Catalyst Working Groups Research & Scoping Analysis by IOG Catalyst Team, Rare Evo, and Sustainable ADA

[GENERAL] Name and surname of main applicant

Kriss Baird

[GENERAL] Are you delivering this project as an individual or as an entity (whether formally incorporated or not)

Entity (Incorporated)

[GENERAL] Co proposers and Additional applicants

Rand McHenry: [Co-Founder of Rare Network]

Wesley Parkinson: [Co-Founder of Rare Network

Evan Fischer: [Director of Operations, Rare Network]

Razali Samsudin: [Co-founder Sustainable ADA, Impact Web3, Streets of ADA - A Samsudin Brothers Projek]

Cole Bartlett: [Co-founder Sustainable ADA, Impact Web3]

[GENERAL] Please specify how many months you expect your project to last (from 2-12 months)

8

[GENERAL] Please indicate if your proposal has been auto-translated into English from another language.

No

[GENERAL] Summarize your solution to the problem (200-character limit including spaces)

≥10 community-run in-person & online Catalyst Working Groups during F12 to scope Cardano funding priorities. F12 in-person Launch TownHall + co-design sessions. Plus Catalyst showcase @ Rare Evo 2024

[GENERAL] Does your project have any dependencies on other organizations, technical or otherwise?

Yes

[GENERAL] If YES, please describe what the dependency is and why you believe it is essential for your project’s delivery. If NO, please write “No dependencies.”

Rare Evo will provide production support to the Catalyst Team for the proposed events

Sustainable Ada will provide support for Working Groups to co-create the strategic scoping framework(s) that will be provided to Working group hosts and will support onboarding the hosts with the Catalyst Working Group playbook

[GENERAL] Will your project’s output/s be fully open source?

Yes

[GENERAL] Please provide here more information on the open source status of your project outputs

The research outputs will be fully open source subject to the conditions of the Apache 2.0, or MIT License we will use.

[METADATA] SDG rating

SDG 4 - Quality Education

SDG 16 - Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions

SDG 17 - Partnerships for the Goals

#proposalframeworktool

[SOLUTION] Please describe your proposed solution.

Solution:

Cardano needs the community to help decide which direction Catalyst funding objectives should travel, but to date, there has been no easy way to coordinate this strategically and on a global, fully distributed scale with the community.

Catalyst Working Groups will consider and analyse available data, contextualise, and produce insights that inform recommendations for what directions Catalyst funding rounds could/should take in the future. The aim is to discover new opportunities to maximise the impact that the Catalyst decentralized innovation fund has always intended to deliver.

This project delivers:

1. Co-design of data-driven strategic scoping frameworks for deciding what are Cardano’s funding priorities in 2024/25
2. At least 10 Community-run Working Groups either in-person or online during the F12 campaign (April-July)
3. Working groups produce analysis and insights for future priorities and changes to Project Catalyst funding rounds
4. Fund12 launched in the most popular Working Group-host city followed by Working Group sessions with the project team
5. Stipend compensation for community hosts and Working Group costs
6. High production content that demonstrates the power of collective Catalyst Working Group analysis and outcomes  
7. Dissemination event as part of Rare Evo 2024

Background:

Project Catalyst is very much centred on enabling the application, utility, and developer experience layers of Cardano to flourish. But deciding on what the priorities are for Catalyst to direct funding towards is hard work and shouldn't be done by a single person or team.

 

In other words, Catalyst needs the collective motivation of the community to help inform how Catalyst can take inputs to address the right problems, at the right time, with the right amounts.

If we don’t do this important crowd-sourced work now, the likely result is that either the Catalyst Team needs to produce the innovation funding thesis or otherwise proposers and voters may be focused on the wrong goals, at the wrong time, or without prior understanding of what has been funded already.

Community members are invited to host either an online or in-person Catalyst Working Group and we hope this engages a wide variety of collaborators. Each Working Group will focus on one of the following special interest areas:  

• Catalyst Strategic funding priorities Working Group
• Catalyst Budget and fund parameters Working Group
• Funded Project Incubation and Acceleration Working Group

Recommendations and outputs from this global research will be analysed with the potential to come together to scope Fund13, due to launch in Summer 2024.

The project will engage a wide and global audience of motivated collaborators, culminating in an exciting showcase at Rare Evo, Las Vegas in 2024. Catalyst Team travel and accommodation are not costed as expenses as part of this proposal.

The uniqueness of this proposal is that it becomes a truly coordinated effort amongst a large, distributed group of community leaders to co-create insights that have a direct impact on the direction of the Catalyst innovation fund.

Working Group process:

The following process outlines the steps Working Groups will respond to, following a call to action and request for proposal (RFP):

1. An RFP will be published inviting community hosts to respond with a proposal to host a Working Group
2. The RFP will include guidelines regarding the shape of the session(s), potential partners, attendees and some budgeting costs.
3. Community hosts will submit their proposals  
4. In-person locations will be evaluated by the project team and a short list will be generated 
5. The community can participate in a vote using the Catalyst testnet capabilities to decide which city Catalyst Fund12 will launch in 
6. Runners up will be invited to host their own in-person Working Groups 
7. Online-only satellite events will be selected by the project team, taking a ‘global portfolio’ approach where the intention is to have a wide variety of regional inputs. 
8. Event hosts will be provided support in the form of structured guidance and coordination of working groups to ensure cohesive outputs. Some costs may be able to be paid upfront.  

More details about the application process to host a working group scoping event will be made available over the coming weeks in advance of the F11 results in February.  

 

[IMPACT] Please define the positive impact your project will have on the wider Cardano community.

Catalyst Working Groups and Scoping Events provides an open invitation for a global community of Cardano leaders and groups to run their own Catalyst scoping research workshops, with financial support that will be made available to cover Working Group costs in this Catalyst Systems Improvements: Discovery proposal. 

Deliverables and outcomes of this project will be recorded and made available as high-production content to elevate the achievements of this network of Catalyst Working Group collaborators.  

The Catalyst community has a tremendous wealth of experience and motivation to make a real difference in the world, after all most of us joined this community in order to see change realised maybe because of a distrust in government, local authorities, big industry or any other reason that is born from an unhappiness with the status quo. Catalyst and Catalyst funding has been seen to be one small part in a puzzle to unleash access to alternative financial support mechanisms for innovation and real world impact. 

There is genuine value in bringing together people to discuss strategic priorities for growing the utility of both the Cardano and Catalyst ecosystems, fostering new insights and discussions about grassroots innovation within local or regional communities. The community-led scoping activities should welcome everyone wanting to participate and contribute to advancing Catalyst and the highest potential for human-collaboration. 

• Catalyst Strategic funding priorities Working Group: this WG considers the types of use cases that have been previously funded and areas of interest that require innovation funding to be directed towards. They could take a data-driven approach to understanding what innovation areas have already or will soon mature, and what are the industrial or societal use cases that will benefit from blockchain innovation over the next 12-24 months. 

• Catalyst Operating parameters Working Group: this WG will consider how the Fund13 budget could be divided and any potential changes to be made to the Catalyst operating parameters.  

• Catalyst Funded Project Incubation and Acceleration Working Group: this WG is concerned about developing enterprises from high potential Catalyst-funded startup ideas by helping to improve the ecosystem’s proximity to a global network of professional angels, accelerators, and other investors. 

To inform potential changes to be made to Fund13, each Working Group will be required to produce a summary of outputs in an agreed format that will be collated into larger themes and topics that may warrant further discussion or consideration. Each host will be expected to run a post-workshop survey.

Impact will be measured by the levels of participation and research outputs and recommendations made to the Catalyst team about the scope of Fund13. 

The results of this ambitious initiative will be available to communicate broadly, disseminate, and celebrate this true effort of decentralized sense-making and ecosystem development at Rare Evo, Las Vegas in August 2024. 

This will also help to elevate the profile of our Catalyst community’s strategic scoping efforts to an audience including and far beyond the Cardano ecosystem.  

• The scoping framework will itself be tested with the community to ensure it makes sense and is easy to follow
• A minimum 11 Working Group and Scoping Research sessions will produce insights for evaluation  
• Qualitative insights will discover new understanding about perspectives of regional strategic priorities within the community of global Working Group leaders and participants
• Quantitative analysis performed by Working Groups could demonstrate the volume of opportunities in a local industry or region and can be used to evaluate opportunities for strategic engagement or pilot-trial partnerships. For example:
• The number of similarly funded Catalyst projects from previous funding rounds 
• the number of relevant businesses interested in blockchain, where there is a high concentration of relevant industries where blockchain can be disruptive  
• The number of investors making investments into startup tech and Web3 innovation in the local region
• The number of blockchain enterprises that are located in the region that could develop or bridge to Cardano  

Additionally, each host will have the opportunity to present their workshops’ outputs either as a pre-recorded deliverable or in person, if they are attending Rare Evo, Las Vegas 2024.

[CAPABILITY & FEASIBILITY] What is your capability to deliver your project with high levels of trust and accountability? How do you intend to validate if your approach is feasible?

Rare Evo is among the most trusted and accomplished blockchain events enterprises operating in the Cardano ecosystem. Rare Evo 2023 was a huge success as a cross-chain conference exhibition that has garnered the attention of the wider blockchain industry. The team’s professional production capabilities will ensure the satellite and in-person events and logistics will run smoothly to budget and time.   

Sustainable ADA have delivered and completed Catalyst-funded Impact-driven projects that have helped to analyse and demonstrate the social impact generated by innovators building on Cardano today. Their expertise will enable the co-creation and co-coordination of a sensible scoping framework that working group hosts can follow in order to produce the analysis and insights that will inform Catalyst’s future priorities and objectives.  

In this project, the Catalyst Team’s role will be to lead on overall project management and oversee coordination and evaluation of the outputs produced by the working groups. The team will also support the co-design of the scoping framework and working group marketing materials, logistics, communications. The Catalyst team will lead dissemination efforts. 

The approach is feasible though requires professional expertise of coordinating a multi-stakeholder programme of work, across different timezones and cultures. The combined team have all of these capabilities and experience available to them today.

[Project Milestones] What are the key milestones you need to achieve in order to complete your project successfully?

M1: Catalyst Working groups Set up and pre-planning:

Outputs: At the end of this milestone all partners will have a clear picture of what they need to deliver, how and when.

1. Hold initial meetings with all the partners. Transcripts and/or recording of the meetings will be made available 
2. A project plan, with an option Gantt Chart, will be developed for each event. 
3. Agree on the format of the deliverables and communication between partners 
4. Provide the strategic framework of the workshops: template of questions, the kind of data that needs to be collected, tracking, in which format 

Deliverables: 

1. All meetings are held 
2. Project plan / Gannt for all WG activities
3. Internal communications and project management plan
4. Strategic framework for working group sessions to clarify expected outputs and evidence of achievements

Acceptance Criteria:

1. Meetings scheduled with all working groups
2. Recording and/or transcripts of the meetings held with each partners is available
3. A project Plan/Gantt chart for each event is incorporated into a Master timeline
4. Framework of the workshops is clear and covers
5. List of attendees
6. Submission of all the invoices
7. Research areas
8. Feedback loop via Survey from the attendees
9. Debrief call with partners

M2: Catalyst Working Group Logistics:

Outputs: 

1. Catalyst and the selected Working Group proposals schedule a meeting to shape the event. 
2. Main points to confirm: location, agenda of the event, budget, attendees, data shared with Catalyst and formats of deliverables and outputs from each working group , i.e. data attendees, invoices for various receipts, surveys from attendees, blueprint/scope materials, etc. Also to be agreed when and in which format it will be provided such materials
3. Creation of support materials and assets is required for the event 
4. Confirmation of available AV, merchandising 

Deliverables: 

1. Quotes and budget from each working group
2. Agenda for each Working Group 
3. Marketing Materials & social content to help amplify working group activities
4. Confirmation of AV for Working Group & F12 Launch activities

Acceptance Criteria:

1. Working Groups and logistics are finalized
2. Marketing materials and merchandise are available
3. AV support is secured and available for agreed Working Groups

M3: Catalyst Working Group Launch & Working Group scoping 

Outputs: 

• Launch event for F12 followed by in-person working group sessions with the project team
• At least 10 Working Groups happening in 10 different locations within the same period, i.e. during the F12 launch campaign (April-July)
• Outcomes and materials are collected from the Working Groups
• Working Group attendees provide feedback  

Deliverables: 

• Working Group & F12 Launch event
• Working Group recordings from live/recorded streams
• Working Group insights provided as raw data
• Attendees survey

Acceptance Criteria:

• Working Groups are held and produce recorded outputs for evaluation
• Recordings are made publicly available

M4: Synthesizing Catalyst Working Group research 

Outcomes: 

1. Project team will produce an analysis of each WG outcomes which will be used to inform the strategic scope of future Catalyst funding rounds  
2. A virtual workshop will be set up by the organisations + Catalyst to discuss the outcomes of the events

Deliverables: 

1. Draft research report that collates and synthesizes working group data 
2. A set of consolidated recommendations that are potentially implementable by the Catalyst Team for F13 
3. Storyboard for video production materials
4. Workshop to communicate preliminary research outputs

Acceptance Criteria:

• Draft research and workshop recording is made available for public feedback
• Storyboard is available for video production

M5: Dissemination activities 

Outcomes: 

1. The research is properly reviewed, organised, and will be made available to the public for further commentary and feedback
2. The recommendations have been evaluated and potentially 

Deliverables: 

1. Final report of Catalyst Working Group outputs
2. Vlog / video diary that summarises the Catalyst Working Group initiative 
3. Breakout workshops at Rare Evo 
4. Blog post with summaries of research outputs

Acceptance Criteria:

1. Vlog, blog, and final report are publicly available
2. Breakout workshops at Rare Evo are held

Project Completion

1. A project completion report and a project closeout video will be submitted as evidence. 
2. A report of the Working Group scoping research analysis and outcomes will be provided and shared with the public, with every community collaborator named as co-creators of the report.

[RESOURCES] Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

Rare Evo / Rare Network: 

Key responsibilities: 

1. Production and logistics for in-person working group sessions
2. Production support for on-line working group sessions 
3. Production support for dissemination of research at Rare Evo 2024

Rand McHenry[Co-Founder of Rare Network], Rand has 15 years experience creating live events and has been working in the crypto space for 7 years. Rand was an award winning pioneer in the cannabis industry. Additionally, he was a Sales Director for a $40M annual revenue logistics company. He is the one full-time employee at Rare Network.

Wesley Parkinson [Co-Founder of Rare Network], Wes has a decade of global software sales and service experience within the Content Services industry. Wes created the RARE stake pool with Rand in 2020.Wes has a bachelor’s degree in Information and Telecommunication Systems with a minor in Business and Marketing.

Evan Fischer [Director of Operations] [Core member of the Rare Evo team, Evan heads business operations at Rare Network, with 15 years experience in live events production and co-founder of Lucid Investments with a focus in Web3 gaming.

Sustainable ADA

Key responsibilities: 

1. Development of the Working Group framework(s) for: WG objectives, playbook for sessions  
2. Framework training and onboarding working groups
3. Supporting analysis of working group strategic scoping outputs 
4. Supporting dissemination of outputs
5. Creation of working group best practices package for future or similar distributed scoping sessions

Razali Samsudin: [Co-founder Sustainable ADA, Impact Web3, Streets of ADA - A Samsudin Brothers Projek]

Co-Author of Recalibrating Value, Identity & Impact Through the Blockchain - Cardano Impact Report 2023

17+ years of experience as an interdisciplinary Educator from early years settings to postgraduate level, with a background in social sciences, humanities, and sustainability.

Author, Writer, Editor, Digital Economy, Blockchain, Sustainability and Impact Measurements, Researcher (Research Lead Connecting SDGs to Project Catalyst and lead on the SDG Proposer Tool and SDG Search Tool with Cardano AIM #Blockchain4Good, #Cardano4Good, #NFT4Good). Social Entrepreneur, Catalyst Proposal Mentor. Wada UN SDG and Education Coordinator, Contributor at Cardano AIM, PositiveBlockchain, Catalyst School, Adafilms.

Zinc VC Fellow | Aspen Institute

https://www.linkedin.com/in/razali-samsudin

https://twitter.com/Razlosophy

Cole Bartlett: [Co-founder Sustainable ADA, Impact Web3]

Co-Author of Recalibrating Value, Identity & Impact Through the Blockchain - Cardano Impact Report 2023 | Bachelors in Economics and Sustainability | Blockchain/Sustainability Researcher | Social Entrepreneur | Co-Founder of Impact Web 3 & Sustainable ADA | Positive Blockchain Contributor | Socious Business Development Ambassador | Impact Measurement Expertise | Donation Officer for Yagazie Foundation | Co-Founder of Vermont Fishing | Decentralized Lead Generation | UNITE 2030 Youth Delegate 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/cole-bartlett

https://twitter.com/cole_vt

Catalyst Team:

Key responsibilities:

1. Accountable for producing all project-related deliverables 
2. Leading synthesis of working group strategic scoping outputs
3. Project and management to ensure the project is operating professionally and is accountable to voters
4. Co-coordinating working groups launch and satellite scoping research and analysis 
5. Disseminating research and communications to Cardano ecosystem and a broader blockchain industry audience 

GM, Head of Product: Kriss Baird

Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/krissbaird

Product Manager: Daniel Ribar

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielribar/

Incubation Operations, Roberta Lifonso:

linkedin.com/in/robertalifonso

Product Owner, Ewa Szczepanek

linkedin.com/in/ewaszczepanek

[BUDGET & COSTS] Please provide a cost breakdown of the proposed work and resources.

Responsibilities and compensation will be split across the project team and community contributors in the following way:

Indicative allocations for a minimum of 10 Working Groups

• ₳333333 for 10X In person Working Groups
• For up to 50 attendees 
• $10k top-end cost
• with AV coverage, food and beverages, at a high quality venue in a major destination city
•  ₳33333 for 10X Online Working Groups 
• ₳66666 Working group stipend compensation based on type of Working Group 
• ₳433333 Total allocated to Working Groups

Understandably, in-person events can take a reasonable amount of time and effort to coordinate and there are costs involved to secure venues, AV, and other expenses such as lighting, merchandise, food and beverages for attendees. More Working Groups will be coordinated if resources allow, such as if the maximum budgets are not requested by hosts, or if efficiencies can be found to produce more outputs.   

Project Team operational expenses: 

Assumptions are modelled conservatively. 

Project team (Rare Evo, SustainableADA, Catalyst Team) expenses are to cover labor and materials:  

c.₳500,000 based on lower bound case of 0.30 ADAUSD or ₳375,000 ADA based on upper bound of 0.40 ADAUSD 

Of which: 

• 40% allocated to Rare Network: providing production support and coordination of Working Groups and dissemination activities
• 23% allocated to Sustainable ADA: providing co-design of strategic scoping frameworks and onboarding Working Groups 
• 37% allocated to Catalyst Team: for overall accountability, supporting onboarding and facilitation of Working Groups, project management, leading synthesis and dissemination

Breakdown of activities:

Milestone 1: Working Group set up and pre-planning 

Budget: ₳150000 

Key activities: 

1. Coordination of kick off meeting with all WG partners
2. Production of Production Project plan and Gantt Chart that accounts for each event
3. Creation of collaborative framework for gathering deliverables and communication between partners
4. Creation of the Working Group strategic scoping framework(s)
5. Creation of checklists to provide hosts for logistics and pre-planning
6. Consolidate framework(s) and production of Working Group Playbook guide for hosts 

Milestone 2: Working Group Logistics 

Budget: ₳300000

Key activities:

1. Facilitate production meetings with hosts to agree on key actions for each Working Group 
2. Produce agenda for each Working Group
3. Confirmation of locations & venues availability 
4. Confirmation of upfront costs related to each Working Group 
5. Production of a suitable attendee data collection process, considerate of GDPR or other similar privacy regulations 
6. Creation of a suitable framework for the gathering of materials, data, and outputs produced from Working Group scoping research 
7. Updating and finalizing Production Project Plan 
8. Confirmation of upfront costs from suppliers such as: Venue deposit, AV, and merchandising requirements
9. Production of Marketing materials
10. Disbursements available to cover eligible and necessary upfront costs 

Milestone 3: Working Groups & F12 Launch  

Budget: ₳300000

1. Deliver Working Group Scoping Research as part of the Fund12 Launch activities  
2. Deliver a minimum of 10 community-hosted Working Group Research sessions either in-person or online 
3. Capture recordings of the Working Groups research scoping, where available 

Milestone 4: Synthesizing Working Group research 

Budget: ₳70000

1. Prepare a summary of the outcomes of the workshops, collecting the scope analysis conducted
2. Deliver the virtual workshop to discuss the outcomes of the Working Groups

Milestone 5: Dissemination activities

Budget: ₳30000

1. Produce a research paper which will be made public and which will include the outcomes of the events.
2. Disseminate the outputs to blockchain industry at events such as Rare Evo, through media publications

Final Milestone: Project Completion

Budget: ₳150000

1. Produce the project completion report
2. Produce the video completion report

Catalyst team’s contributions are an expense as part of this research project, however Catalyst Team members will not account expenses relating to any travel or accommodation costs associated with this proposal.

[VALUE FOR MONEY] How does the cost of the project represent value for money for the Cardano ecosystem?

• Enough resources become available for the community to create new shared understanding and focus Catalyst funds towards the most important areas, without encouraging more volunteerism
• The outcomes of this collaboration produces a shared responsibility within the community that removes the reliance on one person or team to do this research
• Correlating analysis from different parts of the world will help identify parallels or distinct differences and provide cohesive, cutting-edge insights from a large, decentralized organization of people collaborating on a set of common goals.
• Our global collaboration framework and network will demonstrate the collective wisdom in our community and pave the way for other ecosystems to use a novel playbook for Web3 ecosystem growth strategy.

This value produced here is that this approach brings together many Cardano people from all corners of the world to play a critically important role that helps identify and analyse what are the most important directions for Catalyst to take.

This cannot be done without considerable time, people's effort and compensation allocated to getting the job done. so enough funding is requested to ensure the Working Groups are well resourced, distributed, and not siloed in relative isolation from any particular community interest group.

The majority of project costs are allocated to personnel and materials to coordinate and facilitate this truly global network of collaborators. Securing in-person venues and providing stipend compensation for Working Group hosts is the largest of the project costs, followed by Professional events production and coordination is the next largest of costs. Project management, Working Group onboarding, facilitation, analysing the research, and scoping framework development are all areas vital to the success of the project.

In combination, the value this brings helps to empower the Cardano community with more of an active role in considering and evaluating the strategic objectives of Cardano innovation funding in the future.

In the event there are surplus resources available, the surplus will be reinvested into the community to fund more Catalyst proposals. An evaluation of resource requirements will be undertaken during the project initiation phase in Milestone 1.

[IMPORTANT NOTE] The Applicant agrees to Fund Rules and also that data in the submission form and other data provided by the project team during the course of the project will be publicly available.

I Accept