As I mentioned in the Cabinet announcement, I would like to have the Executive Staff set up within the first two weeks of this term. I think we can do it by the weekend, so let's aim for that internally.
The Executive Staff is meant as a one-stop employment center, where people can see all of the ways in which they can contribute to the Executive. By having everything in a single place, we make navigation easier for newcomers, and we can concentrate promotion and advertise to this single forum.
Obviously, you can continue to do targetted recruitment for your Ministries outside the Executive Staff, e.g., by directly talking to your desired appointees through PM or IRC. If possible, I would prefer to have them, once they accept to join your Ministry, post an application inside the Executive Staff. Even though just a formality, it will help to create some activity.
I list below a few issues that need to be sorted out for the set up of the Executive Staff. I discuss my own thoughts on each one of them, but I am also looking for your own opinions and feedback. Also, if you think there is any other issue that should be on this list, please bring it forward.
Membership and services
--Should the Executive Staff be open to everyone with a nation in the region (i.e., citizens), or to RA members only? I am personally torn on this issue and would like to hear your opinions.
On one hand, opening it up to all citizens would allow those who are not interested in legislating, or in maintaining the RA activity requirements, to contribute to the Executive. On the other hand, I am not sure whether we should be diverting attention from the RA in terms of recruitment. By requiring members to be in the RA before joining the Executive Staff, we have a possibly effective way of boosting RA numbers.
As a note, membership in the NPA (which will continue to recruit independently of the Executive Staff) does not have RA membership as a prerequisite. So maybe we can take a hint from there.
--The exact services we will be recruiting for through the Executive Staff depend on the Ministries' needs. In general, any function within your Ministry that can be more effectively performed through contributions by multiple members should be turned into a service, and added to the Executive Staff.
Straightforward cases are the Diplomatic Corps and reporters for The Northern Lights. Home Affairs most likely will need multiple members to act as Mentors (forum welcomers), and can recruit for that from the Executive Staff. Likewise for in-game recruitment in the form of telegrams. Culture can recruit members to help run festivals, or to staff the University.
I will leave the exact details up to the Ministers, but I would like to see each Ministry offering at least one form of employment opportunity. Those you recruit to your staff will then get access to the corresponding joinable groups within your Ministry.
Location and organization
--Regarding location, I would prefer the Executive Staff forum to be as visible as possible, and certainly no deper than first-level subforum (so that a link to it is visible in the index page, on some forum's subforum list).
A few possibilities include: 1) Make the Executive Staff an index-level forum. 2) Move "Registration and Membership" to the index, and make the Executive Staff a subforum of that. 3) Merge "The Docks" and "Registration and Membership", and make the Executive Staff a subforum of that. (As a note, we should probably do this merging anyway, I am not sure why we need a separate sub-forum for the four pinned threads "Registration and Membership" contains.)
Note that, regardless of what we and the admins decide for location, the Executive Staff will be getting one of the three advertisement slots in the newsbox, replacing the Diplomatic Corps.
--Regarding the organisation of the content inside the Executive Staff forum, so far I am considering two possibilities.
The first is that Ministers will be posting separate threads to advertise the various services (and provide description of the duties of course). These threads will be open only to Ministers, who can use them to announce expansions in staff, or just post to bump. Then, there will be a single application thread, where members can apply to join the various services, possibly also rank their preferences, etc.
The second is that there will be separate threads for each service, with the OP being a description and the rest of the posts being members applying to join. While this seems more straightforward, I am worried that we will end up with most people just mindlessly applying for everything.
Ribbons and awards
In my experience from other regions, fancy ribbons and awards are generally effective in encouraging new members to join in, and those who have already joined to continue working. There is also evidence that they are effective in the NPA, where we have been using them for years.
-- Currently, we use the ambassadorial ribbons, which you can see in various members' (e.g., COE's) signatures. I would like to expand see this scheme expanded to the entire Executive Staff. Below are some ideas on how this should be done, but I am also looking for your feedback.
We should probably have different ribbons for each service inside the Executive Staff, and possibly different ribbon versions within each service. For example, ribbons for TNL reporters and correspondents, ribbons for Ambassadors (possibly different from the ones we currently use), ribbons for welcomers, etc.
Visually, I think the ribbons should have both unifying features that would apply to all of the Executive Staff, and characteristics distinguishing among the various services. For example, the ribbons could be short and wide images, where the left half is common among the various version (e.g., TNP logo and the words "Executive Staff"), and the right half is representative of the respective service (e.g., The Northern Lights logo for contributors to the newspaper).
--I would like to see each Ministry recruiting from inside the Execustive Staff give out, say, monthly awards.
These would recognize excellent service by the Staff members. For example, the Ministry of Communications could award their best reporters (both in terms of frequency and quality), Home Affairs could award their hardest working welcomers (by amount of PMs sent), etc. Preferably there should different levels for each award, so that those that win the first level continue to work towards the second, and so on. Their exact nature and number can be discussed separately for each Ministry.
In terms of design, uniformity here probably is not necessary. I am inclined to leave the design up to you and see what you can come up with for your own Ministries.
The awards could come either from the Ministers themselves, or by the Delegate on your recommendation. Alternatively, we could have a second series of more prestigious "Delegate's awards", one for each broad area of the Executive Government, given out at most once per term and preferably towards the end of the term.
Let me know of your thoughts on all of the above.
The Executive Staff is meant as a one-stop employment center, where people can see all of the ways in which they can contribute to the Executive. By having everything in a single place, we make navigation easier for newcomers, and we can concentrate promotion and advertise to this single forum.
Obviously, you can continue to do targetted recruitment for your Ministries outside the Executive Staff, e.g., by directly talking to your desired appointees through PM or IRC. If possible, I would prefer to have them, once they accept to join your Ministry, post an application inside the Executive Staff. Even though just a formality, it will help to create some activity.
I list below a few issues that need to be sorted out for the set up of the Executive Staff. I discuss my own thoughts on each one of them, but I am also looking for your own opinions and feedback. Also, if you think there is any other issue that should be on this list, please bring it forward.
Membership and services
--Should the Executive Staff be open to everyone with a nation in the region (i.e., citizens), or to RA members only? I am personally torn on this issue and would like to hear your opinions.
On one hand, opening it up to all citizens would allow those who are not interested in legislating, or in maintaining the RA activity requirements, to contribute to the Executive. On the other hand, I am not sure whether we should be diverting attention from the RA in terms of recruitment. By requiring members to be in the RA before joining the Executive Staff, we have a possibly effective way of boosting RA numbers.
As a note, membership in the NPA (which will continue to recruit independently of the Executive Staff) does not have RA membership as a prerequisite. So maybe we can take a hint from there.
--The exact services we will be recruiting for through the Executive Staff depend on the Ministries' needs. In general, any function within your Ministry that can be more effectively performed through contributions by multiple members should be turned into a service, and added to the Executive Staff.
Straightforward cases are the Diplomatic Corps and reporters for The Northern Lights. Home Affairs most likely will need multiple members to act as Mentors (forum welcomers), and can recruit for that from the Executive Staff. Likewise for in-game recruitment in the form of telegrams. Culture can recruit members to help run festivals, or to staff the University.
I will leave the exact details up to the Ministers, but I would like to see each Ministry offering at least one form of employment opportunity. Those you recruit to your staff will then get access to the corresponding joinable groups within your Ministry.
Location and organization
--Regarding location, I would prefer the Executive Staff forum to be as visible as possible, and certainly no deper than first-level subforum (so that a link to it is visible in the index page, on some forum's subforum list).
A few possibilities include: 1) Make the Executive Staff an index-level forum. 2) Move "Registration and Membership" to the index, and make the Executive Staff a subforum of that. 3) Merge "The Docks" and "Registration and Membership", and make the Executive Staff a subforum of that. (As a note, we should probably do this merging anyway, I am not sure why we need a separate sub-forum for the four pinned threads "Registration and Membership" contains.)
Note that, regardless of what we and the admins decide for location, the Executive Staff will be getting one of the three advertisement slots in the newsbox, replacing the Diplomatic Corps.
--Regarding the organisation of the content inside the Executive Staff forum, so far I am considering two possibilities.
The first is that Ministers will be posting separate threads to advertise the various services (and provide description of the duties of course). These threads will be open only to Ministers, who can use them to announce expansions in staff, or just post to bump. Then, there will be a single application thread, where members can apply to join the various services, possibly also rank their preferences, etc.
The second is that there will be separate threads for each service, with the OP being a description and the rest of the posts being members applying to join. While this seems more straightforward, I am worried that we will end up with most people just mindlessly applying for everything.
Ribbons and awards
In my experience from other regions, fancy ribbons and awards are generally effective in encouraging new members to join in, and those who have already joined to continue working. There is also evidence that they are effective in the NPA, where we have been using them for years.
-- Currently, we use the ambassadorial ribbons, which you can see in various members' (e.g., COE's) signatures. I would like to expand see this scheme expanded to the entire Executive Staff. Below are some ideas on how this should be done, but I am also looking for your feedback.
We should probably have different ribbons for each service inside the Executive Staff, and possibly different ribbon versions within each service. For example, ribbons for TNL reporters and correspondents, ribbons for Ambassadors (possibly different from the ones we currently use), ribbons for welcomers, etc.
Visually, I think the ribbons should have both unifying features that would apply to all of the Executive Staff, and characteristics distinguishing among the various services. For example, the ribbons could be short and wide images, where the left half is common among the various version (e.g., TNP logo and the words "Executive Staff"), and the right half is representative of the respective service (e.g., The Northern Lights logo for contributors to the newspaper).
--I would like to see each Ministry recruiting from inside the Execustive Staff give out, say, monthly awards.
These would recognize excellent service by the Staff members. For example, the Ministry of Communications could award their best reporters (both in terms of frequency and quality), Home Affairs could award their hardest working welcomers (by amount of PMs sent), etc. Preferably there should different levels for each award, so that those that win the first level continue to work towards the second, and so on. Their exact nature and number can be discussed separately for each Ministry.
In terms of design, uniformity here probably is not necessary. I am inclined to leave the design up to you and see what you can come up with for your own Ministries.
The awards could come either from the Ministers themselves, or by the Delegate on your recommendation. Alternatively, we could have a second series of more prestigious "Delegate's awards", one for each broad area of the Executive Government, given out at most once per term and preferably towards the end of the term.
Let me know of your thoughts on all of the above.
