How should I staff my forum?

[disabutterfly]

Hello everyone this is very inportand to me i´m creating a Mariah fanatic Forum and how can i make staff members what do i do really,, i´m so lost here .
This is the first time i create a forum like this and i need help.. i´ve been a Mariah fanatic since 1990 and i´m 32 yrs old what i need is to know how i make one a moderator i need few really can you help me please.

[∞ ConqueringWolf ∞]

disabutterfly said:

Hello everyone this is very inportand to me i´m creating a Mariah fanatic Forum and how can i make staff members what do i do really,, i´m so lost here .
This is the first time i create a forum like this and i need help.. i´ve been a Mariah fanatic since 1990 and i´m 32 yrs old what i need is to know how i make one a moderator i need few really can you help me please.

Ask in the Support Board and they can tell you exactly how to make someone staff. This topic is just for discussing things like how many staff you should have, and who to make staff and so on.

[papalia]

mmagnesium said:

i have 4 admins:

Myself and three friends from school, i have all the powers obviously, but they have a few less. they can't see IP's for instance because i believe that comes under the Data Protection Act of 1990.

i have 1 global mod.

and about 8 mods.

DPA was last revised in 1998, not 1990. Before 1998, it was 1986 by the way. That is partly why I don't let other staff members see people's birthdays because there's no need to know how old a member is. As for IP address and email address, I would give these to Gmods (high level Gmods with lots of powers) because they need these to ban people effectively.

However, my staff system consists of 6 staff ranks, 2 mod ranks, 3 Gmod ranks, and then the admin rank. However the lowest Gmod rank has only the normal mod powers but the ability to mod any board, rather than certain boards. Also, staff members if needed are chosen from members i personally know, otherwise members i think i can trust (according to their posts and warning history). the member that's promoted gets to be bottom level staff, and must slowly work their way up. however, the 2nd highest rank is not possible for any staff member to get, that's reserved for just one person at any time... the person i most trust who is staff on my forum.

Having read this thread, I have learned some good ways to improve my strategy, such as assessing potential staff members to make sure they're fit for the job, but I also look to what they've previously done, on my forum and other forums they've been on (oh yes - when thinking of promoting a member, I'd like to know what forums they've been a member and admin of to get more info on their experience). also if i know someone who's been an admin before, this really helps to see how they do as a staff member.

[UndeadDeadGuy]

I hate the entire 'application approach' to getting staff members. Staff members should be people you know - whether offline or only on the forum. Any idiot with a word processor can take an application, write a five page essay on why they should be staff, and then act like a complete jerk when they finally get the position.

I choose my staff through post quality and sociability. Well liked members turn into well liked staff. Quality posters become quality staff members.

When you take this approach you need to be careful about popularity. Even if a member has 50,000+ posts and everyone adores him/her, that doesn't mean they are ready for a position. Staff need to be humble, fun, responsible, but above all else, friendly. If you have cold hearted staff, you will become distant from your members. They won't ask you for help or talk to you, which can lead to a downfall on the forum.

Staff need to interact with members. A moderator which sits in the corner all day won't be useful. A staff member which interacts and is social will develop more interest in the forum, be more active, be more likely to spot rule violations, and will have more fun. If staff don't have fun, they won't like the forum and will resign.

And never give out admin positions unless you know the person offline, or you are retiring from the forum.

[hisroyaldudeness]

I like to think of the staff I have appointed on my board, as leaders, not as staff. If they are good at keeping "difficult" members under control, I will make them a mod, without powers. Only because, members don't usually listen to other members, they tend to listen to staff members.

I have had a few people ask to be a staff member in exchange for me to be a staff member on their site. I tell these people no.

Then there is that "select" group of members that will not leave you alone. I once had a member tell me that he/she sould not stop bothering me untill I made them a staff member. I blocked him/her from PMing me. I kinda made an example of him/her, and now I know that that was mean. But, I have not had annoying member problems ever since.

[universedaily]

Its not a good idea to have too many mods. It only takes one to wreck your much loved board and chances are the people you choose might not get along. The more mods the more disagreements and that can blow out into full scale warfare. I've been running message boards for over a decade now and I'm always careful who I pick to help run one. Back when I used to have the biggest science group at Yahoo(before yahoo merged with egroups) I appointed 10 mods by selecting the most frequent posters. It actually worked rather well for a time but ofcourse it only took one clever troll to start playing mods against each other and it soon turned into anarchy.

Less is more. Start by giving them their favourite sub-forum. Once you have a few low level mods and things are getting busy try giving one more responsibility. But remember that its easy giving away powers to members. Taking moderator powers back on the other hand can turn friends into enemies.

[xzernes]

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[myke]

xzernes said:

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[buttonpresser]

I find it the best staff are the ones you can trust to get members to your forum, post decently, and are good-mannered. Yet this can take a long time to figure out, but chances are you won't need them until they are ready.

[SiriuslyLupin]

I didn't even start thinking about staff until I got enough members that I felt burdened keeping an eye on everything that went on myself. I think that's another mistake people make; they tried to get staff together as soon as they start the board. You don't need staff that early, and I think it's been mentioned that sometimes it's done simply to get people to join.

I had my forum for nearly a year before I decided to pick my first moderator, and I didn't tell anyone I was looking for a moderator. I think a lot of people were a little surprised at my choice; several people sent me a PM afterwards saying, "I thought you'd choose so-and-so." I picked the member that I could trust the most with forum responsibilites. She had been a member right from the start, so she'd been around long enough to know about the forum, and she got on well with the others. I started with giving her just two or three powers, and as time went on, I slowly gave her more. That was almost a year ago, and she has several more abilities, and I know every day I made the right choice.

About six months ago, we got several more members, and once again, my moderator and I were feeling a little stressed at keeping an eye on everything ourselves. I picked two more moderators (so I have three total now), and went through the same process again - starting them with just two or three powers, and slowly giving them more. I'm very happy with all of my moderators, and they've never once done anything that's made me reconsider making them moderators.

[#~CrAzY~ByOnD~ReCoGnItIoN~#]

i agree


when making staff i think that the person should be active and trustworthy and should be content with whatever furom the are mod of

[trent]

I'd be demoralized if somebody I thought I could trust gets sorta crazy now that they have power on my site. If my site ended up looking like crap or even deleted. All the hard work I put into the site would be wasted.

So my suggestion is even if you hire staff start them out as just being able to lock threads, then if they are trusted with that increase the power a bit more

[jedikaren]

Here's something I learned not long ago. Check to see how popular the mod is. Are they on too many sites? Do you like what he or she is saying on those sites? Because what they say on other sites, they are likely to say on yours. Check their ego and temper. If that ego is too big, it's going to get in the way of their duty.

[HoudiniDerek]

My forum was created between me and another good and trusted friend of mine. We have pretty much equal say, except we only have one main admin account obviously. We both decide what looks good and what to do for the board and discuss things about the members, such as banning protocol and the like.

We also have the floating moderator position. We created this group in case something happened where we knew we would be away from the boards for a while. In my case, it was a family emergency at the same time as a hurricane hit my friend's area. We chose one of the most consistent and respected members to do the work. We asked her if she would be a substitute with limited powers at times when we had to be away and then we announced it to everyone on the boards through the news fader.

Granted, she did not have a lot of powers, but just enough to help answer softball questions and to have a figurehead to direct problems too while we were gone. Then, we returned, the status was removed...and is there to be invoked if necessary. Otherwise, we run the forum ourself...it is not yet large enough to need THAT much staff. (And yes, she knew the mod position was temporary and understood the relevance of it...especially since she has mod duties other places. We are not THAT cruel).

[$hØ©Këyë]

I created a forum somewhere in may and when I first made it, I didn't know how to be a good admin. But I had 2 friends, papalia and a admin called Lordnova. I made them a group called "Imperial Global Moderator" so they just helped me with the forum. Then I just made a very good admin called Aquabot a Gmod.

In my view, if you wanted help with your forum, ask any of your friends to register, not by posting but just speaking to them. That's how I done it with my staff. I asked them to join because I needed help with my forum but now I have the hang of running the forum