a bit wary that creating the voting of PM system would create some difficult situations. Let's say the proposal was funded and a PM elected in and he assembles his team. He's not performing and is then voted out for an outsider, what happens to the team he assembled? Do payments stop? Can access to a proposer's funds be revoked (for those that are unspent?). As mentioned probably need a lot more time to think about it and come up with solutions. Maybe I'll ping you when I'm fresh and we can throw some ideas.

 
  • Like
Reactions: kot
Hey @BolehVPN !
Thanks for the response. I have already proposed a template (I guess it is even linked on the DashCentral): https://dashpay.atlassian.net/wiki/download/attachments/37355559/01. Dash-Project-Charter-Template-V1.0.docx?api=v2 - please let me know what do you think about it.
I call it Project Charter (this is naming convention from the PM world ;) ) but you can call it Proposal Template as well.

About PM "elections" - I would rather see a PM as a "service" assigned to the project than "hiring" body. PMs could be employees of the network and could be assigned to each project voted in the system (vendors asking for funds from the system should ask for Dash PM first).
 
I had a quick skim through the template, it looks good though I don't know if it's too lengthy for people to follow. How is this template being promoted at the moment? There should be a strong recommendation to use it though for proposals past 1000 USD ?
 
Last edited:
Well... the link to the template is placed on the DashCentral with a recommendation to use during the proposal creation. However there is no strict requirement to use them.
What I observed so far was rather strong resistance to use any process or template. I have heard/read many times opinions like "We don't need PMs" or "We don't need processes and templates" that I was not forcing this solution in any other way than just a proposal. I was rather waiting for people start seeing that it is necessary.
So I am glad you have started this discussion.
 
I think those that don't follow the format should be questioned a lot harder before it passes unless it's a trivial proposal.

Though perhaps it can be made shorter and instead in a link template to have it in a form format or a prefilled text entry with the necessary headers that would prompt people to answer it in the format in Dashcentral?
 
This might be a good idea (the web-based form). I think I will work on this later together with @rango (to put it on DashCentral and dash.org as well).
Anyway - we do not have any formal process (as a part of protocol) to demand this information to be placed.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top