Thank you @SEEDGov for putting this proposal forward! We agree that it’s great to see attempts to innovate and incentivise extraordinary contributions. Generally speaking, we are for experimenting with this, but we do have a couple of points and potential risks we’d like to raise:
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Devaluation of core governance: Reducing compensation for standard delegate tiers could risk disincentivise delegate who reads every technical proposal, asks clarifying questions, and provides well-reasoned votes without necessarily starting a “crucial debate”. Pushing delegates to focus on “extraordinary” contributions for better pay may lead to the neglect of these core duties, which unintentionally may encourage delegates to prioritise visible but potentially low-impact content (like X threads or blog posts) simply to check the box for CPs.
We acknowledge that the tier-related prerequisite does act as a safeguard against the complete abandonment of these duties, but the risk is that we incentivise delegates to treat core governance as a box to be checked at the 70% level so they can move on to earn CPs. In a theoretical worst-case scenario, the DAO ends up having several delegates creating amazing content but all of a sudden a weaker core group dedicated to rigorous analysis of proposals, which would slowly erode the quality of the DAO’s decision-making.
Yes, CPs can be earned through extraordinary proposal contributions too. But let’s imagine a delegate that seeks to maximise compensation. They would have the choice of either (a) spend hours on deep analysis in the hope that one’s forum comment is judged as strategic enough to earn CPs, or (b) spend a similar amount of time on activities with more tangible outputs (e.g. X thread or blog post), which are explicitly listed as extraordinary contributions and are easier to “prove” you completed.
Imo, this would be the path of least resistance, and the risk is that delegates gravitate toward the more clearly defined and provable non-governance activities to secure CPs, because relying on governance work to cross the subjective threshold into “extraordinary” is less certain.
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Relative performance leading to income volatility: Since a delegate’s compensation is not guaranteed for meeting a set performance standard but instead contingent on out-ranking other participants for one of the paid slots each month, delegates face unpredictability that could make it difficult to treat their role as a stable professional commitment. If rewards were to fluctuate (excessively) from month to month even if effort and quality remain the same simply because the overall competition was fiercer (and perhaps not the right kind, see point 1), some delegates may find themselves struggling to rely on their participation a stable source of compensation and make a forced decision to no longer participate. Worst case, this may risk discouraging long-term dedicated contributors that the program aims to attract.
Perhaps an incremental pilot as suggested by @citizen42 could make sense.
Curious to hear your thoughts on this!