*In this article we provide an overview of what we consider to be some of the most valuable skills DAO contributor can develop and use in today’s DAO space. For each of the 3 skill categories we provide a high-level introduction and briefly touch on corresponding tactics and practices.*


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Organizational leadership is no longer the exclusive domain of the C-suite. **Web3 and the self-managing nature of DAOs is democratizing the ability for many DAO contributors to be impactful leaders.**

With this novel mode of collaboration comes the need to educate and equip all DAO members - from contributors to operators to founders - with the fundamental skill sets they need to meaningfully participate in distributed organizations.

The contributor skills we describe here are based on the observation that fully engaging with a DAO is about more than simply accomplishing tasks - at its core, **working in a DAO is about processing vast amounts of complex information and facilitating human collaboration in a fully digital work environment**.

## If We Were Built As Computers - An Analogy

![The Contributor Skill Sets - by cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/ZCgjwZsmB06WY0Vgf410e.png?height=1500&width=3001)

* If we think of ourselves through a Computer analogy **Mental Fitness could be thought as our respective *CPUs***.
* Layered on top of this computing power, DAO contributors should develop **their *Operating System:* a set of Self-Direction skills and workflows** for day-to-day work.
* Finally, the CPU and Operating System form a solid foundation for DAO contributors to run **DAO-specific *Apps*: facilitation skills**. In self-managing organizations like DAOs aim to be, facilitation is the one true skillset that high value contributors should master.

## Skill Set n°1 - Mental Fitness

***Contributors Central Processing Unit (CPU)***

![Contributor Skill n°1 - Mental Fitness - by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/HU4cH5jSzTKLiT5RDJ6XE.png?height=1500&width=3001)

At the core of a DAO Contributor’s practice is Mental Fitness.

If physical fitness helps you cope with physical stress and enjoy the thrill of sports, mental fitness allows you to flow through the cognitive, social and emotional **stressors** that come with DAO work while enjoying the thrill of contributing.

Mental fitness opens up the possibility for us to be in right relationship to ourselves and the people around us, and expands our capacity to engage in the ever-expanding knowledge work of Web3.

How do we develop meaningful mental fitness? Let’s dive in.

It starts with **Cognitive Capabilities Training**, the foundational layer of mental fitness. These practices actively rewire our neural pathways. Reps build our brain’s fitness through neuroplasticity.

Engaging this base layer of mental fitness can drastically enhance the quality of our attention, awareness and ultimately enhance our thinking, analysis and social-emotional processing in the digital workplace.

* *The practices:* Meditation, breathwork, and active resting, stimulate gratitude/compassion, physical health including daylight, exercise, sleep, food.
* *The how:* Build a daily routine that embeds mental exercising. For example doing a [WimHof breathwork](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tybOi4hjZFQ) in the morning, followed by a 12 minutes meditation session to to strengthen your calm and focus. Simple habits like pausing for three deep breaths before, during and after a meeting can make a difference. Using [body scanning techniques](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojw8P4t7bjk) to actively recuperate in the middle of the day can prove extremely powerful too.
* *The ROI:* Enhance your ability to process the vast amounts of information your brain receives on a daily basis in web3. Increased awareness, attention and depth of analysis.

The second pillar of Mental Fitness is **Social-Emotional Processing**. This is how we process the complex inputs from within ourselves and the outside world, and it builds on cognitive abilities like awareness. Social-Emotional Processing is the integration of social awareness and self-knowledge.

* *The practices:* Checking-in regularly with yourself and set times for self-reflection, adopting growth mindset, peer support and mentorship.
* *The how:* Be your own “executive coach”. Establish a daily cadence for self-reflection. Set time-bound intentions and be sure to create time to debrief.
  * Use questions as much as possible to train your brain to come from a place of curiosity, rather than pre-fixed ideas of what is right. Vibe into people’s work and communication styles. Acknowledge what you don't know. View challenges, conflict, and tensions as an opportunity for learning. Never a failure, always a lesson.
  * Carve out regular time for connection with a trusted web3 friend(s).
  * Set up regular meetings with a group of peer contributors.
* *The ROI*: Enhanced ability to respond intentionally to triggers, to stay grounded through stressors, and to flow with relational challenges. Better manage your energy, emotions and prioritization. Grow yourself through cultivating positivity instead of beating yourself up.

Tending to our Mental Fitness core is an investment in our future selves as we build the necessary habits, stamina and flexibility to enjoy ourselves and develop our own unique potentials as contributors and beyond.

## Skill Set n°2 - Self-Direction

***Contributors Operating System (OS)***

![Contributor Skill n°2: Self-Direction - by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/qEMaECjX4W4og84LGZ5F_.png?height=1500&width=3001)

On top of a strong Mental Fitness core is our ability to self-direct. If mental fitness is our CPU, our ability to self-direct is our O*perating System* - **the logic directing daily contributions**: from setting our individual North Star goal to day to day prioritization tactics.

How to define your Contributor OS?

* *The practices:* Self-assessment of skills and capacity, defining your contributor style, identifying your [personal theory of change](https://www.theoryofchange.org/what-is-theory-of-change/), short and long term goal setting, developing a decision-making matrix, design your environment based on how you uniquely function, prioritize always.
* *The how:*
  * Identifying your contribution style may be the most important starting place for any DAO Contributor. Some guiding questions are:
    * What are your favorite kinds of projects and why are they meaningful to you?
    * What are your least favorite tasks, and why?
    * What’s your commitment? What percentage of your capacity are you able to commit to this project/DAO?
  * Make sure to work on defining your personal goals before selecting DAOs to contribute to.
  * Adopt systems to prioritize both your backlog of tasks and spontaneous inbound requests like DMs. A good prioritization system is key to save time, brain power and ultimately move faster towards your goals with minimal efforts.
  * Work with a coach or peer to define your cognitive tendencies. Develop mastery of skills that play on your strengths and let you perform at your best.
  * Set intentions on how you want to spend your days.
    * Block times off in your calendar to reflect the things you value. Time and energy are the DAO Contributor’s more precious resource - allocate it wisely.
    * What time of the day do you feel most productive? What time of the day are you most drained? Plan your work accordingly.
  * Notice patterns for how you work. Anticipate and be responsive to predictable stuck points.
    * At what points in a project do you have the most and least energy? What supports do you need to bring greater balance to your workflow?
  * Set both long and short term goals & expectations. Regularly evaluate if you’ve accomplished your tasks. Clearly articulate blockers, and work to remove them.
* *The ROI:* Enhance your ability to meaningfully contribute in alignment with your values; increased sense of personal fulfillment with your work; enhance your ability to prioritize and find the shortest path to your daily goals.

## Skill Set n°3 - Facilitation

***Contributors DAO-Specific Apps***

![Contributor skill n°3 - DAO Facilitation - by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/D3Ha3iKVx1QiIw0pRQc8t.png?height=1500&width=3001)

The outermost layer of the DAO Contributor’s educational toolkit is DAO Facilitation.

The word “facilitate” literally means to “make an action (or process) easy or easier; help bring about.” This philosophy sits at the center of self-managing organizations where most relevant outputs are emergent.

The DAO Facilitation layer encompasses the skills, tools or applications that a DAO Contributor should gain experience with to make collaboration happen. It’s a set of *Apps* or *programs* that we run on top of our CPUs and Operating Systems. It starts with facilitating interactions between community members up to the facilitation of critical decisions and projects. This also includes daily tasks like communications and meeting stewardship which eventually define the quality of work in a non-protocol DAO.

* *The practices:* Be proactive with facilitating discussions, meetings, events, encounters. Be present and proactive during live communications. Cultivate the groups’ momentum by facilitating decisions and tidy project management. Be an active and right-sized project steward, have clarity on the purpose of the project, not just the goals or deliverables.
* *The how:* **Facilitation is to DAOs what management is to traditional organizations: a skill that makes things move forward.**
  * Meeting stewardship - Make sure you and others have context. Set time aside to prepare ahead of meetings, understanding the object of the meeting, what information you and others need to gain in order to move forward. Debrief at the end of the meeting and document what was learned, what needs to happen next. Follow up to keep the group accountable. If you’re moderating, make sure to build an agenda intentionally and involve the right participants. We say meeting stewardship because a meeting’s success is not the sole responsibility of the meeting facilitator - it requires active and right-sized participation from everyone present.
  * Decision making - Use adapted decision making processes -advice, consent, voting…- for various types of decisions. Run workshops using Figma or Miro to facilitate interactive and engaging group decisions, and communicate visually.
  * Relationships - Design a conflict resolution process to deal with relational blockers.
  * Communications - Improve your async communications by understanding how to best use the tool stack: Discord, Clarity, Lobby, Coordinape, Snapshot, Gather... Design meetings and digests that keep necessary participants up to speed.
  * Project Management & Working groups - Learn DAO native project management practices inspired from Agile/Scrum to make projects happen in autonomy.
  * Operations - Facilitate processes for onboarding, compensation as well as stewardship of governance.
* *The ROI:* **Working in a DAO becomes both more efficient and legible**. Communications happen faster with more clarity and less disagreements. Operations are more fluid and **contributors can focus on adding value and expressing their full potential** instead of being weighted down by half-baked processes.

## DAO Contributor Education - For Whom?

 
 

The skill sets above are applicable to all DAO roles at varying degrees of intensity.

People who engage fully in DAO work - operators and founders - will look to leverage these tools for high performance, similar to the way C-suite members leverage coaching and trainings in traditional orgs. Operator roles are central coordination nodes that can undergo a lot of stressors and some of these skills can make a huge difference.

Contributors who engage more loosely with DAOs, say between 5-15 hours a week, will also benefit from DAO contributor education by improving their capability to quickly and effortlessly add value. Moving swiftly and confidently within any DAO environment. Ultimately, that makes contributing to a DAO a more fulfilling and enjoyable practice.

**Taking a step back, contributor education is essential for individuals, for DAOs and for the DAO ecosystem as a whole**. DAO contributor education:

1. Equips contributors with individual skills so they can express their full potential.
2. Trains contributors and operators in designing and facilitating the next generation of organizations.
3. Establishes the foundation for a dynamic, interoperable ecosystem of contributors and operators.

Let’s keep the conversation going!


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![creation by @glycemag](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/IsaO3bMhkZdUsLb7CtS3B.jpg?height=1500&width=3001&size=large)

*This article is a collab between [@cryptohun3y](https://twitter.com/cryptohun3y) & [@albiverse](https://twitter.com/albiverse) with help from Twoplus contributors - [Antoine](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho), [Ale](https://twitter.com/Aleborda21), [Maxwell](https://twitter.com/KatwellKat), [Greg](https://twitter.com/greg_ader).*

*The Twoplus community exists to support DAO Contributor personal development and Mental Health as well as crafting Contributor Experiences that support those values. We believe that the need for Mental Fitness training and good CX in Web3 will be exponential in the coming years.*

DAO Contributor Skills: Mental Fitness, Self-Direction, Facilitation

> ### "We shape our tools, thereafter our tools shape us"

You've likely heard this apocryphal quote before (mistakenly attributed to the legendary Marshall McLuhan but in actuality from John Culkin, a professor of communication and friend of McLuhan).

What it does, so succinctly, is expose the reflexive nature of the relationship between builder and tool, the co-evolution (or [intervolution](https://twitter.com/strangechances/status/1475245432175529988)) between us and our creations. Think about the innovation of the car for an instant: we invented it about a century ago, but since then it has shaped our world by defining cities (i.e. parkings and malls), sprouting new industries (i.e oil companies) and creating new behaviors (i.e. drive-ins). [The second-order and third-order effects](https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2017/3/20/cars-and-second-order-consequences) of the invention of the car are simply mind blowing.

Software is the same. We shape it, and then it shapes us in more ways than we realize. We built cloud collaboration, video calls and messaging apps and they changed the way we work. But that's not all — now they're also changing the way capital gets raised, how offices get built and the places people decide to settle.

As Wilson Milner puts it so eloquently in this brilliant presentation:

> “We’re the product of our world, but we’re also its designer. \[…\] We make our world what it is and we become the kind of people who live in it.”

![](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/Og2_almUinj8BG7pmPF8l.png?height=2251&width=4001)

## Web2: Adversarial products and human downgrading

Web2 has made our lives easier in so many ways. A couple decades ago, Facetiming your family members around the world was still sci-fi fantasy.

But at the same time web2 (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, Google) has created plenty of negative externalities. Such as addictive use, fostered by the quick dopamine hits that these products repeatedly provide, creating dependency by rewiring our brains’ reward systems via neuroplasticity, and this with surgical precision. Or obsession with self-image, caused by the overwhelming competition for social validation that web2 fuels. Put together, these negative externalities result in what Tristan Harris calls "human downgrading":

![From Tristan Harris’ talk at What’s Now San Francisco](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/fxpSFTwrTiT52PYzclb89.PNG?height=1125&width=2436)

The reason why this human downgrading is happening in the first place?

Incentives. *“Show me the incentives and I will show you the outcome"* once quipped. Charlie Munger. And it so happens that the incentives of these web2 products are often diametrically opposed to their user's best interest — what we call adversarial products. *"Major Web2 products suffer from adversarial designs. Twitter has many great features but it is also optimized to make you scroll for longer than you’d like in order to sell more ad space. This misalignment is paid at a high price by us and billions of consumers.*" [we wrote in a previous post.](https://mirror.xyz/0x09362a31a90F01E18bB4a7B16Bc82796E8B79a7e/_4JYbrI1U85SGf2_J7zcHE48JkP9-R2dFnl--DNHCBM)

From "The Social Dilemma":

> “If something is a tool it genuinely is just sitting there, waiting, patiently. If something is not a tool it’s demanding things from you, it’s seducing you, it’s manipulating you, it wants things from you. And we’ve moved away from having a tools-based technology environment, to an addiction and manipulation-based technology environment. That’s what’s changed. Social media isn’t a tool just waiting to be used, it has its own goals and it has its own means of pursuing them by using your psychology against you”

Beyond adversarial designs, could a reason for the nefarious effects of using those products be that they themselves were created by *always-on, stressed-out* *(if not burned out), unconscious* builders? Dustin Moskovitz, one of Facebook's co-founders (and now CEO of Asana) [seems himself to admit so](https://medium.com/building-asana/work-hard-live-well-ead679cb506d).

Then, we can only wonder whether it’s accidental that the products made by these  web2 builders weren’t mindful of their users' wellbeing, given that’s not what they optimized for *in their own lives and work environments?*

## The promise of web3

Web3 stands out from its predecessor on the basis of its ideals (democratic, user-owned, permissionless, etc) and of its incentives structure, which align users' and builders' interests. Or as Chris Dixon puts it:

[https://twitter.com/cdixon/status/1442201625590779909?s=20](https://twitter.com/cdixon/status/1442201625590779909?s=20)

Ergo, most of us are now contributing to DAOs, getting fired up every day by the promise of web3 to change society and create a better, fairer world based on innovative incentive design. Sometimes even competing for the boldest, most idealistic statements of hope:

[https://twitter.com/META_DREAMER/status/1479590894294556672](https://twitter.com/META_DREAMER/status/1479590894294556672)

Now that's all well and nice, but don't be fooled: **there's no making a better world if we first don't take care of ourselves and each other.**

Indeed, as far as the work environment of web3 builders (i.e. DAOs) is concerned, things seem even worse than they were for web2 builders: always-on, FOMO-inducing, dopamine-farming etc...

[https://twitter.com/chaserchapman/status/1458825169267531781](https://twitter.com/chaserchapman/status/1458825169267531781)

[https://twitter.com/twoplusDAO/status/1473323798279737347](https://twitter.com/twoplusDAO/status/1473323798279737347)

As we established earlier, we shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us.  In the context of web3, the tools we use even *shape the way we see each other* - and subsequently, the culture we work in (ie. faceless Discord: easier to FOMO farm;  video calls and IRL: treat each other as humans). Therefore, these tools we use are *the most fundamental influence in the products we build*. And to close the loop, *in the life of the people who use them.*

When construction workers used their heavy tools, they developed corresponding muscle issues and body aches. But now it’s all happening in the brain — this time however, entirely hidden from view, only showing up in often invisible mental issues like burnout and depression.

Given the above, the future is looking pretty bleak if we, in web3, continue to work this way. We have a responsibility, to ourselves and the billions of people who will use our products, to do better.

## Humane DAOs, humane products

Building non-adversarial, user-aligned DAOs and web3 products begins with healthy lifestyles and work environments.

Waking up to Discord first thing in the morning? NO! (we're watching you 👀). In case you need science to convince you this is a bad idea, [much has been written on the topic.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2021/04/02/why-you-should-stop-checking-your-phone-in-the-morning-and-what-to-do-instead/?sh=42a300682684)

DAOs that can shape healthy cultures and keep their contributors sane by rewarding self-care will [become the ones that thrive ](https://mirror.xyz/0x09362a31a90F01E18bB4a7B16Bc82796E8B79a7e/7neZfOiz0mGUO776qdHiSd70zGDZyC4opXAo3enqtt0)in an ultra competitive talent market. But they will also be the ones most likely to create humane products, and in turn positively impact society. Wen Chief Wellbeing Officer and meditation sprints 🤷🏾‍♂️?

Beyond the DAO environment itself, there are a few guidelines to keep for designing mindful, humane web3 products.  Anne-Laure Le Cunff, founder of [Ness Labs](https://nesslabs.com/), outlines 3 key design principles [in her talk](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yysQnr1ShNo&ab_channel=MakingJam):

**1) Helpful**: *silent by default* (do we really need that notification?), *good timing* and *user-controlled* (how easy is it for users to turn off notifications?). For example minimize cognitive drain by batching notifications at precise times in the day.

![iOS 15 not only allows deep customization of notifications through Focus Modes, but even to let your contacts know you have notifications silenced. How helpful.](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/lhes7om8YKe2AhRq60vpm.png?height=1500&width=3000)

**2) Calm**: *mindful context switching* (is there a way to meet the user where they are instead of requiring them to come to my app?), *limited options, simple filters, fixed interface by default* (limit movement within the interface), *straightforward UI*. This points at the importance of integrations and lowering tool-fatigue.

![How calm is Superhuman compared to the sheer overwhelm of opening Discord?](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/TrBa1Eu3oVltwmC2fRuM3.png?height=924&width=1920)

**3) Value-focused**: *time well spent* (how do we make sure the time spent in the app is valuable?),  *focus on jobs-to-be-done* (getting users to achieve what they came for instead of trying to capture their attention and time) and *completeness* (help users tune off once they’ve achieved what they came for, instead of feeding them endlessly more work or entertainment).

![Imagine Twitter telling you that "You're all caught up" and you'd better take a walk in the sun now instead of doomscrolling.](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/wH8h29H7vsGY8Ngs1Sizw.png?height=799&width=1600)

A great list — which we fork to add our own, web3-focused, humane product design principles which seek to counteract the always-on, scarcity-based and FOMO-inducing culture pervasive in the space :

**4) Slow:** *have a break* (prompt users to take frequent breaks after long periods of activity… even cars do that after all!), *asynchronous communication* (thank you Notion) and *information digests* (we’re loving the #daily-update or #weekly-update channels proliferating in many DAOs). Embed playful and regenerative breaks both in our DAO lives and tooling.

![With an oat-milk latte, please.](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/jY4KiKxIZHUaDmCC8Siqr.png?height=360&width=544)

**5) Abundant**: *peer support* (can we facilitate users recognizing, gifting and cheering each other instead of making them compete for status?), *authenticity* (reduce status chasing by removing status markers and social competitions) and *fairness* (no spending hundreds of hours doing degen quests for a whitelist...).

![Discord tip bots are a great example of “net-positive” peer support](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/Y9kkHqYYoSNUzW6MuUxns.png?height=631&width=686)

## Mindful metrics

Now that you've designed a humane, mindful product or DAO, how do you measure success? Surely, you need to rethink the age-old obsession over engagement metrics, [a point also advocated by the Center for Humane Tech.](https://www.humanetech.com/technologists)

As the saying goes, what gets measured gets improved. Choosing the wrong metrics can lead to adversarial design and zero-sum games as this Youtube engineer confesses in "The Social Dilemma":

> *"It worries me that an algorithm I was working on \[at Youtube\] is increasing polarization in society. But from the point of view of watch time, this polarization is extremely efficient at keeping people online”*

Instead, non-adversarial, user-aligned web3 products should focus on measuring the value they provide to users by setting

1. the right North Star Metric (linked to the main job-to-be-done and focused on value delivery)
2. measuring long-term retention in our tooling and DAOs (over time spent)
3. focusing on contributor or user satisfaction (i.e. NPS)
4. optimizing for shorter task-time (i.e. how can we get users and contributors to achieve what they came for *faster*?).

## One shot

We have a window of opportunity. A golden one at that. Web3 is only in its infancy, so this is our unique chance to shape it and create a mindful and human metaverse. *We won't have another shot*. So let's not waste it.

We'll leave you to ponder that one, from Wilson Milner:

> *“The car shaped our environment in the 20th century in this huge tectonic way. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that the screen will be as important to shaping our environment in the 21st century. What goes on those screens is pretty important. Because the things that we choose to surround ourselves with will shape what we become. We’re not just making pretty interfaces. We’re actually in the process of building environments where we’ll spend most of our time for the rest of our lives. We’re the designers. We’re the builders. What do we want that environment to feel like? What do **we** want to feel like?”*

—

This post was written by [Antoine](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho) in collaboration with [Louis](https://twitter.com/albiverse), [Stephanie](https://twitter.com/cryptohun3y), [Wilson](https://twitter.com/itswilsonhou) and [Alejandra](https://twitter.com/Aleborda21).

We shape web3, then web3 will shape us

*Disclaimer: All the information in this post is for informational and educational purposes only. The information here is not a substitute for professional medical advice. If you are encountering troubles with your mental health make sure to reach out to a qualified mental health professional.*


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The DAO space is extremely demanding for its contributors. Too often passionate and talented people start contributing but after a short honeymoon phase they’re overwhelmed and run out of steam or worse.

[https://twitter.com/frogmonkee/status/1477349866284228620](https://twitter.com/frogmonkee/status/1477349866284228620)

DAOs are new work environments. At this point their many inefficiencies lead to the accumulation of a psychological burden for contributors. An organization wide liability we call *mental debt* ❌🙅‍♀️. This debt can accumulate in 3 areas.

1. On the ***contributors*** end, the amount and pace of information that needs to be processed is orders of magnitude greater than in start-up environments. And it’s on 24/7, 365 days/year putting a strain on contributor’s brains.
2. The ***tools*** we use today -Discord, Twitter- were all designed for use in other contexts with other interests in mind - not for orderly asynchronous collaboration.
3. Most importantly, ***DAOs and their communities*** are still early in designing cultures and operations that encourage mental fitness as they scale.

Only by prioritizing mental fitness as a core design principle in each of these 3 areas will we succeed in making DAOs a great place to collaborate.

![by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/H25PvmsPp2TMYxhaLEiXM.png?height=2251&width=4001)

## 1 - Contributor Level Training And Education

The burst of energy required to operate a scaling DAO is hardly sustainable without proper training or experience. Contributors need to be equipped to swim in the rapid waters of DAOs without drowning. They need to learn how to best leverage currents to progress swiftly without getting exhausted.

We believe that this shift can be initiated through basic education on brain science.

For example, having a basic understanding of dopamine -our brain’s motivation currency- makes it possible to proactively filter out habits and tools that deplet it against our will. And understanding the relationship between belonging and mental fitness can help better select the right place to contribute.

Bit by bit Web3 contributors can grow their toolkit through learning key pillars of mental fitness like nutrition, sleep and mindfulness skills. Lots of resources exist today but few are adapted and embedded in the culture and routine of a Web3 builder.

DAO contributors evolve in a place where the brain and the machine are in constant interaction. We expect that many contributors will struggle before they start taking mental fitness seriously and enter a journey towards more sustainable and enjoyable performance.

## 2 - The Clean DAO Tech Stack

There is nothing worse for brain health than using *adversarial products* all day long.

What’s an adversarial product? It's a product where incentives are misaligned with users’ best interest. Major Web2 products suffer from adversarial designs. Twitter has many great features but it is also optimized to make you scroll for longer than you’d like in order to sell more ad space. This misalignment is paid at a high price by us and billions of consumers.

The presence of tools with poor or adversarial designs cannot be tolerated in a DAO’s tech stack. Running a DAO is hectic and contributors don’t have any spare energy for tools that aren’t supporting them in meaningful ways. A bad tech stack is the promise of a rapid and constant increase in a DAO’s mental debt.

![by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/bCoHCX3EXqv2JuYWbsqLc.png?height=2251&width=4001)

Beyond adversarial designs, future collaboration tools have to minimize context switching and ‘tool fatigue’. This means creating seamless, cognitively smooth experiences by integrating tightly with already adopted technologies. Today this starts with a clear segmentation of content types across interfaces like Notion, Discourse or Discord.

Most importantly, we’re humans. And current digital environments lack rich human interactions. DMs, likes and emoji reacts are cheap but short lived information. A whole range of tools will focus on fostering stronger connections among contributors. Good relationships and a sense of belonging considerably increase effectiveness in communication and team work.

## 3 - DAO Level And Community-Wide Initiatives

When DAOs figure out a brain-friendly tech stack they’ll experience massive leaps forward. But the bulk of the work for each core team and DAO community will be in developing a mental health conscious culture.

Just like professional sports teams, we can expect top DAOs to have a whole working group in charge of fostering social connections, coaching and personal growth programs. A concrete first step could be educating contributors on burn out and creating internal processes to handle it.

Eventually, everything in a DAO up to operational details will reflect on contributor mental health. During contributor onboarding for example, it is necessary to 1. communicate just the necessary amount of information to minimize cognitive load and 2. have newcomers establish their first social connections. Similarly a good compensation system will work from our needs for stability and predictability in order to enable contributors to adopt a long term ownership mindset.

![by @cryptohun3y](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/MLHB0O0K9F-3IOy6I_8br.png?height=2251&width=4001)

Two scenarios co-exist in DAOs for contributors:

* access to meaningful and liberating collaboration.
* constant mental stress and submission to a machinery we can’t seem to control.

The first option implies that we take mental fitness as a core design principle. DAOs are an opportunity for a new culture to emerge. Success here will result from coordinated action among stakeholders in each of the 3 areas and it will help DAOs rise as efficient and sustainable means to collaborate.

If we’re sick of working today, how could we produce better outcomes for DAOs and for society tomorrow ? The future of work is now.


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This post is a collaboration between [Steph](https://twitter.com/cryptohun3y), [Ale](https://twitter.com/Aleborda21), [Antoine](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho), [Sinclair](https://twitter.com/sinclair_toffa) and [Louis](https://twitter.com/albiverse). If this resonates, DM us → [Twoplus](https://twitter.com/twoplusDAO).\*

3 Pillars of Contributor Mental Health In DAOs (and the Metaverse) 

![](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/N4pq6FHVSS5tigaK_Xp2w.png?height=1958&width=3756)

## 2021: Pioneering the new wave of DAOs

The DAO space has been expanding at a crazy pace in 2021.

From a handful of contributors to hundreds. From a couple burgeoning Discord communities to billions of dollars in treasuries. Until recently, DAOs seemed to be on an unstoppable trajectory.

But then, DAO operators, coordinating in the trenches, started to face bigger and bigger challenges. Enough to make contributors realize that the pace of growth wasn’t sustainable. Not with the current set of tools and processes.

Many in and around DAOs felt increasingly burnt out. As communities grew in size and activity, it became exponentially harder for new members to find their path. It became equally  exhausting for existing operators to make up for the lack of structure,typing endless walls of texts in a Discord server trying to make themselves understood.

Looking back, it's becoming clear that the last few months have been about exploration.

About discovering what worked and what didn’t, the good things and the ones that sucked. From the hardships that go with scaling contributor onboarding, up to the most fundamental things like staying mentally sane in such a fast paced, technology-heavy environment.

## The Untapped Potential of DAOs

With all this exploration work done and a new chapter ahead of us, there is a massive opportunity to capitalize on what’s good in DAOs and make sure to value it as we grow.

Because we’re so early in building tools and processes we can make sure that we’re designing them with contributors’ best interest at heart and avoid repeating the mistakes of Web2 giants.

Because we’re so early in scaling DAOs, we have to preserve the passion of DAO communities. Their drive to get together and collaborate towards shared goals. There are many reasons to engage with a DAO for the first time, but the one best reason to stick around for the long term is the sense of belonging to something special.

If we fail to find what we value and hold onto it, we’ll end up in the exact same situation the world is in now.

During this same year 2021, workers all over the world have chosen to leave their jobs out of despair and misalignment with the values that most corporations and institutions hold. From the US to China, the youth have shifted priorities, preferring alternative lifestyles to a workplace void of connections and meaning.

![cigna 2020 loneliness and the workplace report ](https://images.mirror-media.xyz/publication-images/tcrsK-VMOguf0f1_p_TDJ.PNG?height=246&width=787)

Both as users or professionals, the feedback loop we’re now getting from the impact of social media on mental health is brutal. Anyone engaging with Crypto Twitter and Discord has been dealing with some form of addiction, fatigue or anxiety inducing FOMO.

[https://twitter.com/jaesmail/status/1470502134907080708](https://twitter.com/jaesmail/status/1470502134907080708)

[https://twitter.com/chaserchapman/status/1458825169267531781https://twitter.com/Jayislate/status/1458836035354431502](https://twitter.com/chaserchapman/status/1458825169267531781https://twitter.com/Jayislate/status/1458836035354431502)

[https://twitter.com/Jayislate/status/1458836035354431502](https://twitter.com/Jayislate/status/1458836035354431502)

These threats are real and already erode value creation in the DAO space. This can be through the incentivizing zero-sum behaviors or drastically increasing contributor turnover.

But we’re early and the DAO playbook is still being written. We have an opportunity to tackle existing issues and double down on the things we value positively.

## Designing DAOs For People, Not People For DAOs

Good design of DAO tools should start with our brains and body cycles in mind. For example, accounting for our strengths in tackling complex tasks but also our limits in processing vast amounts of information and our need to tune-off regularly.

Good design of DAO environments and cultures should start with our deepest psychological needs at the core. For example our need to socialize and connect with others. As much as our need for things like stability and freedom.

Instead of forcing people into unsustainable and dangerous environments, *designing DAOs for people* will be a winning strategy. What’s good for contributors is good for your DAO.

People are DAOs first and last differentiator. Because the Web3 world is open-source, technical edges are less defensible. Eventually it all comes down to an engaged community, a pool of talented contributors and a great work environment.

In the global competition for people, only DAOs that manage to craft good contributor experiences will attract, engage, and retain the people they need to thrive.

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Twoplus will be collaborating with DAOs and DAO operators to craft and promote good DAO design through research, products and education. Next we’ll be releasing a mapping of current and upcoming DAO tools and their impact on contributors and contributor experience. Feel free to DM us on Twitter if you’re a project or individual and would like to collaborate.

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This post was written by [Louis](https://twitter.com/albiverse) in collaboration with [Antoine](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho), [Jonathan](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho) and [Gian](https://twitter.com/antoinesakho). Also inspired from conversations with [Caroline](https://twitter.com/SpaceXponential) and the [DAO Vibe Ops crew](https://twitter.com/rafathebuilder/status/1452933923009441803).

[https://www.cigna.com/static/www-cigna-com/docs/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/combatting-loneliness/cigna-2020-loneliness-infographic.pdf](https://www.cigna.com/static/www-cigna-com/docs/about-us/newsroom/studies-and-reports/combatting-loneliness/cigna-2020-loneliness-infographic.pdf)

[https://www.amazon.fr/Lonely-Century-Isolation-Imperils-Future/dp/1529329264](https://www.amazon.fr/Lonely-Century-Isolation-Imperils-Future/dp/1529329264)

[From the Great Resignation to Lying Flat, Workers Are Opting Out](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2021-12-07/why-people-are-quitting-jobs-and-protesting-work-life-from-the-u-s-to-china)