PR/Q&A Thread 1: (Applications)

=PR/Q&A Thread 1: (Applications)=

Hello, community members of PMU!

So, the staff team has decided it’s the best direction to keep PR strolling nicely, since we understand for the past years it hasn’t really been the most apparent thing. Starting now and hopefully continuing into the future, we’ll attempt to have public threads like this one to answer some general questions that we feel should be addressed, as well as providing a more down-to-earth outlook of what’s going on. As applications have recently opened, we’ll focus on that. This topic is open, so you’re free to submit any questions you have(relevant to applications.)
We hope this thread answers some concerns players have, and if you guys think it’s a good idea, we’d love to do stuff like this for other topics such as content, moderation, and etc!
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1. Why were applications closed in the first place?

A: When the staff team started to deteriorate in January 2017, it was almost unanimously suggested to do so until the staff team could be structured again. This didn’t happen until early March, where the new admins were in place, and control was successfully transferred. With the new administration, a push for an application revamp was done by a multitude of staff members to make sure that we could get a new application system out of the way. This delayed the process more than it should have, but we’re ecstatic to finally reopen apps and see how the process goes!

2. Why did applications take so long to reopen?

A: As mentioned, the applications were closed beginning in January 2017. It would be ideal for the staff team to first get a grip on itself(which continues to be steadily progressing along) than to open up new apps and risk new staff in a time period that wouldn’t have been suitable for both the staff team and the newly-promoted staff member. The application system arguably could’ve been opened as early as when the new admins were apparent, but the staff team thought it was better to step back, restructure itself, and formulate a better application process so that we could be completely ready by the time they open.

3. What’s the deal with a new application?

A: The old application system, was unfortunately, not polished well. There were a lot of improvements to be made, especially on the staff’s end, regarding communication, the time period/overall process, lack of a response to denied applications, etc etc. As the staff team was attempting to reform portions of itself lost, we thought it would be better to formulate one of the weaker parts of PMU, the general application system. We believe it’s an extreme improvement over the previous format!

4. How do the applications work?

A: Applications will work as follows:
-There are three phases to an application: Applications Phase, Interview Phase, and Trial Phase.
-An interested applicant will submit a revamped application form for a Chat Mod, Moderator, or Designer to the applications forum, using http://pmuniverse.net/forum/forms.php?do=form&fid=1
-The staff team will look over the app within a given time(usually a week to two weeks), and vote whether or not they feel that they are suitable to move on to the interview phase.
-The staff team will organize an interview with an applicant over an accessible means of communication, such as Skype or Discord.
-The interview will ideally contain 15-20 questions that will be suitably tailored to the applicant in question.
-The staff team will get the results of the interview, and vote on that for a second time. If passing, the applicant will be temporarily promoted to Jr. Mod as a trial phase.
-The applicant will undergo training for the basics and essences of moderation, which is where they will apply their skills over 30 days and maintain the Jr. Mod status.
-Once this concludes, any non Jr. Mod staff will take a vote and decide whether or not the applicant is suitable for the position.
-If you pass that, you’re in!
-All three voting phases will require 50% majority from the staff team.
-Ideally, the whole process prior to the trial phase should be done in a few weeks at most. (Right now, we’ve got a good number of apps, so we’ll see if we can meet that deadline!)
-If at any point you are rejected, you will be notified(as long as you answered Yes to the part of the application which asks if you’d like to be notified).

This is the current system for now, but anything is up for change.

5. What’s up with new ranks?

A: Concurrently, the staff team also decided to restructure the organization of the team. While it seems like it may remain almost entirely the same on an appearance scale, it’s not really as such in regards to a back-end scale(which honestly, we’re still trying to sort out! but big transitions will always leave some aspects in disarray, and we’re sincerely trying to get everything in order.).

-Jr. Moderators will act as a “trial” rank for the most part, this rank will have limited powers compared to all the other ranks of the staff, but will gain the tools they need to fulfill the role the applied for. A training system is currently being attempted to set up in place so that they will gather the fundamentals they need for general moderation and transparency.
-Moderators are the same- they manage the communal part of the game and express the rules of PMU.
-Designers focus on content. They now gain additional editors to manage the portions of the game they need, content-wise.
-Developers work on more back-end and gameplay related stuff- such as the script editor and moves.
-Administrators are the head of the game, and manage all facets of the staff team and the community to make sure everything is as streamlined as possible.

In essence, the new roles are ideally focused to specialize on tasks for each role, making it less of a hierarchy, but more of an organized basis of general work ethic throughout the team.

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This is the staff team’s first attempt at a thread like this, so we apologize if not everything is answered directly. Still, this thread will be open for any questions, comments, or etc you may have. We’ll do our best to address anything directed at us in the posts below.

Thank you for reading, and have a wonderful day.
-PMU Staff Team.

I think Q&A threads are a great idea, and I’d love to see more of them in the future! Thank you guys so much for answering questions the community might’ve been wondering about. :]

I definitely think this Q&A Thread was a very nice idea! Answering questions some members of the community may have during the interview process right here will help clear some confusion that may happen! I would like to see this more often!

This is quite the natural idea and I support it considering Q&A is the best systems usually for those curious yet powerful minds. I will be looking forward to seeing a lot more new stuff like this as well asking questions that come to mind once I can think of something haha.

I’m glad to see there is a structure put in place for applications! its really communicated well between staff and players!

I also support this Q&A, its laid out in points which is easy to read and refreshing!

Keep it up! haha

Player-staff communication is so useful. I thought of many questions about applications! Maybe some applicants aren’t sure if they meet requirements for Designer but are a little more certain they will pass as a Moderator, and to them either role is ok. If they then apply for Designer, what if it turns out they do not quite meet requirements for a Designer but they did also write things showing they do actually meet requirements for a Moderator? From an applicant’s perspective, it would be so bad if they would have to wait 3 months because maybe they got a little too eager to become a Designer and ended up denied a staff post, especially around this time because that is essentially a summer break of waiting! Moderator may then seem to be a safer option then. (Designers do have the same in-game moderating permissions as Moderators, or at least I hope they do…)

But in my opinion it would be a shame if this scares away potential Designers who would actually have been accepted, they are so important for new content! Before we’ve had many “temp-Mappers” because of deadlines, so some may reason it would be safer to apply for Moderator and then hopefully be promoted. Which feels kinda unstructured.

Because of this, applicants might ask themselves, wouldn’t it be possible to apply for both? If they do not meet up with the requirements for a Designer, they could still have a chance to become a Moderator? One really big problem though would be that previous applicants may find it really unfair, they could of applied for both for an increased chance.

So what should an applicant do if they are uncertain about being good enough for Designer post? Maybe a bit more info on the actual requirements for being a Designer could help. And also differences in requirements for Moderator too because it is possible the two roles have different requirement levels of “moderating skill” now that we’re trying to move away form a hierarchical system. Or maybe staff do not just look at role-specific requirements, but they also “average” these skills with an overall suitability for teamwork etc. That is a nice thing actually to emphasise, since then it means Moderator and Designer positions have more similar levels of requirement so one is not really “safer” than the other. Also, I could imagine some applicants may write about skills in moderating even if they apply for Designer, which might unfortunately make the application system a bit messy, but what would staff think of it? Oh and also, an explicit answer to the quick question “is it allowed to apply for both in the same application?”

It’s great to see a thread like this, thanks for letting us know what’s going on. I’ll start with a couple questions I’ve been wondering about:

  1. About how many staff members do you guys want to take on for each position? For curiosity’s sake I’d also like to see the numbers for higher up ranks like Administrator that are already filled.

  2. Curious about the same thing that Whimsy’s asking: Is it possible to apply for multiple positions (or indicate somehow that an applicant would be fine with one of any number of positions)?

  3. Would the Jr. Moderators help run the weekly events or is that going to be limited to the other staff ranks only? Things like Dodgeball in particular require staff participation, so it would be good to get a solid ruling established for that.

I think this a great initiative! Lots of useful information has been given.

@Whimsy, some good questions there.

I have to say, I personally don’t think it’s neccesary or even good to have designer match moderator as a ‘safer’ option or even think much about what is safer as they are different roles. Trying to make designer ‘safer’ may degrade that role and hamper development and potentially other area’s of progress/management. These are quite different roles and that’s neccesary and as far as I know (correct me if I’m wrong) each role of staff requires to be able to moderate. I suppose moderators have to focus on moderating so they much do it extra well whereas other staff members are to moderate where they can though it’s not a priority or they may not even have to moderate at all (again, correct me if I’m wrong).
Designing is a more creative role while moderation is more of a noticing/correction/community maintainance task… I think! I think it’s -primarily- the player’s responsibility to decide what role they are most suited for rather than think about what is -safe- as that does not give (me personally) a sense of ones (applicant’s) own responsibility as much.

Basically I think, Designer if you think you can moderate well enough to fill in every now and then and most importantly have the creative skills or talent neccesary
Moderator if you think you can communicate well, remain objective, clear and have enough time to monitor the community.
I have probably missed some points in the things above. I believe though, it’s mainly up to player to think about what may be neccesary/good skills and whether they have them or not/could acquire them. Otherwise players could say well yes I can do all this and that (perfect application/CV, copied) but in practice it shows they don’t have that/know what that all entails.

Also, I think the 3 minute waiting time is fair. It gives players time needed to reflect and staff also get a bit of a breather as if this waiting period were not there I imagine some players (potentially) could send in re-apllication again and again and doing that in withing short amounts of time inbetween applications means it’s highly likely they haven’t thought much about why they were rejected in the first place.

Is what I all believe, makes sense to me personally.

firstly, thanks for the kind words and positive reception! always cool to hear. glad to hear that this thread seems to be working well.

there’s no estimate, because there’s seemingly no cap. i believe that if the staff team believes that (e.g) an applicant is capable for a position, we wouldn’t deny them even if we had 5, 15, or 25 staff members. (if otherwise, we’d probably close applications!)
“higher”(or rather, ranks that can’t be applied to) ranks are harder to answer, to be honest.

i’m sure nobody would be opposed to Jr. Moderators helping out with events. i don’t see why not. o:

yeah, “temporary” promotions were a messy scenario and we don’t intend to continue such ideals.

for a three month wait, we strongly desire people to think about the reasons why they’ve been rejected, and not necessarily for the basis to copy-paste applications. we really want people to prove that they have capabilities to handle a staff position, and more time to think about a potential reason(s) why one may have faltered leaves a lot of room for improvement, imo.

for your other questions, honestly, Ouli provided a clean explanation, but I can input my two cents:

in an application, i think one needs to have some form of confidence. if one is having trouble to what to apply for, how would you perform as a staff member where your role would be otherwise decided? think of a position where you feel your skills would be most needed, or in a role you’d perform best in compared to the other. applying to be a staff member isn’t as specific as being a moderator or a designer, really. it’s entirely possible that the roles may overlap in some aspect(e.g moderators could suggest/brainstorm ideas for content, and designers could help make calls based on a moderation case), but in one way or another the intention is for a staff member to focus on their role’s abilities.

i don’t believe that there is a safer option when it comes to applying. as people should focus on the roles they look to apply for, so neither rank should be “easier” to get in compared to the other- (as if it was, i don’t see how that’d be fair to an applicant to either role, right?). if you’re a designer, we expect you to help around with in-game content. as a moderator, your job should be more communal and help around with moderation if available. we intend to look at your application and decide whether or not you can apply your skills to the rank you signed up for. either way, no rank should have, or intends to have, a higher “qualification” value than the other overall.

(of course these are my thoughts and not necessarily representative of the whole staff team as a whole.)

i hope i may have answered all the questions I saw. feel free to post if you think I may be misguided, or shoot me/another staff member a PM!

Yeah, I suppose knowing exactly what one wants to help out with is to be expected. When I was asking about whether it’d be possible to apply for several positions at once, I was thinking not of any rank being “safer” to apply for, but of people that might think they have the capacity to help out in whichever role needs it the most at a given moment (e.g. someone who would be qualified for both Moderator AND Designer).

Which I guess leads me to another question. I don’t necessarily need this question answered if it’s probing too deep into the behind-the-scenes stuff, but I am curious…

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Would staff team role changes (say, a Designer already on the staff team wants to change their role to Moderator or Developer, etc) be something that could be requested by the player in question anytime (within reason) while they’re a staff member?

Also, for roles not open to the public at this moment in particular (e.g. Developer) would an internal search be conducted first to fill those roles if it’s deemed necessary to get more people into that role?

apologies, meant to respond way way sooner…

  1. i think it would be fairly hard to micromanage and swap roles at any given time, so it’d be preferable if one were to focus on said role only. i’m sure that it could be done, but it would be tedious if asked often.

  2. at this moment, it’s very unlikely that roles not on the current list of applicable ranks will be open. can change in the future, but as of now I doubt it.