Thoughts on Operations, Governance and Values Alignment in the Ambassador Fellowship
- “Members must act professionally, respectfully, and support the Polkadot network.”
This is too vague and is open for different interpretations.*
Values Alignment
Values Alignment Checklist
I recently prepared a comprehensive Ambassador Fellowship Commitment Checklist (v0.1) and shared that draft for refinement privately for feedback to one other member.
The checklist would use a tiered approach with increasing requirements by rank and would serve a crucial purpose in ensuring values alignment and would be about verifying that ambassadors who are representing the ecosystem understand and commit to Web3 and Polkadot values and fundamental technical understanding.
Values Alignment Staking Requirement
The checklist has a staking requirement that includes multiple accessible alternatives to staking for so it isn’t about wealth but ensuring ambassadors have “skin in the game”, because when ambassadors stake a native ecosystem token like DOT, KSM, PAS, or WND or an accessible alternative of similar equivalent value, their economic interests align with the ecosystem’s health, they signal genuine commitment, and face accountability through potential slashing. Without such requirements, we risk misaligned incentives, low-quality participation, vulnerability to governance attacks, and inconsistent messaging about Polkadot’s principles.
Pre-funding vs. Retroactive Compensation
The checklist supports standardisation by requiring detailed scope documentation before beginning work. It highlights that pre-funding ensures participation that isn’t limited to those who can afford to work without guaranteed compensation to be more aligned with Polkadot’s “inclusive” value, since retroactive compensation models create unsustainable dynamics where contributors must self-fund work upfront with no guarantee of fair compensation or even recognition.
I’ve decided not to publish the comprehensive checklist for community discussion yet, as it would require a phased approach with a “simplified” version initially, similar to how we’ve only implemented the “simplified” version of the technical specification that maps to the Ambassador Fellowship Manifesto rather than the “detailed” version that I prepared.
The initial version would focus first on the social values component while developing any technical aspects later.
The goal would be to ensure representatives truly understand and embody our core values, since those unwilling to engage with those values may not be ideal ambassador representatives regardless of status or experience.
Values Assurance Group
Even if the checklist approach isn’t initially adopted (since it’s more hands-on and requires members to explicitly complete checklists on an ongoing basis), then we must at least proactively perform random verification of alignment with values through a Values Assurance Group.
Alignment with the following would be expected:
- Polkadot Vision - Polkadot 1.0 - Polkadot Wiki
- Polkadot Mission - About
- Polkadot Values (adapted to the Ambassador Fellowship)
- Interoperability: Building bridges between communities and facilitating cross-ecosystem collaboration, ensuring ambassadors can effectively communicate Polkadot’s vision across diverse audiences and technological backgrounds.
- Decentralization: Promoting distributed leadership and equitable participation within the Ambassador Fellowship, avoiding power concentration and ensuring diverse regional representation in decision-making processes.
- Autonomy: Empowering ambassadors to initiate independent projects while maintaining alignment with ecosystem values, encouraging self-governance and personal accountability in community representation.
- Innovation: Embracing creative approaches to community building, education, and outreach that challenge conventional methods and demonstrate Polkadot’s forward-thinking ethos.
- Adaptability: Remaining responsive to evolving community needs and governance practices, continuously refining ambassador approaches based on feedback and changing ecosystem priorities.
- Inclusivity: Creating welcoming spaces for participants regardless of technical background, socioeconomic status, or geographic location, actively seeking diverse perspectives and ensuring governance processes are accessible to all.
- Community: Fostering supportive relationships among ambassadors and ecosystem participants, prioritizing collective success over individual recognition, and building sustainable networks of mutual support.
- Security: Maintaining information integrity in communications, protecting community members from misinformation, and ensuring transparent, verifiable governance processes with clear accountability mechanisms.
- Sustainability: Developing ambassador practices that can be maintained long-term without contributor burnout, emphasizing pre-funded work models and equitable compensation for specialized contributions.
- Utility: Focusing ambassador efforts on activities that deliver tangible value to the ecosystem and address real community needs rather than superficial metrics or vanity projects.
- Accessibility: Removing barriers to participation in the Ambassador Fellowship by providing multilingual resources, accommodating different learning styles, and creating clear pathways for newcomers to contribute meaningfully.
- Polkadot DAO Constitution
- Web3 Values
- Ambassador Fellowship Values
- Ambassador Fellowship Code of Conduct
- Kusama Code of Conduct
- Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)
Technical Implementation Improvements & Deployment Approach
“an open community discussion about the current on-chain pallet configuration. The Technical Fellowship has configured the previous Ambassador 2.0 pallet to align with the Ambassador Fellowship manifesto”
It’s important for all Ambassador Fellowship members to know that the “current on-chain pallet configuration” that was implemented by Jesse in this Pull Request reflects the Polkadot Ambassador Fellowship: “Simple” Technical Specification and NOT the Polkadot Ambassador Fellowship: “Detailed” Technical Specification
“moving on-chain represents the next logical and widely supported step”
I have a question, and that is, given that there’s no guarantee that we’ll be paid even retroactively for even essential operational or governance work for the Ambassador Fellowship, why are we deploying to “production” on Polkadot before deploying on the canary “staging” environment on Kusama and before first properly “testing” it on Polkadot Testnet like Paseo or Westend?
I’m currently implementing this “AND” Gate on-chain pallet that will provide an on-chain “conditional approval” supported by on-chain comments (remarks) feature that could be integrated into the Ambassador Fellowship on-chain implementation to require pre-approval by a threshold of approvals from a group of members from a diversity of ranks that aren’t just members but have also ratified on-chain their understanding and commitment to ecosystem values and that follow strict and transparent evaluation criteria when qualifying value alignment of tip proposals before the tip proposals proceed to voting by other members, so there’d be structured on-chain comments to supplement approval of tip proposals that use the tip bot and providing more robust governance.
UML Diagrams and Documentation
“flow chart generation”
I’d like to highlight that whilst it’s quite easy to generate comprehensive UML diagrams using generative AI of both the “simplified” and “detailed” technical specifications, the reason I decided not to publish them is because I haven’t formally reviewed the implementation.
As Lucy mentioned, if I did so then it might require additional tests, adjustments and independent verification to accurately reflect even just the current configuration. I wouldn’t want them to have any mistakes since that’d just invite criticism.
I don’t want to face unnecessary attacks for unpaid volunteer work, and because the community might even assume I’m getting paid for it when I’m not, or that my selfless efforts to help other members is just a strategy to ultimately “grift” the treasury.
Conclusion
In summary, I believe we need to establish proper governance processes with clear accountability mechanisms, pre-funded work arrangements, and transparent value alignment verification to ensure the Ambassador Fellowship truly represents the principles of the Polkadot ecosystem. These improvements would strengthen our governance while making participation more inclusive and sustainable.