Program Lead Agreement.

Purpose and parties

This agreement is between SEESALT, a voluntary association represented by its founder, and the individual named below (the “Lead”), who is establishing or leading a unit under the SEESALT name. It takes effect when signed and continues until ended under clause 12.

What SEESALT provides

SEESALT’s activity is limited to four things: open-source knowledge production; the Adaptation Lab; the consultant network; and capacity training. In relation to the Lead, that means:

• training and method, including research design, evaluation and data handling;
• review of the unit’s plans and outputs when the Lead asks for it;
• introductions, and the use of the SEESALT name under clause 8.

SEESALT provides no funding, no staff, no equipment, no insurance and no legal representation.

Independence

The Lead is not an employee, agent, partner or representative of SEESALT or of its founder. Nothing in this agreement creates an employment, agency, partnership, joint venture or fiduciary relationship. The Lead has no authority to bind SEESALT, to sign anything in its name, to accept money on its behalf, or to make commitments to third parties on its behalf, and shall not hold themselves out as able to do so.

Responsibility for the unit

The Lead is solely responsible for the unit: its design, its people, its resources, its delivery, its safety and its compliance with the laws of every place it operates. The Lead will not represent to anyone that SEESALT supervises, directs, funds, guarantees or is otherwise answerable for the unit.

Money

The Lead raises and holds whatever the unit needs, and accounts for it to whoever provided it. No unit funds pass through SEESALT or through its founder, and SEESALT holds no budget for any unit. The Lead will not solicit donations, grants or sponsorship in SEESALT’s name without the founder’s written agreement, and where such agreement is given, the funds are still received and administered by the unit.

Data

Where a unit collects or handles personal data, the Lead is the party responsible for it — in the sense the applicable law uses, whether that is the GDPR, China’s Personal Information Protection Law, or the law of the country where the data is collected. The Lead is responsible for lawful basis, consent, storage, retention and deletion, and will follow SEESALT’s Privacy and Data policy as a minimum standard. Any suspected breach is to be reported to the founder within 72 hours, alongside whatever the applicable law separately requires.

People in the room

Where a unit runs activities involving participants in person, the Lead is responsible for informed consent, for any waivers or releases required locally, and for insurance if the activity warrants it. Where participants include anyone under 18, the Lead is responsible for safeguarding arrangements, guardian consent, and complying with local child-protection requirements. Field activity requires a written risk plan held by the unit before it begins.

Use of the name

SEESALT grants the Lead a non-exclusive, non-transferable and revocable permission to use the SEESALT name in connection with the unit, for as long as this agreement is in force. The Lead may describe the unit as operating under SEESALT; the Lead may not speak for SEESALT, issue statements in its name, or use the name for activities outside the unit. SEESALT may withdraw the permission at any time, and will say why.

Work and credit

The Lead owns what the unit produces. The Lead grants SEESALT a non-exclusive, perpetual licence to publish, archive and reference that work with attribution, and agrees that outputs intended for publication are released openly — Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 unless the Lead and the founder agree otherwise in writing before publication. Where a funder, university or partner imposes different terms, those are to be raised before the work begins, not after.

Training does not transfer responsibility

Training, method, review or feedback provided by SEESALT to the Lead is offered without warranty and does not make SEESALT responsible for any decision the Lead takes or any consequence of the unit’s work. Review of a plan is not approval of it, and the absence of comment is not endorsement.

Each side carries its own

Each party is responsible for its own acts and omissions. The Lead will hold SEESALT, its founder and its other members harmless from claims, losses and costs arising out of the unit’s activities, other than those caused by SEESALT’s own acts. Neither party is liable to the other for indirect or consequential loss. Nothing here excludes liability that cannot be excluded by law.

Ending it

Either party may end this agreement by writing, with thirty days’ notice, or immediately where there has been a serious breach or a risk to participants. On ending: use of the SEESALT name stops; the Lead keeps their work; anything already published stays published with its attribution intact; and the Lead remains responsible for the proper handling or deletion of any personal data the unit holds. Nothing in this clause obliges either party to continue anything.

No compensation

This is unpaid. Neither party owes the other any salary, stipend, honorarium, expenses, equity or future consideration, and none is implied by anything in this agreement.

Changes

SEESALT may issue a revised version of this agreement. A revision applies to a Lead only once they have been notified and have not objected within thirty days, or have signed the new version. Existing units are not bound by a revision made after they signed if they object to it in writing; in that case either party may end the agreement under clause 12.