Choosing Staff For Your ProBoard

[Ќĩɳĝ]

Though I mostly agree with you, pikablu, sometimes it may be wise to have every board assigned to a mod. However, you should have more than one mod for a board if it's a big forum. They won't always be around and can drop out on you, leaving the board/s they were handling unchecked,s o make sure to have more than one for the important boards.
By doing this, though, you can commit a major mistake. Never rely solely on mods to take care of your boards. This is unwise and could lead to chaos. As the admin of your forum, it is up to you to make sure everything is truly working, not them. It is your responsibility to make the last check of everything, so don't just hire a bunch of people and then sit back or your site will go to ruins.

[kelendria]

My staff in the past have all deserted me at one point, so I don't have any now.
I may choose some more once we are fully active, all but one I've had I've trusted.
None of my staff seem to want to do anything to help the forum (not that I expect them too) but I've seen other forums where staff members are great at helping to advertise, get members & keep their forums updated.
I guess I'll have to wait a bit longer......

[Ќĩɳĝ]

kelendria said:

My staff in the past have all deserted me at one point, so I don't have any now.
I may choose some more once we are fully active, all but one I've had I've trusted.
None of my staff seem to want to do anything to help the forum (not that I expect them too) but I've seen other forums where staff members are great at helping to advertise, get members & keep their forums updated.
I guess I'll have to wait a bit longer......

Patience is the key. Do not rush getting staff, as it seems you have learned. Make friends with your members. Get to know them and their flaws. Weigh their bad attributes with their good ones, as no one is going to be perfect, and then decide whether or not they will make a good staff member.

Get to know them first. Until then, don't rush it or you'll regret it.

[fredhart]

My forum is fairly new and I don't have the need for extra staff members. I would much rather do the whole thing myself - that way I know everything that's been going, good or bad. On a number of forums I've had in the past (which have never been successful), I gave out staff positions to every member until I had a mod for each seperate forum and one global mod. I've stopped doing this now as they all banned eachother just for spelling a word incorrectly.

[rat]

Also notice if u need further help that I can just pm for any needed help b/c like u a lot of my members have completly deserted my site mainly b/c they have thier own so go figure!

[Moira]

trent said:

I jus made staff on my forum. They were the 2 highest posters other than me and did things for my board outside of posting.

I have to say, I find that rather unwise. Just because they're the highest posters, doesn't generally mean that they'd make good staff members. (Yes, I realise that they've 'done things for your board outside of posting') I was run off of one forum that I was highest poster on, so a high post count does not really mean that a member is suitable to be staff. My staff are all people I know, or have been in contact with online for a long time (like, loooooooooooooooooong time, not just a few months).

[megaman]

i made a forum sometime ago, and I have a member that complained when I notified him of a detail he had to fix, and started to post on the c-box rules suck and made another post that my site has stupid rules. But I've been thinking that I'd rather ban him even though he's the only other member on my site,it's a tough choice because no one has joined lately he used to be staff but I drop him down to a normal member.

[Mr. Magic]

Staff members I have been thoroughly thinking through. I already am the administrator with 2 people I can truely trust to help out when they can. As of now that is the only thing I really need. Buuuutttt.......

I'm looking to complete my froums to make it look right:

• My forums deals with magic, so getting those who actually knows a great deal of magic will get a special "magical-based" rank and they will help in dealing with the real magical stuff that goes on with my forums. Of course, they will have some regular moderator powers so to have some control if any problems arise. what about regular moderators? Well,...
  
• Some moderators will moderate along side the specialty staff. They will have trhe usual moderating powers so to help the specialty staff. the rest of the moderators can work in the other non-magical areas such as the general chat and the gasming area.
  
• Coders/Designers will have very few moderating powers, if not at all. Only powers they would have is the access to design skins and work with the codes, especially if a code is causing trouble on the forums.
  
• This leavs my global moderators and myself. Of course I would be overlooking the forums and making sure everything is in place and make the important decisions while my global moderators helps out as well.
  

Of course, I agree that the ones who get each rank must be good for that position and trustworthy. One way to be trustworthy is to have friends be staff members. Members you can trust that have been on your forums for a while can be a good choice as well. If you got a group of friends that can help out, it's a good way to start with a new forums.

[Des]

Before, I chose staff only by choosing people who applied, and I had rather a lot of staff. Even though I didn't have any mishaps [thank god] I decided this method was rather faulty. The staff often disappeared for ages and didn't really do much.

On my forum now, I use the following system:

• For a lot of time in the beginning, I was the only admin. I didn't need much help. However, I did appoint teachers and HOH's but they had only limited power for their particular boards.
  
  
• Then, when it became a little hard to manage alone, I chose three co-admins, one from our Ministry of Magic, whom I knew from school and was very active on our site (someone I could really trust), One from the teachers, who was extremely active and helpful, and I felt had the right sort of experience to be a co-admin. From the Students side I chose an admin who had always shown active participation and great ideas in her work, and who had even before chosen to voluntarily do an admin duty.
  
  
• I have had very good experiences this way, all my admins remained active and were very good at what they did. They also helped out a lot by doing Activity Checks and such when I couldn't come online so much.
  
  
• Recently, one of the admins had to leave because of school work reasons. This time, we chose again a member from our midst who had shown herself to be active and helpful. We questioned PB Experience and such, and we believe we have made the right choice.
  

[Shentino]

You should NEVER higher staffers straight away unless you can either trust them or they are well liked by your members.

Mass hirings of staff can create chaos, and unless you're wikipedia, it probably won't work. Forums are by nature interactive environments, and without a static standard to compare against, it's very hard to repair any damage a rogue vandal might do.

Screen your staff carefully and make sure to keep an eye on things.

[WilburyMania!]

My friend... she made me a co-admin. She also has one "super moderator". (They are a moderator that can moderate all boards, but not ban anybody) So that's 3 staff, which I find is good for a beginning forum. Even though we don't know each other offline, we each have our own forums.

The moderator. The main admin knew her pretty well on her forum. So one day the admin said "Hey, do you want to moderate a board?" and the mod said "sure". The admin gave her some "tasks" for practice. (Moving threads, for example). The moderator now has her own forum. I think the admin influenced her.

[WilburyMania!]

You don't have to know somebody offline to make them a staff member. And they don't even need to have staffing experience.

My friend gave a moderator position to another girl. The girl, well she barely knew how to post a new thread. My friend gave her "practice". for example posting in the wrong forum on purpose, and it worked out well. They had only known each other for a few months on her forum. It ended up leading to the girl starting her own forum.

[Shezrie]

When my forum reached the point of needing a staff member in addition to myself, I chose someone who had been supportive of my main website and the forum since the start. Even though I had only been in communication with this person for a few months, he had often expressed a love for the site, assisted me in setting up my main website, repeatedly offered help and showed real dedication to what the site was all about by being a constant on the new forum from the start.

It turned out extremely well and many months later he is still around, still doing a fabulous job and I trust him completely.

After many months I found I needed another staff member so thought very carefully, consulted the present staff and finally made a decision. Again someone who had expressed a love for the site and forum, someone who I had personally brought in to be a judge on one of my site's competitions, but who had ended up staying since then. What stood out most about this person was when she had written in a thread that this forum 'was like home to her'. That had stuck in my mind.

Again, it worked out extremely well. I had eliminated many members in my search, some had outright challenged the way I ran the place a few times, some were prone to starting arguments, some were just 'casual' visitors to the forum, some demonstrated a lack of maturity and some were well respected, mature and well liked members but unwilling to take on the extra responsibility. In the end I chose someone dedicated to the forum and site, who showed maturity, a friendly nature, an ability to get along with everyone, but who could also put their foot down when necessary.

Now I include the staff in all major decisions and consider it 'our' forum. We all work well together and we all keep up to date on forum news by writing in a thread in the moderator's private area, any warnings, major moves we each make. Ultimately I have the final decision as the admin, but on the whole we all work together, making decisions, enforcing rules and general running of the forum. Noone has particular threads they moderate, we all cover the whole forum. I have never needed to assert my authority as the last say on any decisions as I can rely on the moderators to make good decisions. All together I feel very fortunate in my forum and the staff that make it so great.

[Wesley2005]

I have my own forum of course, and I try to staff it very well. When I do make people staff I make my own member account so that they won't know its me and I will make a few boo boo's in the proper edicate. Maybe then I can see what kinda staff they will be. That is how I get a good picture of them. I never assign someone as an admin or gmod straight off..it would be just like me handing power over to them. They will work their way up. I hardly ever make anyone an assistant admin either, I have had some horrid experiences which evolved into me deleting the board..

I am very picky as well..they must know a lot about UBBC and other coding types if a member needs some help, they must also not discriminate..which seems to happen alot on my board recently, but staffing my board...is something I do not take lightly.. it is a hard task..but it is worth it when you find a good mod. ;D

[~»tobi«~]

My staff are chosen from those that assist with the building and planning stages of my forum . The people I choose have to be loyal and active and able to dedicate some of their time to help me keeping my forum running well .

I have loads ask for positions and make everyone do an application and decide from that ( along with my mods )