Will the web3 revolutionise management jobs ?

The emergence of web3 is leading to the development of new organisational models. Will management jobs be reinvented as a result ?

Adrien Book. Fas­ci­na­ting and inter­es­ting deve­lop­ments are taking place in this field. But let’s be clear from the out­set that what is hap­pe­ning is not the disap­pea­rance of the world we know, but the emer­gence of a wider range of com­pa­nies, with a wider range of wor­king methods. And these methods dis­rupt a few habits and set patterns.

Web1 brought us new ways of consu­ming content, on web­sites. With web2 we were able to par­ti­ci­pate, inter­act, share content on digi­tal plat­forms : we were “at home”. What is new with web3 is that we have owner­ship of what we read and write. Web3 gives us orga­ni­sa­tio­nal power : we can create an eco­sys­tem around a sub­ject, and orga­nise people around that subject.

The cen­tral concept here is DAOs : decen­tra­li­sed auto­no­mous orga­ni­sa­tions, made tech­ni­cal­ly pos­sible by blockchain.

DAOs are a group of people who come toge­ther to make deci­sions in the digi­tal world. They do this with the help of two key tools. First, the rules that govern the orga­ni­sa­tion are expres­sed as a series of digi­tal “if/then” sta­te­ments that are enco­ded direct­ly into a blo­ck­chain, making them both audi­table and per­ma­nent. Then, voting shares are issued and allo­ca­ted to sta­ke­hol­ders in the form of “digi­tal gover­nance tokens”, also regis­te­red on a blockchain.

DAOs are basi­cal­ly self-orga­ni­sing digi­tal com­mu­ni­ties. People volun­ta­ri­ly come toge­ther around a set of sha­red values and work toge­ther to advance their agen­da, with the help of smart contracts. It’s an emergent logic : you start with a mis­sion, and the orga­ni­sa­tion will slow­ly emerge around it.

So, you don’t choose your employees ?

These new digi­tal orga­ni­sa­tions do not have a recruit­ment pro­cess. And, rather than employees, you have contributors.

In prac­tice, DAOs today are made up of two types of people : pri­ma­ry contri­bu­tors and secon­da­ry contri­bu­tors. As most DAOs work without per­mis­sion, anyone can work on them because their code, smart contracts and lists of contri­bu­tors are trans­pa­rent­ly acces­sible to eve­ryone. You can join the Dis­cord ser­ver of any DAO and start wri­ting code.

You come in and start wor­king on what you can do and what needs to be done. One of the most inter­es­ting aspects of this sys­tem is that once someone regu­lar­ly adds value, they are like­ly to be asked to join the team of senior contri­bu­tors. No more CVs, no more cover let­ters : the bot­tom-up model and optio­nal DAO mem­ber­ship reverses the talent search model.

This is a big step for­ward for three rea­sons. First­ly, we know that tra­di­tio­nal selec­tion pro­cesses have a nega­tive impact on mino­ri­ties because of deep-roo­ted pre­ju­dices. By eli­mi­na­ting these, we can focus on abi­li­ty. Second­ly, this mea­sure is part of the trend towards flexible work ini­tia­ted (for bet­ter or for worse) by the “gig eco­no­my”. Final­ly, it can contri­bute to a par­tial reduc­tion of fric­tio­nal unem­ploy­ment since there is no time lag bet­ween the wish to work and the start of the job.

To ima­gine these new orga­ni­sa­tions, ima­gine that you are wor­king on a film. Direc­tors, pro­du­cers, actors, pro­duc­tion assis­tants, art direc­tors, props people, came­ra people and sound engi­neers get toge­ther for a pro­ject. When the pro­ject is fini­shed, they split up and go to work on dif­ferent films. In DAO, the same can be said of deve­lo­pers, com­mu­ni­ty mana­gers, accoun­tants, consul­tants… In addi­tion, contri­bu­tors can work for one or more DAOs.

How do you get paid ?

The DAO sells ser­vices or pro­ducts and sets aside part of the reve­nue gene­ra­ted for sala­ries and rewards. As contri­bu­tors do not have a contract, there is no conven­tio­nal way of deci­ding what eve­ryone should receive fair­ly. Ins­tead, many DAOs are tur­ning to tools such as Coor­di­nape to address this chal­lenge. These solu­tions allow orga­ni­sa­tions to create “circles” of contri­bu­tors (the equi­va­lent of teams). Each mem­ber of the circle receives points and allo­cates them to other mem­bers over a per­iod of time. The higher the per­cei­ved value of the work done during this per­iod, the more points are recei­ved, and the higher the finan­cial reward.

In this sys­tem, one token is equal to one vote. Unlike tra­di­tio­nal com­pa­nies, eve­ryone has a vote in pro­por­tion to their par­ti­ci­pa­tion in the pro­ject. Cus­to­mers, who must buy tokens to access a DAO’s offe­rings, are also able to vote on its direc­tion. Your cus­to­mers become your col­leagues… or even your bosses if they buy enough tokens ! Obvious­ly, there will be a lear­ning curve for this new type of mana­ge­ment. Never­the­less, there is poten­tial for a real para­digm shift.

DAOs solve some of the pro­blems asso­cia­ted with open-source pro­jects, which are often pla­gued by the issue of com­pen­sa­tion. People who use a DAO must get a token to access it, which pays contri­bu­tors, but also gives users a voice in the deci­sion-making pro­cess. In essence, this means that people will be able to earn a living (or close to it), while wor­king on things they are pas­sio­nate about.

It is a glo­bal and asyn­chro­nous way of wor­king. By defi­ni­tion, all you need is an Inter­net connec­tion to get access and to work.

You say that with the DAOs, web3 gives us organisational power. But isn’t the idea of management wavering ?

In the sense in which we know it, i.e. embo­died in a hie­rar­chi­cal chain or pyra­mid, with “mana­ge­ment” at the top, yes. But orga­ni­sa­tion, gover­nance and mana­ge­ment are rea­li­ties that are deta­ched from the figure of the “mana­ger” to recon­fi­gure and rede­fine them­selves in dif­ferent terms. For example, DAOs are both trans­pa­rent and ano­ny­mous, thanks to the use of blo­ck­chains and smart contracts. All deci­sions and actions can be audited.

It is not only the figure of the ‘boss’ that disap­pears in this model, but also that of our “col­leagues”. This is both a chal­lenge and an oppor­tu­ni­ty. The work­place is a place of socia­li­sa­tion, and the lack of phy­si­cal com­mu­ni­ty and com­mon iden­ti­ty can be trou­bling. But orga­ni­sa­tions can respond by beco­ming more active and deli­be­ra­tive when it comes to team buil­ding. Simi­lar­ly, self-mana­ge­ment can be uncom­for­table for many of us, but per­haps we are just not used to it yet.