Choosing Staff For Your ProBoard

[dynam1te]

I like giving a trial period, so i know what to expect from the person, and i also hold multiple trials to get out the best from people, however when choosing staff i believe the following factors are of great importance.

-How well you know the person.
-How responsible they seem to be.
-How they behave towards other staff.

I also like to ask them what they will do forum when they become staff, and if they suddenly decide to not do those things they get demoted to member, i believe that you should make sure of the following:

-They will remain active.
-They actually want tobe staff.

[Serenity]

At my site we currently have six staff members and 151 members. When I first became admin I wanted to add a whole bunch of staff as a lot of proboards sites I had been a member had. My first two staff members strongly discouraged me from this. That we didn't need more staff members. And now looking back at it I'm glad that we didn't add like 50 staff members to start with. A lot of sites with the whole thing being staff don't succeed as much. We're very active and I think it's due to our less staff. If the whole site is basically staff then one or two people are not then members feel left out I think. Therefore less staff is best.

[kelendria]

I think having too many staff can be overwhelming.
I also try not to put staff on the front page.
This is my own preference because it too can be daunting having a lot of names on the boards.
We have over 2000 members but only 3 staff, we can handle this as we're not very busy.
But I've never had more than 5 staff at one time, but then they were more active back then.
And they deserved the job after a time not just given it from the start

[Michelangelo "Spike" Scarlatti]

Since I have mostly roleplay boards I use friends I have on the internet
that Ive roleplayed before with on myspace or on another board
I can trust them the most over a complete new member that wants to be staff
I occasionally just up their status sometimes not as in making someone else staff but as in giving them more to do on the board itself

[GSJ]

I see staffing as everything on your site, they are the ones who are helping support you and assist you in making the forum the place you wish it to be. I created my site with a very close online friend, it being a pair admin team (we have each others details/passwords ect) The site eventually grew to a size of 250 members and we found it was too much to do just on our own so we starting looking for mods. We chose them because they'd been active, pleasant members who had been on the site for over a year. They always followed rules and kepts in constant communication with us, also and most importantly they got along with one another.

In picking any staff you need to look really hard at their qualities, every person has positive and negetive attributes. So for one Mod, we knew she was responsible, to the point, followed rules and able to correct others, however we also knew she couldn't always be diplomatic. The other mod, was pleasant, kind, compassionate and very hardworking, however also she was someone who liked to make others happy and let members walk over her at times, as she was so gentle. (They are now our Global Moderators)

So we made them a pair or a team, they worked together in all the tasks, so if one had to be diplomatic, the gentle mod took over, yet if there was an intense disagreement or rule breaking the to the point mod took over. By putting the staff in pairs that complimented each other we found the site was ran very well and they always had another to support them.

Again the site grew to 600 members and so on, so we put on another team of mods, this time a set of twins, one was very shy and didn't like talking with other members alot, but was very responsible and realiable and nice to those she spoke with. The other was more social but strong in her views and occasionally could be a little strong with her emotions when upset. However the shy mod was excellent in behind the scenes work, reporting problems and getting things completed expecially in maintence work. While the more social mod was fantastic at dealing with members and knew to pass things that stressed her on to another mod or us. To prevent her temper getting the better of her.

All mods we chose over our sites time were ones we watched for months! We spent a long time coming to a decision on the staffing and did screenings on the site to find who members respected who they didn't and the reasons. Staffing makes or breaks a site now having 800+ members and a site thats pretty active, I know without the dedicated staff we have the site would be just a shell of itself.

Staff you need to rely on when you're not online or if you go away, also to stop or contain fights at the moment they occur. In our case they had little power when first staff, their job was surveying and reporting back to us, eventually we gave them powers to move threads and eventually modify posts, sticky lock and other maintenance powers. Even now none of our staff can delete a post or thread, and none have access to codeing or other higher powers that can be misued. Not because of distrust but. because I know how easily mistakes can happen with codeing ^.^;;

So in my opinion staffing is everything, you need to choose those not only you trust but have proven themselves to be a respected and reliable member. Future staff need to be watched for some time to work out their assests and liabilites they bring to the site. As no one has the perfect attitude or perfect personality we're all human, so to be able to see that and work out how that will impact your site is important. Once staff I believe you give powers over time as you give more trust and they have proven themselves capable.

Mistakes in staffing I see is, application processes as just anyone can apply and you want a person or member you know rather well and can predict then the unknown, the site is something you care about right? So why hand it to a person who hasn't proven they care about the site too. Also putting on members who ask or request continualluy to be staff, as often it is more a power thing, or because they believe they deserve such a position. Two attitudes that don't normally better your forum. Also putting on staff that are highly conflictual and fight with other members and even staff, ones who do not follow rules, staff that are barely ever on, staff that have an elitist opinion believe they're better then everyone else and tell this to everyone and correct members continually in ways that are more of their own opinion then the rules of the site. Also members who are always mini moding I don't see as good future staff as if they're telling members how to do everything now or telling the staff how to do their jobs all the time, how would they make good staff? They always want everything done their way and it would cause many fights in the staff system. Oh and also, choose staff who get along with everyone else, don't pick two rivals or enemies as two staff on your board, its asking for trouble. We encourage group chats and talking between all our future staff with the current staff, to see they melded well before making them staff. You want the staff mix to be harmonious not full of tension and future disagreements.

XD well those are all my opinions anyway, staffing is important I think its what makes your site as successful or unsuccessful as it is. And my site would be nothing without its wonderful staff.

GSJ

[gothic]

Another interesting topic.

I think that when it comes to choosing staff for my site (I have owned sites in the past). That I will choose people who don't get into alot of fights, aren't catty, have a level-headed and mature outlook on how things should be ran and aren't power hungry. I also think that they should be people who have been on the site for a while and have great interest in it. And would stay even if they were declined as a member.

I would firstly make them a moderator with limited powers and then raised them as they proved themselves. But I think that admins who allow their staff to have complete control they leave themselves open to a whole variety of problems. I really just can't be bothered with it all.

Basically choose people who know what they're doing, are genuinely interested in your game, are very mature and are kind to new members. And yes, even people who annoy them too.

[Jay]

I choose staff very, very carefully. Usually, when I make a site, I'll advertise on one of the sites I go on already, where I know a lot of trust-worthy people. I sometimes make them Admin if they decide to join. I don't really use moderators, but on my new site, I just might.((There's a lot of boards)) The only time I ever made someone admin without knowing them from some other site was this one person called Sky. She'd been on my site for a while, she made lots of good, descriptive posts, was there all the time, and never agrgued with anyone. So on her birthday, I was looking at her pro, and decided to make her admin. I have not regretted it.

[Serenity]

Recently, my friend made a new site and she met some guy in a chat room. She didn't know him but they talked for about a day and I guess she offered him a position of global moderator. She doesn't remember how it came about. Anyway he joined and was a global mod for about a day. It was a bad decision. When I came to the site (I should've joined sooner I was just busy) anyway he was bossing her friend around (who was also staff there) and was being very rude to her. Saying what had to be done, it had to be his way. Even though he was only a global moderator. He was being extremely rude. He was later removed from staff.

This is an example of why you should be very careful who you give staff positions too. Also be careful what they can do. If you don't trust the person 100% don't give the person access to IPs because you never know who they could be and what they could do with IPs. My advice is to wait awhile before making someone you "just met" staff. Make sure they've been a member a certain amount of time. Watch and observe their posts. Are the helpful? Are they friendly?

After my friend's experience I would never give any random person staff positions. New members are not wise decisions for staff.

At my site, it is required you have a minimum of 100 posts before coming staff, that's a bear minimum. Most of our staff members have way more than that before becoming staff.

[Encryption__]

I'm currently starting up a new forum , but I'm not sure how should go about staffing it. Tips? Halp?

[chanelley]

I only have one staff member on my forum at the moment and we both started the forum together so she is an admin also. When I do choose my next staff member (which will be soon because our numbers are going up), it'll be an active member but not the most active members. It will be someone dedicated to the site and someone who is ok to take suggestions and treat people with respect. My co-admin will both make the decision.

A forum I am a member of once had a 'competition' type way of choosing staff members. They made people apply and then choose someone. It was really disheartening to find out you hadn't been picked and it made a lot of members bitter. I won't use this on my own forum. I believe that staff should be picked by other staff. Of course they'll have the option to turn the post down but you should choose someone you know is dedicated enough that they don't turn it down.

[xjuliax]

I am in the process of getting new members, picking my staff, and learning how to make my forum successful. I will remember what you said and listen to it while I'm picking my staff members. Thank you.

[LLlover]

It can be hard to pick staff members. You don't always know how people will act when they actually become a staff member unless you've been on a staff with them before. For me I've had staff that haven't minded trying to help out on the keeping members in line part of the job, but had almost absolutely no interest in helping add boards and like that. Then I have a staff member that is willing to do pretty much anything I ask of them. They might need a little explanation on how to do it at first, but I can count on them.

Sometimes though it's just hard to predict what's to come because they'll act one way while they're just a regular member and then another way once they've become staff. In other words some people make good members, and some make good members and good staff. You just have to be careful to figure out which they are. Staffing is a learning process.

[Neb]

On sites that I've been to, a lot of them have tons of staff members, very few "just members" and barely any of them are active. If an entire site is staff, everyone gets bored because they have control over everything. If not everyone is staff, then it's more exciting for a member to visit a site because they have more to look forward to: they have very little control over what happens and are always in for a surprise!

The way I choose staff members is setting requirements. Example:

1) You must have 150 posts.
2) You must have 5 karma.
3) You must be active at least 4 days a week.

Those are similar to my requirements for staffhood. If a member fulfills all these and they are liked by other members, then I offer them a job if I'm in need of a staff member. If I'm not in need, I let them know that they're in the running for staff. Staff member should be limited and not clutter the list of members. If over 10% of your members are staff, it's too much!

[Shinigami Deception]

actually you can give your staff members test runs, and you can choose the options your staff can do. i tent to pick the most active member of my board and the one whose freindiest with the other members, you give them a small job and see how they do that and slowly move them up to positions limiting the power until they prove themselfs

[Desdemona Dreadful]

I have friends as my staff and I trust them, for a most part. I like that one friend wants to be purely admin. She is able to say things better than I could too. She can speak to members in the rpg who are making trouble and make it sound so professional yet firm all at once.

I started a new rpg on proboards so I truly hope most of these problems are gone now but I realize proboards could give me a new set of problems and that concerns me.

LOL. I'll be back here for help if my friends give me trouble.