One year as a staff member.

It’s been one year to this day that a major accomplishment happened: @Xenon followed me on the forums.


Also one year as a staff member.

It’s hard to believe that it has been one year a staff member. This is quite the milestone, and since it’s a milestone I feel obligated to make some long wall of text that only half of you will read that is supposed to be super inspirational or something.


This thread will be divided into three parts: What I learned, some thank yous, and what’s next.


So, in 365 days as a staff member what did I learn? There are many things you can learn while being a staff member, and none of them have to do with hacking, griefing, or when to warn someone. A lot of these skills are skills that you will learn later on in life.


The largest thing I learned is that being a staff member, or for that matter growing up, is about making choices, and dealing with the consequences.


This should be prefaced by me saying that the word consequences has a bit of a negative connotation. The definition of a consequence is “a result or effect of an action or condition”. This can mean that a consequence is good, bad or otherwise.


The most basic choice a staff member will take is “Should I take action or not” This can also be defined as "Should this player be punished or not?” This is a choice that staff members are well trained on. And while mistakes are made, staff members generally strive to make the right choice. While this choice can be an important one, it is an easier choice to make. The choices can become much more difficult.


Staff members have a choice in how the interact within the community. Are you going to be publically visible in tab, chatting and interacting with the player base? Or are you going to be in /d or spectating so there is an illusion that no staff is present. Both of these have their advantages. While the later option might allow you to catch more rule breakers, it does not do much in how the community thinks of you. As someone who has taken the “stealth” approach I often get the reputation of being a “strict” staff member. To me this does not bother me, however I won’t be winning any J&H awards any time soon.


You also have a choice of how you want to work within the staff team. It is very easy to become focused on your promotion, and your success. While being ambitious and having goals is good, it’s important to not forget the option of being more of a team player, and not being as focused on your own success. You see when you “compete” for a promotion the staff team collectively becomes weaker. This is true for a lot of organizations. And while you might climb the ranks faster if your are more focused on your own success, it can backfire when you find yourself being passed up on for promotion. This again leads to the choice of “Are you going to supportive of what happened, or are you going to be negative about it.” For me I have been passed up for promotion for every rank at least once (It took me over two years to get staff lol). However I knew that me being passed up on was because someone was more qualified, and that in return would benefit the server. Don’t get me wrong, sometimes you get shafted, and that sucks(again, two years). However I assure that good things happen to those who are patient.


Moving on, as a staff member you have a choice to make of when to fight your battles. As you climb the ranks, you will find more situations that are not black and white, and people are going to disagree. As a staff member you have to decide what battles you want to fight, and then realize with some you are not always going to win them. While you can debate every single thing you agree/disagree with, that becomes taxing for the other people around you. I am not suggesting that you change your morals, or “sell out”, however there are some battles that are not worth fighting. When you learn the balance of when to take stand on something and when to not, you will find that your relation with your fellow staff members will improve, and people will be more inclined to listen to what you have to say. This is something that takes time, and no one on the staff teams has mastered. However being mindful of this is something that I believe made me successful.


Similarly, staff members have a choice of do they want to get involved in drama, or do they want to put there head down and focus on working. Drama can be enticing, however it never ends in reward. I have found that limiting the amount of drama you put yourself in will make you a bit easier to work with, and that in turn can lead to success.


These are only some of the choices that staff members have to make. And while this thread was written in the context of being a staff member on a minecraft server, it can be applied to just about any job.


That said, while I had a large hand in how I got here, I would not of made it here without the help of a few people. I would like to thank these people. If I don’t tag you it’s nothing personal.


First I would like to thank all of the current, and past, administration team for giving me giving me the opportunity to work on the staff team. I hope you see a return on the chance you took with me.

I would like to specifically thank @NESlover . While I’ll never be sure exactly why I was promoted, I am fairly confident that you were a big part as to why. For that I am grateful.

Nes is also someone that you can talk to, and know that he will give you the honest answer and hold his share of the work.


I would also like to thank @ItsHarry. (Jerry you're cool too, okay?). You guys have no idea how much work both the owners put into this server. I can assure you they are not sitting back and collecting paychecks. And whatever money they do make, if any, they deserve it. They both work unbelievably hard developing minigames, rank features, and moderation tools. Harry in particular also plays a massive role with mid-high level staff stuff, and is a driving force behind the staff team. I would like to thank Harry for putting up with all of our dumb shit we do as staff members from time to time, and not killing us in the process.


I would like to thank @YFIOTR for being someone to talk to at every point of the journey. Evan works extremely hard, and is someone that will always give you an honest take on what he thinks.


I would like to thank @VideoKilledTheRadioStar for being an exceptional human being, and not being afraid to tell me to pull my head out of my ass when needed.


I would like to thank @Slevin @Heatdude Da Waffle @Unprepossessing and @Auxilium__ for helping me early on as a helper. You guys help give me the confidence and skills I needed to be successful later on.


I would like to thank anyone who was a staff member when I was for being able to work together. Someone of you probably don't have the highest opinion of me, however every single person brought a unique skill set to the table.


Finally I would like to thank this community. Without you there would be no staff team. There would be no server. Besides that the community is always here to put staff in check when needed. One of the reasons I believe the server has maintained it’s success is because this server has always allowed an open door for talking about the staff team. The staff team is not untouchable, and you guys remind us of that.


Alright so what’s next?


I had said earlier in this thread that staff members have choices to make. One of those choices is whether or not to stay part of the staff team on move on from it. This might be one of the most difficult choices to make.


For me I am making the choice to stay. I plan to stay for as long as I can, and have no real plans to leave any time soon. Of course with college just around the corner that can all change quickly.


I am not sure where my journey will go, or where it will end. All I can say is that I have the enjoyed this journey so far.


This was long, and maybe a bit dramatic (Honestly you should be expecting this by now lol) but I hope that you all got something out of this.


Thanks for reading.

 

Congratulations on 1 year as a staff member, Scout.
Reading this has made me realize how many mistakes I actually made during my time as a staff member and how many things I could have done differently. I don't think I had the right mindset.
However reading this has given me more knowledge on how to be a good staff member and I believe that all the staff reading this will think more before they act and hopefully make good decisions. (Not saying y'all make bad decisions .-.)

Even though I've never really shown it, I do appreciate your work and dedication. Thank you :)