Admin Election: The Results!

[Narv]

The Google Sheet has been tabulated and the results are in. The top four vote-getters, and your (non-Narv) admins for January - June 2021, are (in alphabetical order):

Moriel
Sil
Tarawen
Winddancer

So clearly the Plaza as a whole has banded together, risen up, looked the powers that be squarely in the eyes and cried out fiercely: "Ok!"

Firstly: congratulations to the team! The people spoke and they're pretty much cool with what yall are all about.

Secondly: while this is a great team I'll admit to being a little conflicted about this result! As a reminder of how the selection worked: the top three vote-getters are elected no matter what, and then I reserved the right to select the fourth admin myself. Like last time, I gave my pick to the person with the 4th most votes. I strongly considered using my 'Narv Pick' to select someone fresh this time, as I think some regular turnover is very healthy for the site and helps to lessen the 'admin-member' divide which is a big goal of mine. On the other hand, my other big goal is to let decisions here be driven by members whenever possible, and the result was fairly clearly in favour of these four. In the end, as it's only been one term, Democracy won out over Variety in my brain.

It also helps that I think this is a terrific team that's done a great job so far, so it is encouraging that it appears most of our members agreed.

A few more notes:

1) While fairly clear, this wasn't a landslide - quite a few other members had significant support and I am incredibly grateful to all the nominees who put themselves out there. Back in June it wasn't clear to me at all whether this site would still even exist come election #2, so to have another full slate of nominees willing to put their time and energy into the keeping this thing going is very gratifying. I hope all our nominees will consider running again in the future, as I really do believe in the long term that some semi-regular changeups are going to be important in keeping our community sustainable in the long term.

2) I greatly appreciated everyone who took the time to send me comments and concerns -- I received a lot of helpful feedback and I will do my best to take action on it in the upcoming term. As a first item, I'm going to set up a site email for myself (separate from the 'admins' email) that folks can use to continue to talk with me directly about things that they might not wish the whole admin team to see. Stuff sent to that email will remain confidential if you want it to be, and I'll have an announcement on that soon.

3) I would really like from hear from people about how they found the process, both as voters and nominees, and anything you think I should change about the process in the future. Could we streamline it somehow? Make it easier on nominees? Were the blurbs helpful in deciding? Do you like the 6 months schedule? Please let me know any thoughts you have about any of it as none of this process need be set in stone. Let me know here, or at the election email, or at my fancy new upcoming email, or however else you like.


And.. I think that's all! Huge thanks again to everyone who participated, congrats to the team, and I'll see you all next time around (and like hopefully before then too)!

[The Good Hunter]

Congrats guys! You all kicked ass the last six months, I can't wait to see what you will do in the next six months. If it ain't broke, don't fix it! I am very proud to be a member of a forum with adminions like you!

[Dimcairien Luiniel]

Congrats to everyone! I guess we're all happy with the last six months, so I can't wait to see what the next six months will be like.

Overall, I found the election process to be very simple. And considering the great selection of nominees, it was very difficult to narrow it down to my top choices.

@Narv Perhaps one way to encourage regular change-over is to have a limit to how many times in a row someone can hold the 6 month admin position?

[Nessa Saelind]

Congratulations to the reelected admin team! You did an excellent job for the first 6 months and as Gregor Vorbara likes to say the award for a job well done is another job. Aren't you glad?

Re member's/voter's feedback, I'll write something more coherent tomorrow after I had copious amounts of coffee because right now my brain wants to sleep

[Nia]

Massive congratulations to the team! <3 I wanted to mention somewhere how much of an awesome job I think you're all doing, and for some reason I decided not to do it in my little own blurb, but then I really regretted not having done so; but equally didn't want to go back and edit the post to add it in... But yes, just wanted to pass on an enormously BIG THANKS from me for everything you've done (and congratulations on the re-election!) We continue to be in a terrific and safe set of hands as we see in 2021!

I also just wanted to say thank you to anyone who nominated/ voted for me - I will continue to be the little background lurker, making occasional random appearances across the place, and be someone who is very much in awe of all of you very fine people's lore, creativity, RP expertise etc etc. (I am also sure I will continue to occasionally decide to RP as slightly mad squirrel or otherwise).

Finally, thanks again to Narv for answering concerns and being generally awesome and also for orchestrating all of this in such a fantastically smooth and organised way. Best run election of 2020 HANDS-DOWN.

[edit because there was a somewhat amusing, but ultimately slightly embarrassing typo]

[Winddancer]

Wow, that's me humbled. What a crazy year this has been. I can't believe I got voted back in. I am not just saying that, or fishing for comments, as we had such an awesome line up and I was sure it was leaning towards a change up. I am super grateful to those who voted for me and who think I did a good enough job the first time around to be allowed back in. All my love to you all. In a minion kind of way of course.. :P I will again do my best to continue working towards keeping the Plaza an awesome place to be and to make sure admins are as invisible as can possibly be, as to me that seems like the best way of keeping this place wonderful :)

Speaking of feedback and an email to Narv. I think it is great there will be an open line to Narv to send some feedback. BUT, I will also say, we (the admins) would like it too. It doesn't have to be official (unless you want it to be), but it is important to me that the admins be approachable and that is whether it is good or bad feedback. We can only get better if you guys let us know if we need to improve in an area. Also, we arent OP admins, you arent going to be banned or publically shamed or anything else bad because you speak up. Under the Narv administration it will take a LOT to ban anyone (Please dont test that though..). As long as you are respectful in the way you say it, then SAY IT. Speak your mind, tell us what you would like to see, help us make this place the best version of the Plaza we can possibly make. No one is going to kill you for speaking your mind <3 Nooo! Not even me! Pft..

[Eriol]

Congratulations, victors! Do well and do good. Thank you for your service.

[Lirimaer]

Well, I won't say I didn't hope to see a full set of new icons around, but you are all vibrant parts of the furniture here, so ... keep up the good work!

[Lail]

Whoo! Congratulations to you all! You've each done a really tremendous job the last six months keeping us all afloat. Here's to six more! Also - well done to Narv because without you we would not all be here for a second round of elections and thank you for facilitating the democratic process.*

I hope you admins will continue playing and engaging alongside your responsibilities as you have the last few months. I am glad of the reminder re feedback and will certainly reach out through the appropriate channel if I have any concerns/questions/suggestions/whatever. I'm glad to be part of a community where my voice/opinions count.

*with no recounts necessary

[Taethowen]

Congrats (again) folks! Hope that you'll push the Plaza to be even better, more fun, and more welcoming than ever!

I do agree with @Lirimaer that it would have been nice to see some turnover in admins just so that it's not turning into one set of people always in charge. Otherwise we end up with the problems of Old Plaza again. Variety is good for democracy.

@Dimcairien Luiniel's suggestion for a limited number of consecutive 6-month admin terms is good, too. Possibly even a limit on how many terms one can serve within a period of time (like 2 terms in a 2-yr period, whether consecutive or not).

As a whole I would like to see more transparency and interaction overall from the admins. Sil's been awesome on this front, because she actively looks for ways to be involved in every kingdom, even if it's just running games here and there.

On the transparency front, it would be nice to know what criteria are being used for selecting ATRs, for example, and possibly even choosing less ATRs each month. November was the anomaly since it was covering October as well, but from August (the start of the ATRs/MotMs, IIRC) thru December, we've blown through a LOT of ATRs for the small crowd we have active here. Makes it seem more like a popularity award than anything else.

As for interaction, I understand real life constraints, but some admins seem to only interact with a very small group of Plaza-ites, and honestly that makes it seem less likely for someone to be comfortable approaching the admins if there is a problem, because it's hard to think they will be unbiased.

[Fuin Elda]

Congrats again to those that were elected. I am sure you will, as ever, strive to do a better job each day.

[Boromir88]

Congratulations and well earned! Keep up the awesome job.

Thank you @Narv for another smooth and simple election.

[Winddancer]

Woot feedback! Seee?? No one got killed for speaking up! :D

Just speaking for myself and not as the admin team right now, but as to the term limits and the turnover. That can be both good and bad and definitely something worth discussing, but I just felt I needed to clarify and at least mention again that the team made it in again because of member votes. This time around Narv didnt even pick, he stuck with the overall votes. That is stil not to say it is not a good idea with a turnover, however the outcome is based on member votes.

As for ATRs (again me speaking not as admin) we got feedback that we were giving out too few, so we bumped them back up. But as before, it is definitely something we can put out there for a vote and you guys can let us know how many is a good number?
As for who receives them, well a lot goes into it. Activity, is likely the top one, or if you did something special for the Plaza (Like Mojo made the HoKs), but then we also have to take into account people saying they are going on leave and so on as we want them to enjoy their ATR and not have to wear it while they are not even here. So some might be put on a backburner for when we know they will be around to have fun with it. And the biggest difficulty is that there are still a lot who deserve one, yet we are limited to 4, even though we still (thank god!) have a lot we think deserve one and still hasn't had one. Does that make sense? It's also why we brough Motm back, so that it isn't just us, but also the members who can pick someone they think deserve it.

As for being more active (again just speaking for myself here) I would hope that people feel I am being fairly active and visible and approachable (always on Discord when I am awake and even at work.. dont tell my boss..:P ) At least I hope that was the criteria people had when they voted for me and the others as well. If anyone thinks I need to do more, let me know. But keep in mind I would be doing it as a member, not as an admin as I still believe admining should be "invisible". I know there is a "power" that comes with the icon, but that is also what the person attributes to it. I would honestly be upset if people felt they could not come to me for anything, be it feedback or even to let me know I did something wrong. I am not infallable, but hopefully with constructive critism one can improve, right? <3

[Silky Gooseness]

Thanks to everyone who voted - your participation keeps this site going! I’m honoured by anyone who thought it was a good idea to keep me in here even though I ran on a platform of Honk Honk. Thanks also to the other admins and congratulations. You’ve been a great team to work with and I’m sure you will continue to be so - we had never worked together as a team before but I think we’ve pulled together well. Anyone who voted for us, thank you for your trust.

I am a fan of turnover and change as well, to be honest. Term limits is something we talked about, but we decided not to go with it at the point of the first elections - mostly because we thought that a gradual team change rather than a whole new set of four or five would be less disruptive. The elections in their current format does allow for this to happen, but honestly I was anticipating maybe one or two of us being elected but some change. That the members have returned us ALL was surprising - and touching - to me, but I doubt very much we will return to the Old Plaza situation of people being in post for years and years. No doubt we the current admins may want to move on and play as members, and we have some fantastic admin candidates currently whom I hope will still be willing to take up that role in the future. That future is in the members’ hands.

I am certain I’m speaking for the team when I say that we don’t take this trust for granted. Your feedback is really important and welcome to us. We don’t want to seem unapproachable, or punitive. Please feel free to criticise and comment. Speaking of which, some things that have come up which I think we can take forward (and which Windy has already covered somewhat):

ATR Selection: Asking for transparency - very fair. In all honesty, we would love to give everyone active the chance to wear a shiny face. Pacing it has been something we’ve discussed: do too many make it less special? Do too few make people feel under appreciated? If someone is really shining one month but then disappears the next, when is the best time to offer them an ATR? We have gone with between 3-5 per month, plus MotM - a member led initiative that we’re very grateful to Frost for suggesting - but we’re open to other ideas. The list we have of potential candidates is LONG, most everyone active is on it, and we have just been working our way through it - switching it up a bit when people tell us they aren’t going to be around etc. More detailed feedback about how you, the members, would like this to work is welcome. It’s not meant to be a Formal Award you have to jump through a specific hoop to earn, nor should it just be about “popularity”: anything you want to tell us about how we can improve the process will be taken on board. Going to 5 per month + MotM was based on member feedback but we can see there’s a variety of opinions on this, so a poll is probably in order.

Activity: Honestly, the bulk of *admin* activity is invisible: reading through the forums to make sure things are going smoothly (even if we aren’t posting there), manual tribbing is a pretty painstaking task, going through and checking the Halls of Knowledge. We also want to continue enjoying the website as members, of course, without burning out, so the stuff we post in is often just stuff we enjoy. I’m on mobile a lot so I enjoy quick games, for example. I think we all aim to be visible *somewhere* on plaza, and I think we are achieving that, but interaction for us all everywhere is probably a bit ambitious if there is a particular spot or area you think would benefit from admin attention though please bring it to us.

On being biased: of course we, as people, have friends on plaza, but I super promise we will do our very best to be unbiased as admins. If you have any real concern about this I know Narv, our benevolent and neutral troll, will be happy to listen.

Yikes, this is the longest post I have written on mobile EVER and my thumbs may shortly fall off. TL;DR - thank you, love you, show us where you want us to do better & we’ll keep doing our best. HONK HONK

[Zôrzimril]

Congrats to the rest of the team and thank you for voting, everyone! I appreciate the confidence and chance to continue contributing to this site as an admin for another 6 months.

I won’t repeat everything that Sil and Windy have said but I will say I agree with them. I do want to add that, speaking for myself, one BIG lesson I learned as a Cottage Maia on Old Plaza is that the quickest way to burn out is to feel obligated to be involved with everything. I think this goes for anyone on site, to be honest. On New Plaza, we have expressly made it a goal for the admin work to be as low-key as possible - I think this was reflected in all our blurbs. The admin work is what is not visible, or is less visible, but it is still work. The visible activity that I personally engage in is participating in things I find fun, as I think everyone should be able to! If you have an idea for something fun we can play out, I’m always willing to dive in. We’ve got an awesome RP request form system in OOME that I know has connected people across the site.

On bias: in the last six months, I’ve done my best to help out and hear out members in a way that upholds our commitment to DEI, the RP CoC, and our General Rules, regardless of who is involved. If anyone feels something was mishandled, I’d like to learn from that. I think the whole team would. We can’t know how anyone feels about something, though, unless we’re told. We are all always learning, so help us! Like Windy said, we won’t bite.

All that said, I want this to be a place that all can enjoy, and I will certainly do my best in the next six months to help make that happen.

[Nessa Saelind]

3rd coffee of the day and I think, emphasis on think here, I am coherent enough to write coherent-ish feedback. Or look trying

Although personally, I am glad that the admin team remained unchanged not only because I am a Woman of a Certain Age™ (and I like stability), but in their first 6 months they did an excellent job at being admins, in my opinion. They managed to balance being visible and invisible at the same time; you knew they were there, helping things run smoothly, but you didn't really hear them. (Why does this sound like a description of children in the Victorian period? Seen but not heard? *thinking face*) Since they did an excellent job in the first 6 months, the best reward for a job well done is another job, or in this case continuation of the same job. And I believe that we will be in an even better position to comment on the team's performance after a year.

In addition, I am really pleased that in the 2nd Plaza Admin Election we had so many wonderfully amazing and talented people who were more than happy to dedicate time and effort to the NuPlaza. If I haven't mentioned this before about the candidates, you're stars!

Regarding the whole election process: it's simple, to the point and holding the admin elections twice a year is optimal, and we should stick to it. The only "problem" (which is truly a wonderful problem to have) is whom to nominate and vote for because people wrote wonderful blurbs! Oh, yeah, the thing I "hated" most was writing 3 sentences about myself Yea Gods and Little Fishes I would literally rather write a dissertation titled Migrations and everyday life in Ravni Kotari from the early Middle Ages to the establishment of the Venetian Military Fronteer than write something about myself, but I'm just weird like that. Please feel free to ignore that

Regarding a regular changeover - I think it's a good idea, but I still think it needs to be discussed more. I really wouldn't like to impose restrictions (is that the word?) on how many terms can a person be elected as an admin. If they're doing a good job, and the members show by their votes that they think that person is doing a good job and would like them to continue to do so and that person agrees to do it it's fine by me if they keep the position. But that's a lot of ifs

[Moriel]

Thank you to everyone who voted for participating in the process- it's your voice that keeps the plaza running, and puts the admins of your choice in office! I am honored by your continued trust and confidence and hope that the next six months will be as successful and pleasing to you as the first. As I said in my blurb, it's been a joy to work for you and the plaza we all hold dear.

With regard to the feedback given so far in this thread, pretty much everything I want to say has already been said by other members of the team, so I'll try not to rehash. Suffice to say, admins are people too! Most of the admin job is behind the scenes and I'm very happy that it has remained so. Visibility is absolutely a good thing, but no one can be everywhere all at once- that's how you get burnout. Everyone, admin or not, has their favorite places to play and activities to participate in, which may or may not involve some members more than others just due to the nature of the activities and settings. Just as no one can be everywhere at once, no one can constantly be interacting with everyone at once. That said, I'm personally always up for plotting and ideas, and am on the list in the RP Request thread!

We're also people in that we have friends, but part of the commitment you make upon becoming an admin is the uphold and enforce plaza rules and policies fairly for everyone, regardless of your personal relationship with them. I sincerely hope that any member feels they could come to the team or any member of it without fear of bias- and know that all major decisions about anything are discussed and decided by the team; no one is making unilateral decisions about anything that will affect the whole plaza, or about concerns brought to us by members. If you see an admin saying something adminny in public, you can rest assured that it has been discussed and considered. And if there is a concern you have that you are for some reason not comfortable bringing to the team- firstly, I apologize. That is a failing on our part. But secondly, Narv has now provided (will soon provide) a remedy in the form of a private email that only he has access to. Over the course of the first six months, the team has received numerous emails with feedback to the admin inbox and contact via discord, both agreeing and disagreeing with us, and I hope the members who brought their concerns to us came away from those conversations feeling confident in their ability to get in touch with an admin team that would listen to them. Please talk to us- this statement hasn't been vetted but I feel pretty confident in saying for the team that we'd invite you in for tea if we could!

That was longer than I intended it to be but gosh darn it I just care about the plaza and all of you so much

err i mean

[Saranna]

Congratulations to all of you, I have every faith in your committment and skills. Well, in other words you're a great bunch and you'll do a great job.

[Boromir88]

Not so much a quibble because as far as I'm aware every situation has been handled but a suggestion for the future...

In the RP code of conduct one of the primary rules is no godmoding. In RPing it's widely accepted as bad form to take control of another player's character and dictate how someone else's character responds/acts.

I think the same "no godmoding" needs to apply to the Lore forum. Maybe it already does, but checking over the forum posting rules it covers the big no-nos and so I'm suggesting a "no godmoding" across the entire forum.

What I mean is, I think it's bad form, not just in RPing, to dictate how other people "should" reply/answer Lore topics. Under godmoding I would include no one should be determining, or commentating on, the tone/attitude of another poster. Now I think Lore and RP are different, and can't handle them as if they were the same, but an example:

Person A writes a post in Lore.
Person B doesn't reply to the topic, but dictates how Person A should have replied to the topic. Or Person B commentates on Person A's tone/attitude.

In RP, if my understanding is correct, this would not be allowed because it would be considered godmoding? (If that's wrong please feel free to point me straight!) I think the same should apply to lore posts, because even more so than in RP where 1 person is taking over someone else's RP character; there's an actual person on the other side of the screen. And in the above example, Person B is trying to control how Person A should reply/answer a topic.

[Silky Gooseness]

@Boromir88, as you say RP and Lore are different but general rules of good behaviour should apply to both. I definitely see your concerns but think they have been addressed by @Winddancer’s post here: viewtopic.php?f=3&t=606 - in particular the request to keep things from getting ad hominem. I’m not sure this is the perfect thread to discuss it in a huge amount of detail as this is more specifically an announcement/celebration/feedback on the admins/election process but it is something that does bear more thought. Feel free to carry on until/unless we can think of a better place to stick it though

[Boromir88]

@Sil, yes thank you! Like I said it wasn’t so much anything done wrong. I was trying to frame it as feedback for Admin teams to consider in the future.

[Silky Gooseness]

Thank you, @Boromir88! Your good sense and feedback is always welcome.

[Drífa]

Congratulations to the Admin Team! Thank you for your time, commitment and dedication to this great forum. You are wonderful! The drinks are on me in the Rock N Boot!

Thank you, Narv, for all you do!

[Ercassie]

I have read each new post here as it rolled in, over the last week; I felt quite sure that I had already given up my own, but seems that I did not. So, before I return to the delusion that I have typed up what I felt on just reading those posts above this ;

Congratulations to the elected admins who have clearly proven that they have the peoples' trust, and continue their tireless efforts to safeguard it.

A hearty applause to EVERYONE of the nominees, who gave their time and showed their courage and put themselves forward, ready and willing to go that extra step further to make this place all that it is.

And a genuine appreciation to Narv, for conducting the whole proceedings, and encouraging a place for us all to have a voice on Nu plaza; member or admin, though we each may be.

[Pele Alarion]

*comes fashionably late to the party* Congrats, admin-peoples! The site is still running; there are people here; there are no fall outs... I think you have done well for the previous six months, and I am sure you'll handle the next six month excellently as well.

[Narv]

Thanks again everyone for the positive vibes and for the feedback both here and that I've received via other channels. There's a lot of input here so apologies for not responding individually but I assure you I am taking it all into consideration for this upcoming term and for our next election. And as I said feel free to get in touch if you'd like to talk specifics about anything brought up here (or not brought up here)!