Mysterious officer stuff

I'm in general a big fan of the officers explaining why they are doing something.

That being said, I believe they should have the ability to debate issues behind closed doors, come to a decision and then explain the final reasoning to the guild.

I think I share what I feel is necessary. There's always some drama that doesn't need to be shown to the greater masses, but sometimes, it's better to get stuff out in the open. Having an officer you can trust is something that separates a good guild from just any other guild. Think of it this way. You have the staff here who looks over the site, and the members. We rarely ever keep secrets from anyone here, but sometimes for the good of the community (say a hacker attack or something) it's better to just keep it between the 'officers' right?

I pretty much agree with Kaze. Why give them more information and drama-fuel than they need to have?

Generally officers should keep silent about as much as the guild trusts them to.

When I was an officer and guild leader, I asked my officers to conduct themselves like a manager or supervisor.

Offer as much transparency as you can without endangering the company (guild). This would lead to me posting that certain issues occurred, the subsequent actions made, and a reasoning behind it. I agree that certain things should be kept from the general populace.

I think its highly situational. Making a change to a loot rule is something that should probably be explained. /Gkicking a drama queen may require more discretion.

Alot depends on the type of guild and the management style its run by as well.

The best answer is to strike a balance that achieves trust (as said above) among the members. Say too much and it seems like you are going overboard to justfy a move, seeming desperate. If you say to little, you may appear to be grinding an axe of moving unilaterally. Its a very hard thing to know where but IMO, you should err on the side of less information and work to see that your guildies trust you to make that decision.

I'd agree with H, it's highly situational. Generally after a discussion I'll announce a decision to the guild/raid, and off we go. I think the guild overall trusts me in whatever I say as there are rarely complaints.

I've had *many* officer problems in the past however with promoting the wrong people and I think that's much worse than not sharing officer details with everyone.

I had two people were extremely close and one was an officer while the other wasn't. It ended in a lot of drama because the officer told everything that went on in officer chat to the other person, including some harsh things that had been said about them.

We've also had problems with too many people having officer access. People who just wanted to hang out in officer chat and didn't actually contribute. It became more of a social event than a place for leadership to make decisions so I did a mass demoting and only left 2 around that I had long trusted. To be totally cliche: too many hands in the cookie jar.

I'm going with minimal officers into LK. I have 2 right now, and that's all I need. I've known them for 3 years and they've always been upfront and honest with me about their opinions on guild matters.

When i GM i use my officers as a backbone to the guild as a whole, when we raided i had them become the managers for each class. When i rp'd i used them in stuff like event officer. As the guild master i manage the guilds dirty biz, such as gkick. But the officers gathers up all the info needed if we need to put down a drama queen.

I think the most important thing is protecting the privacy and well being of guild mates or players. That generally trumps most things in our guild. It creates an atmosphere where those who are vulnerable feel comfortable dealing with officers.

As for things you should tell guildies, for example, my guild has loot council. The decisions are based on the three senior officer (including the GM and myself). The most important aspect of the Loot Council implementation is that every single member is allowed to speak to the officers and expect an answer concerning the loot decision. We find that we will end up talking to someone after the raid 75% of the time concerning a decision. While it very often does come down to "I don't like this person, I don't feel valued, etc., etc," the key is always active engagement with the guild members.

Policy decisions that have not been finalized, however, are different. Certainly informing guildmates of a change in policy prior to its implementation is best since sometimes guildies can bring up very good concerns. When in brainstorming phase, however, keep it to officers and keep it secret.


Don't hang out in officer channels except on officer business. Distinguish a point for the officer meeting, get it hashed out and figured out. Once the officer discussion starts to veer off (and we all know when it does) put a cap on the meeting and take it to a social channel that all guild members can enter. If you allow the officer channel to be a hang out, people, especially officers, will start treating it like a club house. Think of that channel as the office, not a lounge. It's not for hanging out in while you do dailies, and not for a "friends only" 5 man. You know a guild is doing badly when officers retreat to their channel every night to avoid contact with guildies in every way possible.

A more difficult question to me is what to do when you have guild decisions, and officers who are not all at the same level of seniority and therefore you don't include them in some of the preliminary discussions. We have a team of semi-officers who have done wonders for our guild in what we needed them to do, but now its like they get offended if we don't bring them in on every aspect of guild management.

I like the idea of a small officer corps. When you have alot of the best discussion going on in O chat, it should point out that there is a problem with your guild.

I've been around the block a time or two and with the massive, 500 character guild, it really sets apart the officers from the guild population. I suppose its overly naieve to believe you're going to be best pals with all your guildies but O chat shouldn't become gossip central....that can be a huge problem.

Ideally, almost everything should be handled in guild chat. Governance of the guild should be handled by established and transparent rules....there shouldn't be officer powwows going on all the time.. If people are constantly a source of handwringing in O chat, they should be cut loose and rules discussed and implemented in a professional manner.

You can delegate tasks to all sorts of people without them being officers. I honestly think something so simple as a seperate chat channel is a big issue and causes or is a major symptom of many problems guilds have.

Thanks for all the viewpoints! I like the rl work manager/supervisor analogy best I think. I want to be able to trust the officers, but be able to ask a question or two if something affects me.

Good comments all...and no disagreement here.

There is, however, another consideration. My experience has been that officers in general have no problem sharing information on decisions including how they were made...and even revisiting decisions that have not gone as expected. The bigger problem that I have found is one of communication medium. There seems to be little in the way of in-game media that lends itself to asynchronous communication. In other words, if guildies are on when a decision is made, then there is little problem in announcing and explaining the decision and responding to questions. The problem comes up later when people log on after the fact. We can change the message of the day or the limited "Guild Information" but neither is completely satisfactory.

In fairness, some guilds have excellent web sites that provide a good forum for such communication. My last guild had crap for a site. My current guild is working to put together a good one. We do have some sense of urgency since the single biggest source of dissatisfaction is the limited communication.

If anyone out there has good suggestions other than a great website...perhaps something I have overlooked...would be happy to hear it.

I've found that sometimes you gotta take 20 minutes out of a raid night and make it about guild issues. Some people will get aggravated that you're taking raid time up for those matters, but if you keep it succinct, matter of fact and inform them that issues can be brought up and engaged after the raid, its a very effective way to get it out there.