Giant's Lair has been one of the better communities I have been a part of, and I do hope this is not the final chapter in this communities story. That being said, I do think that a lot of the structure of this community needs to be taken apart and rebuilt if wants that chance at success. Alas, tomorrow is my first day back to work in over 3 months of recovering from my herniated disc. In all the communities I have been part of in the past, I was always the one to hold out even when everyone else has given up, but I am getting too old for that lifestyle. I need to think about myself, and the stress of the uphill battle that would be involved in trying to rebuild community trust after all that's happened. That said, I hold no ill will towards anybody, I do truly still believe that this community was and still is great and could bounce back from this AS LONG as we are willing to look within our system and finally recognize the flaws that have led to these issues.
To be brief, I don't think anyone is truly responsible for the shortcomings of the community, but rather the system itself. I think from the beginning, the staffing system that was setup in GL does make sense from a logical standpoint for a small team... however that system becomes horribly inefficient as a team grows and especially inefficient as the community planned for expansion. Our system is far too stressful for mods who are constantly pushed to perform their best and feel put under a lens, then that is amplified when a mod wants to push for admin. If a mod isn't already burnt by the time they apply, they will probably get burned out waiting to get their shot as admin due to the slot process making it so the only times new admins come up is if an admin leaves, or becomes a lead. I was told all the horror stories of "dampening my expectations for admin" because apparently admin chats are a shitshow, but I chose to ignore most of that because it wasn't my first rodeo, and I have been part of admin / manager teams where people fucking hated each other, so how could it possibly be bad when I am joining an admin team where we all respect each other? Well, the truth is I never once felt bad about a conversation in admins, I thought the conversations we have in there are good and civil... but despite that it also never felt like what we said never carried the weight it should have because in most cases, once our conversation is done, the final verdicts are had above us. I had a lot of stuff that I wanted to help out with in the community and was enthusiastic starting out in admin to get them started, but the best way I can describe it was that almost everything I wanted to do got slowed down by an almost "bureaucratic" process. That process is slow in large part I feel because I don't think Admins or Lead Admins truly know what their discretionary levels are to do projects, so a lot falls on Jabba because ultimately everyone goes to him to ask for permission, and that absolutely shouldn't be the case because one person being the rubber stamper is not at all conducive to a productive or expanding community, I also dont think thats his fault... however it is one of those things that needs to be shaken down so Leads, devs and admins feel like they have more freedom to do what they want and need. The longest lasting community I was part of, Admins were the primary force of everything, Leads oversaw them and the Owner only ever stepped in when absolutely necessary... I feel like this community's biggest problem is that we have that structure flipped upside down.
Now that being said, I don't know what goes on at Lead+ levels so I cannot say for certain what the core issues are at that level where this bureaucratic slowdown happen. All I do know is everyone up there are great people and they deserve the best, and I think whats best for them, for Jabba, for the admins, for the mods, and the overall community, is to start fresh and really just look at everything; what are all the things that cause stress on the staff team, what are the things that stress the devs, what are the things that stress the Leads, what does the overall community dislike... The fact of the matter is we shouldn't have these problems since we have a great team, but systemic issues are ones that creep up over time and then hit a community all at once if they havent been taken seriously until its too late.
While it is bittersweet to step down when there was so much I wanted to do to build this community up, it is what's best for myself. I will still be around and I do wish us the best, hopefully together the community can bounce back from the negative spiral it has been falling into. I love y'all
- Cel
To be brief, I don't think anyone is truly responsible for the shortcomings of the community, but rather the system itself. I think from the beginning, the staffing system that was setup in GL does make sense from a logical standpoint for a small team... however that system becomes horribly inefficient as a team grows and especially inefficient as the community planned for expansion. Our system is far too stressful for mods who are constantly pushed to perform their best and feel put under a lens, then that is amplified when a mod wants to push for admin. If a mod isn't already burnt by the time they apply, they will probably get burned out waiting to get their shot as admin due to the slot process making it so the only times new admins come up is if an admin leaves, or becomes a lead. I was told all the horror stories of "dampening my expectations for admin" because apparently admin chats are a shitshow, but I chose to ignore most of that because it wasn't my first rodeo, and I have been part of admin / manager teams where people fucking hated each other, so how could it possibly be bad when I am joining an admin team where we all respect each other? Well, the truth is I never once felt bad about a conversation in admins, I thought the conversations we have in there are good and civil... but despite that it also never felt like what we said never carried the weight it should have because in most cases, once our conversation is done, the final verdicts are had above us. I had a lot of stuff that I wanted to help out with in the community and was enthusiastic starting out in admin to get them started, but the best way I can describe it was that almost everything I wanted to do got slowed down by an almost "bureaucratic" process. That process is slow in large part I feel because I don't think Admins or Lead Admins truly know what their discretionary levels are to do projects, so a lot falls on Jabba because ultimately everyone goes to him to ask for permission, and that absolutely shouldn't be the case because one person being the rubber stamper is not at all conducive to a productive or expanding community, I also dont think thats his fault... however it is one of those things that needs to be shaken down so Leads, devs and admins feel like they have more freedom to do what they want and need. The longest lasting community I was part of, Admins were the primary force of everything, Leads oversaw them and the Owner only ever stepped in when absolutely necessary... I feel like this community's biggest problem is that we have that structure flipped upside down.
Now that being said, I don't know what goes on at Lead+ levels so I cannot say for certain what the core issues are at that level where this bureaucratic slowdown happen. All I do know is everyone up there are great people and they deserve the best, and I think whats best for them, for Jabba, for the admins, for the mods, and the overall community, is to start fresh and really just look at everything; what are all the things that cause stress on the staff team, what are the things that stress the devs, what are the things that stress the Leads, what does the overall community dislike... The fact of the matter is we shouldn't have these problems since we have a great team, but systemic issues are ones that creep up over time and then hit a community all at once if they havent been taken seriously until its too late.
While it is bittersweet to step down when there was so much I wanted to do to build this community up, it is what's best for myself. I will still be around and I do wish us the best, hopefully together the community can bounce back from the negative spiral it has been falling into. I love y'all
- Cel
