No members all officers monarchy (conscept based in Guild Wars) - Page 2

SavageX · #11 10-16-2007, 03:51 PM

It is pretty common in a lot of communities, to have everyone want to be the boss but not put the time in to do the work.

Sirius · #12 10-19-2007, 11:00 PM

1 leader, 6-7 officers. Top 2 (3 max) act as leader if leader is away. 15-20 members no more.
I like guilds that are base on this. But its just my opinion. Also i know many small but really good guilds who rely this rule "1 officer for every 4 members"

grusom23 · #13 10-21-2007, 06:14 PM

my guild is rly small cause of member retention probs, im gonna try this our (my chief officers r rl friends so it cant be to bad if it fails)

Zeli · #14 10-27-2007, 02:52 PM

When my guild first started, we did this. We had all been in a guild that was folding up shop, so those of us that wanted to stay together quickly threw together an idea of what we wanted.

At first we made everyone equal - all leaders. It quickly became evident that this wasn't a good long term solution. New people joining the guild didn't have an understanding of our guild, so to make them instant-leaders didn't work out. Some people embraced the role while others were not able to contribute as much time. We changed it to a leadership council of 4 or 5 people and the rest were all officers. Any new members were not made into officers though. They were members. They could rise in rank and become officers after they spent some time in the guild and learned our collective concept of what our guild was about. This helped our guild to maintain our personality/identity while still sharing as much power as people were able to handle. Plus, not everyone wants to be involved in running the guild. Some people simply enjoy being a part of the guild and playing the game. Forcing those folks into a responsibility they don't want does not help your guild. Rather than promoting people and letting them know their new responsibilities in the guild, we let people contribute to the guild as much as they want and then set their membership level accordingly.

Sometimes the whole guild will vote on things. Other times our officers do and other times the leadership council makes a decision and other times one leader may just say "this is how it is" and that's that. It depends on the circumstances. Like someone else mentioned, you can't vote on every single little thing as a whole guild because it takes forever to make a decision. Because of our collective leadership style, our leaders are able to make a gut-call in situations where an immediate decision is needed, based on the goals of the whole guild.

I'd say it's a good way to start out, but don't carve it in stone. Remain flexible and be willing to change your structure with the needs of your guild.

Adythiel · #15 10-27-2007, 03:09 PM

You have to be very cautious when using this approach. For a long time, my guild used this format and we still use it to a lesser extent.

If you are in a large guild, I'd shy away from this myself. It is where the cliche "Too many chiefs, not enough indians" comes from. Open recruiting is fine as long as you are willing to deal with the less than desirables you are bound to get. But I wouldn't give them any privileges beyond inviting new members. And I'd keep them at a rank underneath an officer spot. I've seen too many problems arise from giving everyone officer privileges, especially when there is any kind of guild bank/house/storage involved. Eve Online is quite possibly the one game where an all members are officers type guild would not work.That is just asking to have everything taken. Personally, with the things involved in running a guild I just don't think it is worth it.

Aravis · #16 10-28-2007, 07:37 PM

Too many cooks in the kitchen tend to burn the dinner....
I was talking a bit about this in the "guild loyalty" thread, about one way to create "ownership" among your members regarding your guild. After the dissolution of our first guild, due to bad feelings and "drama" created by some of the leadership, I thought about how to create a guild where everyone would feel included at any given time. We hold monthly meetings where everyone is invited to speak their mind, I keep regular minutes and post the minutes on our forums, and we hold officer elections every other month - we keep the officer number to 4 only, and no one is allowed to campaign as an officer. People are voted on their leadership, helpfulness, knowledge, involvement, etc...I as guild leader do not vote nor do I campaign for anyone - each election time someone volunteers to take votes over the course of exactly one week and keeps a tally, then tells me what the votes are, at which time I ask those elected if they want to take the position. Anyone at any given election can become officer - therefore, everyone feels as though they have a say in matters and "own" the guild. We are fairly picky about who we invite and have an application on our forums as well.
This certainly wouldn't work for everyone - it is simply something that has worked very well for us for 2 years now, with *very* little turnaround and little to no "drama". It is obviously not entirely "unique" - my inspiration is history and *some* modern governments - but it is something I Have yet to see work as effectively as we have made it work in Guild Wars anyway...and not a bad way to keep pretty much everyone happy.

RedQ · #17 10-28-2007, 08:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Severus T Snape

I've tried running a democratic guild in the past and it simply doesn't work. Officers stop caring about guild growth and become clickish and it kills the guild. That and if you leave everything up to a vote it takes entirely to long to make a choice.

Sounds like it didn't work, but perhaps you need to revise your implementation of democracy, rather than to abolish it entirely.

If officers becoming clickish disrupted the guild community, ask yourself why they became clickish and why it disrupted the community. Use the answers to create your solution to how to create a better guild structure. If voting bottlenecked your policy making process, ask yourself how it did so, and after deciding what parts of voting is essential, create a new process that's quicker yet retains the effectiveness of voting.

If you can't identify the weakness and a possible solution, try seeking help from experienced guild leaders by providing them with details on the problems experienced and preferences you have. If this sounds like too much, then you could always go the no officer (or all officer, whatever) route and settle for its limited (yet transparent) nature.

Morph · #18 10-31-2007, 10:32 PM

I have been involved in all mannor of guild leadership, and I have learned that if you make potential members work a little to have your guild tag, you increase your quality. I would rather be in a small guild of high quality members than be in a large guild with monkeys throwing poo at each other.

Your guild will only be as good as your vision of how things should be. It takes a relatively high self esteem to say "My guild is a great guild, and you have to work a little to earn the right to fly my colors" Its amazing how hard someone is willing to work if you set high expectations for them. One of the hardest aspects of leadership is setting firm but fair rules and regulations. If you give up the ability to set boundaries, you are basically asking for a HUGE problem.

Personally speaking, I feel that allowing your general members full privs is a HORRIBLE idea. You are not asking for problems, you are getting on your knees and begging for them.

oronra · #19 11-01-2007, 09:57 PM

I've been in several guilds on a few different games, all with all different layouts on leadership.. Currently I have a guild on GW.

In one PvP guild, each officer was on a rotating leader schedule.
That didn't last long due to conflicting personalities and "good ideas" lol.

Another was a PvE/PvP that had a few officers that did.. hmmm not really sure. Yea that one fell apart due to a Officer that went nutso and kicked everyone.

Another was a more serious roleplay guild on GW. Based on a military structure. We had a full history and Code of Conduct. That went very well. I was one of 3 officers (aka Admirals) My responsibilities were to recruit, screen, get set up on the site we had, and place them.. sorta like the Guild Admin, lol.

The all officer one I was in.. oh man.. it was a mess, no one followed the reqs for age/faction/vent, etc. If you want to do that.. start out with people you know so it doesn't go ugly.. lol

Here's what I'm doing in my own guild that I just got going not too long ago(My friends and I tired of guild hopping

)..
I just can't join another serious PvP guild.. people get too grumpy, lol.

We're making it a bit fun on our structure since the guild name is.. Arbor Bay Beach Party [nKd] rofl.
Beach Babe Guild Leader (me)
Sexy Lifeguards - Officers
Beach Bums - Members

We have our own reqs for age, campaigns, experience, etc.

All of us are expected to bring in a few good people.. Members as well. It's easy to get an officer or myself to invite. Members can just post or send a email if we're not on. We really don't spam recruiting. We usually invite people we've partied with that we would like to have join us. So we're a pretty close group.

Fixeon · #20 11-01-2007, 10:30 PM

Every guild will have its own style, some styles work better for different people and some just work better by design.

Having every one be officer leads to some good things and some bad things. Some examples are officers can invite any one, if you are a rank or skill required guild or clan then sometimes those requirments fall. Also you have no control over player attitude. I perfer to stay away from trouble causing players, by not having the chance to talk with a recruit before he is accepted into the guild can lead to drama, sometimes it can be cought beforehand.

On the good side however with constant recruiting from every one in the guild your guild there should be little need to force 2-3 people to recruit more often. This also leads to less people complaining about how few people are in your guild cuse you can simply tell them if they want more they should recruit more often themselfs. It also gives players a feeling of being accepted and cared about.

If your guild is a have fun and kick back kind of group of people then having every one able to start a guild match is a good thing, not so good if you want a set core group of people to be GvGing so that your rating dosnt go down.

That is just some of the examples of how this style can be good or bad. And depending on how your guild is you might like this style or you might not.

I have been leader of several guilds, and have been in keey positions to help lead lots of other guilds. Most use one system and that is you have a leader, council (officers), members, recruits. Now in Guildwars there really is no "recruit" placement in the guild list so all recruits and members are pretty much counted as a member. I think that a recruit slot is important in any guild. As it lets you break the possible recruit into the guild without hurting your guild. It also gives you an extra step to weed out any trouble makers or possible problems you see forming down the line.

I think what game you play really changes your guild structure and how it works aswell. I have played a lot of first person shooters before getting into the RPG standpoint I am in now and I feel that the way a guild works and operates is very different between games. In first person shooter games if your guild owns a server just about every one on the server will want to join your guild just so they can have admin, so recruitng is no big deal. It is also easier to get officers to do more things for you because in most cases its not as time consuming. In a RPG like guildwars you have to work to get recruits, and work even harder to get good ones. Making it a job few like to do. And since the only real perk most guilds give to officers is a slightly stronger opinion and the option to invite people without asking I have to say that its not a job thats really fun interms of a game. Its work durring something your suppose to be having fun doing. That is why most officers slip when it comes to recruiting. Some people just dont have the time either. They get to play for 1-2 hours a day. They want to spend that time having fun not sitting in some town spamming a msg and not getting any replys.