Setting Up a Working Group Charter and Mandate

In decentralized organizations like DAOs, a working group charter is a foundational document that defines a team's existence and operational boundaries. Unlike a traditional corporate mandate, it functions as a smart contract with the broader DAO, outlining the group's specific mission, granted authority, and resource allocation. A clear charter prevents scope creep, aligns contributors, and provides a measurable framework for accountability and success. It is the first critical step in moving from a vague idea to an executable, on-chain initiative.

The core components of a charter typically include: the mandate (the group's primary purpose and goals), scope (included and explicitly excluded responsibilities), membership & roles (defining leads, contributors, and entry/exit mechanisms), budget & resources (treasury control, vesting schedules, and multisig signers), and governance & reporting (decision-making processes, key performance indicators (KPIs), and reporting frequency to the main DAO). Tools like Snapshot for signaling, Safe (formerly Gnosis Safe) for treasury management, and Coordinape for contributor compensation are often referenced within these frameworks.

Drafting an effective charter requires balancing specificity with flexibility. For example, a "Growth Working Group" charter might specify a mandate to "increase protocol TVL by 20% in Q2 through strategic partnership integrations," with a budget of 50,000 governance tokens allocated to a 3/5 multisig. It should also define off-limits activities, such as modifying core protocol smart contracts, which remain under a separate technical group's purview. This clarity prevents conflicts and ensures focused execution.

Once drafted, the charter must be ratified through the DAO's governance process, usually via a formal proposal on platforms like Tally or Boardroom. This vote delegates authority from the collective to the subgroup. Post-ratification, the charter acts as a living document. Regular reporting against its KPIs—such as publishing monthly transparency reports on Forum or Mirror—builds trust and justifies continued funding and autonomy, creating a sustainable feedback loop between the working group and the overarching DAO.

A working group charter is a formal document that defines a team's purpose, scope, and operational rules within a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO). Unlike a traditional corporate mandate, it is typically encoded as a governance proposal and ratified on-chain or via off-chain voting platforms like Snapshot. The charter serves as the single source of truth, aligning contributors and providing accountability. It should answer the fundamental question: What is this group authorized to do, and what are its limits?

Start by drafting the core components. Every effective charter should include: a mission statement defining the group's primary goal; a scope of work detailing specific responsibilities and deliverables; a budget and funding mechanism (e.g., a multi-sig wallet address, a grants program, or a quarterly allocation); membership and roles (e.g., stewards, contributors, advisors); and decision-making processes (e.g., consensus thresholds, voting periods). For example, a "Developer Relations Working Group" might have a scope including documentation, hackathon support, and SDK maintenance.

The mandate, often embedded within the charter, specifies the authority and autonomy granted to the group. It clarifies what decisions the group can make independently versus what must be escalated to broader DAO governance. For instance, a mandate may allow a working group to spend up to 5 ETH per month without a full DAO vote but require a proposal for any protocol parameter changes. This balance of autonomy and oversight is critical for operational efficiency while maintaining decentralized control.

Before finalizing the charter, conduct a stakeholder alignment phase. Share the draft in the DAO's forums (like Discourse or Commonwealth) to gather feedback from token holders and potential contributors. This process not only improves the document but also builds legitimacy and buy-in. Use this feedback to refine the charter's language, ensuring it is unambiguous and captures the collective intent. Ambiguity in scope or authority is a common source of future conflict.

Once ratified, the charter should be published in an accessible, immutable location. This is often a dedicated section in the DAO's official documentation (e.g., on GitHub or a docs site like GitBook) and referenced in the on-chain proposal that creates the group. The living document should include provisions for amendment processes, allowing the mandate to evolve through a defined governance pathway as the DAO's needs change. A static charter can become a constraint to growth.

The Working Group Name and Purpose is the first critical component. This section must clearly articulate the group's raison d'être. A vague purpose leads to scope creep and inefficiency. For example, a "Developer Experience Working Group" charter might state: "To improve the onboarding and productivity of protocol developers by maintaining documentation, managing developer tooling grants, and facilitating technical support channels." This establishes a clear, actionable mandate.

Scope and Responsibilities define the boundaries of the group's authority and its day-to-day duties. This prevents overlap with other groups and clarifies expectations. It should list specific deliverables, such as managing a treasury sub-multisig, curating a governance forum category, or producing monthly ecosystem reports. Crucially, it should also state explicit limitations, specifying what the group cannot do, such as unilaterally changing protocol parameters or allocating funds beyond a predefined budget.

Membership and Roles outlines the structure of the group. This includes defining core roles like Coordinator, Contributor, and Multisig Signer, each with distinct responsibilities and authority levels. The charter must specify the process for onboarding new members (e.g., via proposal or application) and offboarding inactive ones. Many groups use a proof-of-contribution model, where sustained activity is required to maintain membership status.

Decision-Making and Governance details how the group operates internally. This covers proposal submission procedures, voting mechanisms (e.g., snapshot polls, simple majority), and quorum requirements. For example: "All treasury expenditures over 5,000 USDC require a 7-day signaling post on the forum and a majority vote from at least 5 core contributors." This internal process is separate from, but often feeds into, the broader DAO's governance.

Resources and Reporting is the operational backbone. It explicitly grants the group access to necessary resources, typically a designated treasury multisig wallet address (e.g., a Safe on Ethereum or a Squads on Solana) with a seeded budget. It also mandates transparency through regular reporting cycles, such as publishing financial statements and activity summaries to the DAO's forum or transparency dashboard after each epoch or quarter.

Finally, the Amendment and Sunset Process ensures the charter can evolve or be dissolved. It defines how charter changes are proposed and ratified, often requiring a supermajority vote of the group or approval from the parent DAO. A sunset clause specifies conditions for dissolution, such as achieving its core objectives or a sustained lack of activity, and outlines the process for transferring remaining funds and responsibilities.

A working group charter is a formal document that defines the operational mandate for a sub-entity within a Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO). It serves as the group's constitution, establishing its scope of authority, primary objectives, and governance procedures. Without a clear charter, working groups can suffer from mission drift, unclear decision-making, and accountability gaps. The charter is typically ratified by the DAO's main governance body, such as a token holder vote, granting the group its legitimacy and allocated resources from the treasury.

The core components of an effective charter include the mission statement, scope of work, and success metrics. The mission should concisely state the group's purpose, such as "managing the DAO's grants program" or "overseeing protocol parameter adjustments." The scope defines specific responsibilities and, crucially, explicitly outlines what is out of scope to prevent overreach. Success metrics should be quantifiable and verifiable on-chain where possible, like tracking the number of proposals processed, the TVL managed, or the completion of specific development milestones documented in a repository like GitHub.

Governance structure within the charter details membership requirements, voting mechanisms, and multisig configuration. It specifies how members are added or removed, often requiring a vote from either the group itself or the parent DAO. Decision-making rules must be clear: will the group use a simple majority, a supermajority, or follow a conviction voting model? The charter should also define the multisig wallet that holds the group's treasury, listing the signers and the required threshold (e.g., 3-of-5) for executing transactions, linking to the safe.global or Gnosis Safe address for transparency.

Operational clauses cover reporting requirements, funding cycles, and amendment procedures. A charter should mandate regular reporting—often monthly or quarterly—to the broader DAO, detailing activities, financials, and progress against metrics. It should define the process for requesting budget allocations, whether through a quarterly proposal or a continuous stream via a tool like Sablier or Superfluid. Finally, the charter must include a clear process for its own amendment, typically requiring a high-threshold vote from the parent DAO, ensuring the mandate can evolve without being changed unilaterally by the group.

In practice, a charter is deployed as a public document on the DAO's governance portal, such as a snapshot.org space or a dedicated forum like Commonwealth. It is often paired with an on-chain registration, like a DAOstack Alchemy avatar or an Aragon Client entity, that formally links the multisig and voting app to the DAO's main registry. This creates a verifiable, transparent link between the mandate, the actors, and the funds, which is critical for building trust with token holders and participants in the decentralized ecosystem.

A working group charter is the foundational document for any decentralized team. It functions as a smart contract-based proposal that, once ratified by token-holder vote, creates a new entity with a specific budget, mandate, and governance rules. Unlike informal teams, a chartered working group has on-chain legitimacy, with its funding and permissions programmatically enforced. This prevents scope creep and ensures accountability, as all actions and expenditures are transparent and tied to the approved mandate.

The core components of a charter are defined in the proposal's metadata and associated smart contract logic. Essential elements include: the group's name and purpose, a detailed scope of work outlining deliverables, a multisig wallet address for the group's treasury, a budget allocation in the DAO's native token or stablecoins, and a duration or milestone-based sunset clause. Proposals often use standards like EIP-4824 (DAO JSON-LD schema) to structure this data for interoperability across platforms like Tally or Boardroom.

To create the proposal, you typically interact with your DAO's governance contract (e.g., OpenZeppelin Governor). The process involves encoding a function call that will execute if the vote passes. For a new working group, this call is often to a factory contract that deploys a new WorkingGroup module. The calldata includes the charter parameters: the multisigMembers, budgetAmount, tokenAddress, and a IPFS hash pointing to the full charter document. Here's a simplified example of the proposal creation using ethers.js:

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const calldata = workingGroupFactory.interface.encodeFunctionData('createGroup', [
  multisigAddress,
  budgetAmount,
  charterIPFSHash
]);
await governor.propose(
  [workingGroupFactory.address],
  [0],
  [calldata],
  "Proposal to form the Security Working Group"
);

Before submitting, the charter document should be published to a decentralized storage solution like IPFS or Arweave. This ensures the mandate is immutable and publicly accessible. The hash of this document becomes a permanent part of the on-chain record. Best practices include specifying clear Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), regular reporting requirements (e.g., monthly updates to the forum), and a governance mechanism for the group itself, such as a 3-of-5 multisig for approving operational expenses.

Once the proposal is live, community discussion and a formal voting period follow. A successful vote triggers the automatic execution of the contract call, deploying the working group's treasury and officially granting its mandate. The newly formed group can then operate with defined authority, requesting further budget allocations via subsequent proposals. This structured approach transforms vague ideas into accountable, on-chain operational units, which is critical for scaling decentralized organizations effectively.

A Working Group Charter is a smart contract-enabled document that codifies a sub-DAO's operational framework. It moves beyond informal agreements by establishing clear, on-chain parameters for mandate, membership, funding, and decision-making. Key components include the group's primary objective (e.g., "Develop and maintain the protocol's front-end interface"), its granted authority from the parent DAO, and the specific multisig wallet or governance module that controls its treasury. Defining these elements upfront prevents scope creep and establishes accountability.

The charter must specify membership mechanics. Will members be appointed by a core team, elected by token holders, or self-nominated? Define roles like Coordinator, Contributor, and Reviewer with associated responsibilities and expectations. For transparency, consider using Soulbound Tokens (SBTs) or NFT-based badges to represent non-transferable membership status. The charter should also outline the process for onboarding and offboarding members, including any vesting schedules for compensation or the clawback of unearned grants.

Funding and reporting are critical. The charter should detail the budget request process, whether through periodic grants from the main treasury or a continuous stream from a vesting contract. It must mandate regular reporting, typically on a quarterly basis, covering deliverables, financial expenditure, and key metrics (KPIs). Tools like Snapshot for off-chain signaling, Tally for on-chain execution, and Coordinape for reward distribution are commonly integrated into this workflow. All reports should be published to a public forum like the DAO's Discourse or Commonwealth channel.

Here is a template structure for a working group charter implemented via a markdown document in your DAO's repository:

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1. **Name & Purpose**: [Clear, concise mission statement].
2. **Scope & Authority**: [Specific responsibilities and limits].
3. **Membership**: [Criteria, roles, selection process].
4. **Governance**: [Internal proposal types, voting thresholds, e.g., 4/7 multisig].
5. **Funding**: [Budget source, request process, multisig signers].
6. **Reporting**: [Frequency, format, KPIs, publication venue].
7. **Amendment Process**: [How this charter itself can be changed].

This document should be ratified by the parent DAO via a formal governance proposal, creating a permanent record of the delegation of power and resources.

Finally, integrate the charter with your tooling stack. The approved budget should be transferred to the designated Gnosis Safe or DAO-specific treasury module. Use a project management platform like Dework or SourceCred to track tasks and contributions against the charter's goals. Automated reporting can be facilitated by tools that pull on-chain data from the treasury address. A well-structured charter transforms a working group from an ad-hoc committee into a transparent, accountable, and effective operational unit within a decentralized organization.

Formalizing your working group's charter and mandate is the foundational step, but its true value is unlocked through execution. The charter serves as a single source of truth for the group's purpose, scope, and rules of engagement. It is a reference point for onboarding new members, resolving disputes, and measuring progress against the defined Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). Without this documented consensus, groups often drift from their original goals or become mired in procedural ambiguity.

The next critical phase is operationalizing the charter. This involves establishing clear workflows for proposal submission, discussion, and voting using the agreed-upon tools, whether that's a forum like Commonwealth, a snapshot space, or an on-chain voting module. Assign initial roles from the charter, such as a facilitator to run meetings and a scribe to maintain public notes and documentation. Begin work on the first milestone from your roadmap to build momentum and demonstrate tangible progress to the broader DAO.

Finally, treat the charter as a living document. Schedule regular reviews—quarterly is a common cadence—to assess the group's performance against its KPIs and the evolving needs of the DAO. Be prepared to initiate the amendment process outlined in the charter to update the mandate, modify the budget, or sunset the group if its objectives are met or are no longer relevant. This cycle of execution, review, and adaptation is what transforms a static document into a dynamic engine for decentralized coordination and value creation.