Over enthusiastic staff members?

[The Reverend]

have you ever had a forum where a staff member was swinging the banhammer too much, editing posts too much e.t.c ?

 

[Joshua Farrell]

Oh yeah, I have had a moderator once that enjoyed editing everything that he thought wasn't correct, sticking threads without permission, deleting posts that needed to be reviewed without first consulting me, and other fun stuff. I demoted in within 3 days of promoting him.

The person wasn't a bad member, but knew nothing of the proper way to moderate.

 

[Darthmaul]

No, I haven't. I tend to choose staff members who aren't crazy like that.

 

[Mik.]

No I haven't. I choose staff members wisely.

 

[death180]

That isn't overly enthusiastic that is power abuse.

And no, I haven't come across that.

 

[The Reverend]

i kind of meant to put over enthusiastic in speech marks

 

[AnAccount]

I've been pretty fortunate so far. I haven't had staff who are ban happy and all that other stuff.

 

[Fergal]

Sometimes it helps to limit a Moderators permissions when they start out in the role. This gives them time to learn about how moderation is normally done on your forum, before they are given more advanced permissions.

For example you could ask them to notify you of members that they would like to see banned, before you give them permission to actually impose bans. That way you can both learn how each other works and likes to do things.

 

[Acorn]

That's what we do. We start our new staff in the lowest level staff position to see how they do with that. Then we promote from those the best candidates when we need more upper mods. And so on. So that by the time any one of them has any measure of real power on the site we know whether they are able to use it right, and we filter out people who just aren't cut out for it, before they have a chance to do much damage.

 

[AnAccount]

Sometimes it helps to limit a Moderators permissions when they start out in the role. This gives them time to learn about how moderation is normally done on your forum, before they are given more advanced permissions.

For example you could ask them to notify you of members that they would like to see banned, before you give them permission to actually impose bans. That way you can both learn how each other works and likes to do things.

I've seen and heard of forums doing this before, and I personally like that idea. It gives the owner a chance to truly find out if you will be trustworthy enough for the position and if you'll be honest enough, etc. Then you can always gain more permissions as the owner warms up to you or whatever.

 

[Hissae2]

This has never happened to me. I always have to trust the member before promoting, never use FP to get staff imo.

 

[InFiNiTy™]

have you ever had a forum where a staff member was swinging the banhammer too much, editing posts too much e.t.c ?

Uhhh... I hate those kinds of people. I just fire em'.

 

[Nebulous]

it helps to limit a Moderators permissions when they start out in the role. This gives them time to learn about how moderation is normally done on your forum, before they are given more advanced permissions.

People can turn over to the dark side at any moment, doesnt matter how long they've been there and how much they've "learned" 😛

 

[Fergal]

...People can turn over to the dark side at any moment, doesnt matter how long they've been there and how much they've "learned" 😛

Unfortunately that's all too true and all we can do is try to stack the odds a little bit in our favour. The most reliable predictor of someone's future behaviour is their past behaviour, so one way to stack the odds in your favour is to give trust to people who have earned it.

 

[D]

No, I haven't. I tend to choose staff members who aren't crazy like that.

Lol, how would you know if they were 'crazy'? 😛

 

[Darthmaul]

Uhm....I look at their history? Or I just get lucky... :lol:

 

[AnAccount]

Uhm....I look at their history? Or I just get lucky... :lol:

Well, that would be what you do before you even consider hiring them. Especially if they were staff on your last forum and you plan on opening another one.

 

[Goddesstreca]

God yes. I was redoing my site so that it would look better. Moving old dead threads to the basket. So I told one of my staff that I was clearing out the site. So he goes through and deletes everything! Luckily I had it all backed up.

 

[AnAccount]

God yes. I was redoing my site so that it would look better. Moving old dead threads to the basket. So I told one of my staff that I was clearing out the site. So he goes through and deletes everything! Luckily I had it all backed up.

Wow, now that's extreme! Sure, it may be a lot easier to just delete everything, but you are better off moving things to the archive if you have such a thing, then it's better as you keep all your current stats, members etc. Someone ever pulled a stunt like that on me, that would seriously call for automatic demotion.