We all know the problems at hand here: things move so slowly on the board that it's not even funny. We have tons of ideas on the board but there is this lingering notion that there aren't enough people to do the tasks. That's not entirely true as we have at least 10 active staff members that things shouldn't be put into the bottleneck so much as they are. That's why we have decided that it is finally time to implement a system much like the real world to adapt to the growth of our site and once more start to have things flow again.
The system we are implementing is the departmentalization of the Neocodex staff. Essentially we are creating internal departments within the staff as mainly a procedural upgrade in the system. It's nothing more than what we had before with the single difference that with the new system, each staff member knows exactly what they are responsible for allowing us to focus on one issue like a laser rather than being spread too thin over many. I'll go more in depth as to how this will all work in the rest of the post.
The departments
- Human resources
- Finances
- Content
- Management
- Advertisement and Recruitment
- Project management
- Technology
The human resources department is the public face of all staff relations on the website. Human resources will handle member suggestions, complaints, appeals and all communication with the staff in accordance to the rules. In addition, the human resources department will concentrate on seeing what members who do work on the board are happy and will work to make sure that what will make them happy is implemented. Finally, the human resources department will be responsible for ensuring that those who work on the website receive proper appreciation through use of creative means on the board.
Finances
The finances department will be the main financial arm to Neocodex. The main focus for the finances department will be to keep track of all of the financial data of Neocodex. Furthermore, all financial requests will go through the financial department to make sure that Neocodex has monetary ability for whatever items planned. The finance committee will also do small financial analysis to determine any trends with the data. Financial plans and budgets will be made a month in advance and posted to the board so that everyone can see the goals of that month as well as the results of last month. The finances department will also conduct fundraisers for the website in order to generate funds for use on the board.
Content
The content department will be in charge of the creation and upkeep of all content on the website. First and foremost, the content department will ensure that topics and guides on the board are up to date. This includes but isn't limited to board guides such as the ranks of Neocodex, board rules and pinned topics in all sections (the content department will not be making the new rules of the board but rather ensuring the rules are up to date). Obviously, the content department will be in close contact with all section leaders and will work in all sections to ensure that all topics have up to date information within them. The content department will also be the main group in charge of the creation of new content on Neocodex. They will then work closely with think tanks to get the ideas accomplished, delegating tasks to the members of the board who wish to give a lending hand. The content department may or may not be the ones doing the actual implementation of the ideas that they come up with.
Management
The management department will handle all member account related issues. The management department will handle the management of member accounts (i.e. name requests, IP lockouts, promotions, demotions, etc.), manage forum permissions and settings, and will be responsible for the training of all new moderators and super moderators. The department will be responsible for coming up with new and innovative ways to train new super moderators and moderators. Furthermore, the department will be responsible for the proper understanding of the rules and policies on Neocodex. The methods to achieve this is up to the department itself but one way to go about it is to give regular reminders of board policies and possible scenarios on the board to ensure that the entire staff has proper understanding of the rules and policies.
Advertisement and Recruitment
The advertisement and recruitment department will be responsible for organizing ways to introduce the web site to public so that the reputation and member base of the site can grow. It will also be responsible for constant communication with the members to identify special events that the Neocodex community can benefit from (i.e. decoder, programming, etc.). Also, the department will be responsible for coming up with benefits and perks for the different user groups and will work to get them implemented into the Neocodex system. This department is also in charge of recruiting new members and researching ways to introduce incentives for attracting members. The department will also be conducting surveys on the general public to see the feelings of the Neocodex members. A small survey monthly or bi-monthly will be good. Finally, the department will be responsible for following up with members who have left the boards in an attempt to bring them back and have them active. Lastly, the advertisement and recruitment department will be responsible for actively searching for affiliations on the Internet for Neocodex.
Project Management
The project management department will be responsible for coordinating various projects within the site. It will work very closely with the content department to ensure that the ideas which come out of it are implemented correctly. This department is mainly a organizational department which will delegate tasks to members on the board who wish to lend a helping hand or use staff manpower in order to complete tasks which are in the pipeline. Essentially the project management department will keep track of the progress of all ongoing projects on Neocodex, set task deadlines, divide up the project to many different people and assemble the work done by the individual into the large final product at the end. The project management department will also be responsible for the regular updates to the administration on the progress of each individual project. This will most likely be done in a constantly up to date page detailing each project that is in progress. The project management department will work very closely with think tanks to make things happen.
Technology
The technology department will be in charge of ensuring all Neocodex technology (forums, codex checks, etc.) is working correctly. They will regularly perform updates to these technologies such as forum software upgrades and ensure that the forum is fun and usable for everyone. The technology department will be responsible for the design of the forum (forum and group permissions set up, software design, etc.) and all running software within the site. The technology department will also make sure that the site's SEO is at an adequate level for the site.
Again, this system is nothing new but rather just a formalization of the infrastructure we had before. It should help in getting things done faster on the board once it is fully implemented and working. The staff is already under way in changing towards this new system and it will also change how we hire new moderators for the better (more on that later).
For future reference, I've also posted a copy with some extra information in the board guides area. Please check there as well.
If I've missed some Neocodex responsibility in what the departments of the staff cover, then please let me know and I'll find a department which can take on that responsibility.
I just wanted to tell you guys about this since I was so excited myself. Let me know what you think .