[DENIED] New approval rating system for staff

The current feedback system is primitive in design and does not encourage staff to perform at a standard level that is acceptable. It is there to collectively store old feedback which typically doesn’t reflect their present performance or level of activity.

My suggestion: Introduce “public” monthly approval polls for each standing staff member. You should be able to rate them on a scale of 1-5. 1 being the lowest and 5 being the highest. The grading system could be done in many different ways (A-F for example). There should be a thread stickied which lists their monthly approval ratings during their tenure. This is the best way to measure levels of performance that accurately depict their current production.

Benefits:

1. It promotes higher levels of production knowing their performance will be critiqued.

2. It showcases who is lacking in performance. With this, decisions regarding what should be done with those who aren’t “bringing it” are easier to make.

 

Hasn't something similar been suggested like a hundred times?

 

If it was suggested “like a hundred times”, it probably would be on the DNS list. Its not.

 

Rating System on staff performance.
legit two weeks ago

 

This doesn’t indicate that it was suggested “like a hundred” times. I did not view the thread, but the idea is solid. The way it was explained could’ve been better.

In bold letters on the DNS thread. I’m pretty sure this is set and applicable for any suggestion if there is a strong/more convincing argument to be held.

 

Going to reply to this since he didn't allow anyone else to by immediately closing the thread.

The current feedback system in place is simply a collective of feedback and just that. Actual substantiated feedback is rare and a lot of the times the feedback that is left is just gratification for approved requests. As someone who has been on the staff team, it's pretty easy for "inconsistent effort" to be misinterpreted as regular effort. The unfairly rated argument goes out the window as that could be done right now, and the addition of a new system does not change that. Individual feedback threads should be left alone for personal feedback. I'm suggesting this be added as a better way to gauge production levels over the course of each month. It's easier to find trends in production/activity in that way, bad or good.

 

I programmed a staff peer review system as a Discord bot back in November of 2016. I had access to the votes being cast for the metrics set in place, so I felt it went against the ideology of creating something confidential and anonymous. As such, I recommended Richard to have Matthew add the peer review system as a feature request in the user center. This was done and we've been using it ever since. This is what Hahanerd was referencing as staff already having a feedback system in place.

 

Staff reviewing staff is a poor way to gauge accurate and truthful assessments of individual performances. Staff don't deal with staff, they deal with the community; regular users. Therefore if anyone should be doing the review, it's them.

Think of it as a local police department reviewing and investigating the performance of their own officers after complaints have been made. You're likely to have some bias if not done so by an outside source. In the case of the example I made, a higher bureau.

 

Well there clearly is a problem with some staff members that got promoted purely because they were friends with most mods, so we really need something like this. (And probably a community say in the application process)

 

Alot of people asked for this before :S

 

Asking the general public to give performance reviews on officers would be a worse solution

Lmao got any proof or statistics to back this up?

 

Agreed. However, I still agree with this suggestion. I think that, in order to have a "valid" monthly feedback post for staff, it needs to be over a certain word limit or X amount of points/justifications should be given in the feedback thread. It would most obviously increase the validity of a post if a member is REQUIRED to explain themselves through the post or it will NOT be valid.

 

One thing just to keep in mind if this does get pushed through and become a reality.. does this become mandatory for all forums participants? Is it voluntary?

There are issues/kinks with both that need to be worked out. For example - let's say EVERYONE has to participate. Great! Except most people who don't give a fuck will just give everyone a 5 so they can get back to what they were doing. Alternately, let's say it's voluntary. The people who will do it are 1 of 2 kinds of people. 1. They're friends with staff and are just going to do the reviews because it's for their buddies. 2. They're salty and think all staff suck and will just give people shit scores (yes there will be markings for outliers but I'll bet my balls there a group of people who will gives certain staff a 1 score consistently just for shits and giggles).

That may be a harsh generalization of the current community but that's just what I anticipate would happen - so how do you work around that? I also could be dead wrong in my assumption since I'm not really looped into how the current community. Just trying to help either way

 

I got better things to do than collecting stuff like that, but it's hard not to notice sometimes

 

So what your saying is you made a blanket statement about something that is "clearly a problem" based on your opinion with no statistical evidence. Ok.

 

I feel like there has been a general trend in the past couple months demanding more accountability and systems on the staff team - If you look at suggestions and problems that have arisen in the past lets say (3) months, there are many more staff accountability suggestions, problems and feedback then there normally has been.

I personally have never seen so many people demanding more transparency and accountability from staff since I've joined Sythe.

I feel like this is mainly because as the community continues to shrink and shrink, every loss is being felt a little bit harder - 90% of Ban evader reports now(Number I pulled from thin air but I read them all so) are being made by staff themselves - I feel like people are slowly watching the community fold in on itself and are demanding more strict requirements and transparency on staff because I think on a subconscious level most people are *starting* to realize that harsh punishment terms and rules are slowly killing the site.

I personally have nothing against more transparency, there have been some situations lately where I feel staff have just flat out reached the wrong conclusion and I've let them know that, but I also think that for every case I've had a problem with, 50 others have been successfully dealt with properly.

It's one of those things yeah I'm fine with it, but at the same time I don't want this to turn into a witch-hunt of community vs staff.

The other problem is you have staff regulating staff, so a suggestion like this is very, very hard to get through, the closest the community comes right now to regulation of staff is rioting/complaining/sf posts/ discord spam and messages and spamming staff.

I'll support I suppose, the details will need worked out though, the actual general idea I support however.

 

I'll agree that I don't think implementing this will give an accurate measurement of performance, but I do think it'll give some kind of measurement of community perspectives on each individual staff. This could give them some reference point for improving their interaction with the community or to keep doing what they are doing.

I don't see a problem with adding it.

 

The community*

How would asking community members to rate those who look over the community be a worse solution? That makes no sense to me. Members of this community have no say in who gets promoted, contrary to being able to do so in reality. Being able to rate their performance on a monthly basis is not asking for much, in fact its a practical idea.

Naturally this would be a voluntary measure as everyone on this forum isn't here for the same exact thing. Also forcing all users to vote on something they probably care little for is not a good idea.

There would be measures to discourage that sort of thing. Right now I'm just presenting the idea. Working around the abuse of this system would come next. There are little things that can be mandatory.

1. Having to comment/give reason for your rating
2. Must be a member for x amount of time
3. Can't change vote once submitted

Ideally you want to have a system set up where you're able to submit these votes anonymously to avoid ratings being discredited. Votes that don't follow procedure wouldn't be considered when tallying. You also want to have an option for those who are indifferent and rather not vote. Rewarding users for voting each month (give x amount of sg for example) would bring forth a lot more community interest and involvement.

Would it be possible to filter through all troll votes? Realistically no, but that's where giving a comment would be critical.

 

Polls are just popularity contents, much like that "member of the month" community crap that ran a few years ago.