Topic List

[Luke Hill]

Hey guys,

The following is my preliminary list for topics within the member handbook. If you see anything missing, let me know, and if you'd like to see items moved/combined, let me know. This assumes general consent with some of the things we've talked about already, notably Liam's idea about organizational hierarchies and of doing away with chapters. I use the same terminology for many of the things as the MES uses; if that's a problem, assume the terms are just common definitions to foster discussion and we'll envision new terms when discussing said item. Alrighty, here we go..!

Preliminary discussions: WILL NOT GO IN THE HANDBOOK

1. What do we want most?

2. What do we want to avoid the most?

3. Five words (to summarize your most important desires/fears re: this project)

Chapter 1: Introduction; The Basics

1. What is the GWB? Existential questions galore!

2. What am I entitled to as a member?

3. What is expected of me as a member?

Chapter 2: How to take part

1. Starting fresh

a. Venues

b. Domains

2. Organization above the local level

b. Affiliates

c. Global interaction

3. Global rules and restrictions

a. Rules addendums

b. Special approvals

Chapter 3: So who does what, exactly?

1. Officer positions: An Overview

a. What a Storyteller does

b. What a Coordinator does

2. Positions within the club

a. At the local level

(i) Venue Storytellers

(ii) Domain Storyteller

(iii) Domain Coordinator

b. At the Affiliate level

(i) Genre Storytellers

(ii) Board of Directors

-- Director of Storytelling

-- Director of Coordinating

-- Other Directors

c. At the Global level

(i) the Master Storyteller

(ii) The Club Director (or Global Coordinator, or Master Coordinator, or so on)

Chapter 4: Receiving your just rewards

1. Prestige

a. What is prestige

b. Earning Prestige

2. Member class

a. What is member class

b. Earning member class

Chapter 5: When Things go Awry

1. Disciplinary actions

a. Life cycle of a disciplinary action

(i) Complaint / Infraction

(ii) Investigation

(iii) Decision

(iv) Punishment / Documentation

b. How to handle investigations

(i) Member privacy, and what to/not to reveal

(ii) What is and is not appropriate evidence

(iii) What is a witch hunt, and how do I prevent it?

(iv) Assuming the best, seeking the truth

c. Appropriate levels of action

(i) Types of punishment

-- Making the punishment fit the behavior

-- Why being fair is more important than being tough

(ii) Trivial actions / infractions

(iii) Minor actions / infractions

(iv) Moderate actions / infractions

(v) Major actions / infractions

(vi) Severe actions / infractions

2. Appeals

a. What is an appeal, and when it should happen

b. To whom do I appeal?

c. How do I file an appeal?

d. What an appeal can and can't do

3. Removal of an absent/unacceptable officer: the vote of no confidence (VoNC)

a. When to VoNC

b. What must happen prior to conducting a VoNC

c. Who conducts a VoNC, and how do they do it?

4. Problems between members: conflict resolution

a. When to use conflict resolution

b. What is conflict resolution

c. The conflict resolution process

(i) Direct discussion

-- When to step away for a moment, and when to let others step away (the 24 hour rule)

(ii) Mediated discussion

Chapter 6: How we choose - officer (s)election procedures

1. General (s)election procedures

a. Calls for election, and appropriate applications

b. The question & answer period

c. Voting, and counting votes

d. Identifying a winner

2. At the local level

a. Venue Storyteller (s)election(s)

If we want VSTs to be selected rather than elected, here's the place to say so

b. Domain Storyteller (s)election(s)

c. Domain Coordinator (s)election(s)

3. At the affiliate level

a. Genre storyteller (s)election(s)

b. Board of Directors (s)election(s)

4. At the global level

a. Master Storyteller (s)election(s)

b. Club Director (s)election(s)

Chapter 7: Communications

If you really want, I'll put together topic headings for this chapter, but I really think it can be dispensed with entirely.

How does that work for you guys?

Luke Hill

GWB2004031302

[Amanda Spikol]

Luke,

1. I think what I want most in the new handbook is something
comprehensive that will be easy to use and not off-putting or
overwhelming to new members; a living document that can be adapted and
changed as time passes to best meet the needs of the organization.

2. I think what we should try to avoid the most is over-doing things
by making language over-complicated, building in too much bureaucracy,
and/or making this a tome to beat people with, rather than a guide for
our organization.

3. Keep it simple and concise.

- Amanda S.
GWB2007029463


On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 9:32 AM, Luke Hill <luke.b...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hey guys,

[Luke Hill]

Amanda,

Good response. I totally meant for the prelim stuff to be a separate discussion, but points well made all the same. If anyone cares to respond here, go ahead, or I'll put up a thread this afternoon for that purpose. Either works for me, since both foster the same discussion.

Also, are you good on the list of topics? Nothing was missing or parsed too finely for your tastes? I want to start with a general consensus on the roadmap we'll be operating by, so that can be out of the way and real discussions can happen.

Luke

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[Amanda Spikol]

Luke,

Ooops, sorry...still snow in my brain this morning. Yep, all's looking
good to me. :)

- Amanda S.
GWB2007029463

[Luke Hill]

Amanda,

Ooops, sorry...still snow in my brain this morning.

No worries! 6+1=4+3=5+2=7. It doesn't matter how you do it, just that it gets done. I'm glad you're good with the topics. I'll let the others chime in (and do chime in, please; gmail does not have a "like" feature :P), and then we can adjust if necessary and move on.

Luke

[Jessi Sauter]

> Preliminary discussions: WILL NOT GO IN THE HANDBOOK
>
> 1. What do we want most?

A clear, concise MH that is functional and easy to use.

> 2. What do we want to avoid the most?

Unnecessary verbage. Unnecessary rules. Overwhelming language. A
system that has loopholes solely to be exploited when necessary.

> 3. Five words (to summarize your most important desires/fears re: this
> project)

Fair, balanced, concise and DONE!

The Outline-

I like the outline. Do we need to attach some dates, or have some
kind of timeline by which we intend to have this sucker done? Having
a due date will make planning for things outside the MH a lot more
useful.

I didn't see a Code of Conduct (which might be my lack of coffee. I
miss coffee.) but I really liked the one we came up with. Can we
still use that, or do we think we can do without a Code? I'm not
particularly attached, but I did quite like that one.

Jessi

--
Jessi Sauter
GWB2002023219

[Luke Hill]

Jessi,

I like the outline.  Do we need to attach some dates, or have some kind of timeline by which we intend to have this sucker done?

I'll do that once we get a consensus on the outline. I want to have a list of things we're going to discuss before I break that list down into a timeline or set deadlines for things.

I didn't see a Code of Conduct (which might be my lack of coffee.  I miss coffee.)

I envisioned that in the "What is expected of me as a member" section, so Chapter 1, Sec. 3. It was originally entitled "the Code of Conduct" but I went with a more general title so that it could encompass more things, if it was decided that more could/should be expected of members than that they follow those four rules. If not, that's cool too.

Luke

[Luke Hill]

Hey guys,

Since Liam asked that we refrain from using "Affiliate" and I think "Nation" is equally problematic in our case, I've adjusted the following section in the outline a little:

b. Club-wide

(i) Genre Storytellers

(ii) Board of Directors
-- Director of Storytelling
-- Director of Coordinating
-- Other Directors

Luke

[Guy]

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 6:32 AM, Luke Hill <luke.b...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hey guys,

>
>
> Preliminary discussions: WILL NOT GO IN THE HANDBOOK
>
> 1. What do we want most?

Clear, Concise description of who we are, what we do, and how to get involved.
Fair OOC rules that do not lend themselves to either rules lawyering
or autocratic abuse.

> 2. What do we want to avoid the most?

situations which set people up to fail, loopholes, "Wall of Text",

> 3. Five words (to summarize your most important desires/fears re: this
> project)

Clear, Concise, fair, usable, readable.

> Chapter 5: When Things go Awry
>

This section is going to need some considerably reworking. I also
think we should split corrective action into two parts - Immediate,
non-disciplinary corrective action that takes place right at the scene
and can't be appealed but is designed to do the absolute minimum to
correct a problem, and disciplinary investigations.

> 1. Disciplinary actions
> a. Life cycle of a disciplinary action
> (i) Complaint / Infraction
> (ii) Investigation
> (iii) Decision
> (iv) Punishment / Documentation
>

Without getting into Liam's idea about having officers who are
specifically tasked with investigations (which I think may be a good
idea) here are some take-aways from my time as an Ombudsman and my
review of a large number of DAs and Investigations:

1) IF YOU SAID IT, YOU OWN IT. Period, full stop.
This has a few implications:
a) An investigating officer should never be allowed to keep
evidence from the accused. The accused has no way to rebut what is
being said about them if they don't know what has been said. Nor do
they have a way to challenge the credibility of witnesses if they
don't know who said what.
b) It doesn't matter where you said something. If what you said
violated your perpetual responsibilities as a member, it doesn't
matter if you said it on a sanctioned list, at a game, on IRC, on
social media or at your local Denny's. You're responsible for that
statement.
c) Things that are said in a "non club" environment (such as
social media or the local Denny's) that don't violate perpetual
responsibilities can't be the *cause* of a DA, but can certainly be
used as evidence when determining if wrongdoing was done 'on club
time' or showing motive or a pattern of behavior.

I can give general thoughts (but not specific cases) on why each of
these is true. b) refers to things like divulging confidential club
information to people not authorized to have it, making promises on
behalf of the org that you're not authorized to make, etc. It does NOT
refer to calling someone names, even if it is a club related matter.
c) basically means that if one member calls another member names over
social media, we're not going to DA them for it or get involved.
However, is someone admits they did something at a club event over
social media, that can certainly be used as evidence that X happened
on club time. Further, if a member did things that are wrong, and the
officer isn't sure if they're simple mistakes or maliciously intended,
statements made by a member in either direction should inform the
officer's decision, regardless of where those statements were made.

2) Appeals should never be on the "Clearly Incorrect" basis. They
should be on a standard that promotes fairness and an equitable
resolution. I think we've covered that elsewhere but it bears
repeating.

3) At the end of the appeals chain, publish the DA. Keeping them
secret does way more harm than good.

> 4. Problems between members: conflict resolution
> a. When to use conflict resolution

And when it is completely inappropriate to force conflict resolution.
I've seen situations in the past that people tried to shoehorn into CR
inappropriately, in part to avoid having to deal with an investigation
that most likely should have happened.

Guy Seggev
GWB199511039

[Luke Hill]

Guy,

This section is going to need some considerably reworking. I also think we should split corrective action into two parts - Immediate, non-disciplinary corrective action that takes place right at the scene and can't be appealed but is designed to do the absolute minimum to correct a problem, and disciplinary investigations.

Splitting it into two parts should be easy. Most of your corrections seem like they fit in the body of the text and the substance of the writing, though, rather than in the discussion topics or basic framework. We'll get to that in due course. Am I right in thinking that, or do you have a problem with how I've framed things so far? If the latter, what do you suggest I replace it with?

Luke

[Guy]

On Tue, Mar 26, 2013 at 11:29 AM, Luke Hill <luke.b...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Guy,

>
> Splitting it into two parts should be easy. Most of your corrections seem
> like they fit in the body of the text and the substance of the writing,
> though, rather than in the discussion topics or basic framework. We'll get
> to that in due course. Am I right in thinking that, or do you have a problem
> with how I've framed things so far? If the latter, what do you suggest I
> replace it with?
>

You have it surrounded. :)
Splitting the immediate response from the investigation/DA process is
the only change I'm asking for in the timeline. The other stuff was
meant as reminders for future discussions on those sections.

Guy Seggev
GWB199511-039

[Luke Hill]

Guy,

Okie doke. I'll make that change this afternoon, and put up a revised draft (including Liam's note on terminology and whatnot) tonight.

Luke

[Jessi Sauter]

Quick thought - include a flow chart for the DA/conflict process(es).
With corresponding sections on what each of those steps is supposed to
mean. Might streamline things a good bit and do some good things for
ease of understanding in those sections.

Or not. Anyhow, there it is. :)

Jessi

[Luke Hill]

It's a decent thought. I'm all for it, when the time comes to write that section.

Luke

[Games Without Borders NC]

> 1. What do we want most?

Something that does not resemble old Membership Handbooks.

> 2. What do we want to avoid the most?

Resembling old Membership Handbooks.

> 3. Five words (to summarize your most important desires/fears re: this
> project)

Inclusive, fair, helpful, explanatory, open.

Cheers,
Liam

--
Liam T. Draper - UK2001061047 - NC Games Without Borders
IRC: Liam-OOC / Email: gir.coo...@gmail.com /
http://gameswithoutbordersltd.wordpress.com
"Whether you like it or whether you don't, it's the best thing going
today." - Ric Flair

[Luke Hill]

Liam,

> 1. What do we want most?

Something that does not resemble old Membership Handbooks.

> 2. What do we want to avoid the most?

Resembling old Membership Handbooks.

Ha! Okay, message received. :P

Luke

[Games Without Borders NC]

> This section is going to need some considerably reworking. I also
> think we should split corrective action into two parts - Immediate,
> non-disciplinary corrective action that takes place right at the scene
> and can't be appealed but is designed to do the absolute minimum to
> correct a problem, and disciplinary investigations.

I have some fairly strong views on how this section should look. We
can get into immediate action vs. disciplinary action when Luke wants
to address it.

> Without getting into Liam's idea about having officers who are
> specifically tasked with investigations (which I think may be a good
> idea) here are some take-aways from my time as an Ombudsman and my
> review of a large number of DAs and Investigations:
>
> 1) IF YOU SAID IT, YOU OWN IT. Period, full stop.
> This has a few implications:
> a) An investigating officer should never be allowed to keep
> evidence from the accused. The accused has no way to rebut what is
> being said about them if they don't know what has been said. Nor do
> they have a way to challenge the credibility of witnesses if they
> don't know who said what.

Putting to one side witness credibility, which I'm not sure has ever
been an important part of our system, withholding evidence material to
a complaint would (I would have thought) been justification for a
disciplinary action on the withholding officer as well as cause for an
instant quashing of the disciplinary action on procedural grounds.

> b) It doesn't matter where you said something. If what you said
> violated your perpetual responsibilities as a member, it doesn't
> matter if you said it on a sanctioned list, at a game, on IRC, on
> social media or at your local Denny's. You're responsible for that
> statement.

As has been mentioned elsewhere, I'm not a fan of perpetual
responsibilities. I think there are responsibilities while you engage
in club activities only. Those responsibilities should be about
aspirational conduct. They should be separated from specific (yet to
be identified!) activities of wrongdoing that the club actively
pursues eliminating which may include things like intentionally being
dishonest in order to substantially benefit from that dishonesty or
intentionally spreading information known to be false.

> c) Things that are said in a "non club" environment (such as
> social media or the local Denny's) that don't violate perpetual
> responsibilities can't be the *cause* of a DA, but can certainly be
> used as evidence when determining if wrongdoing was done 'on club
> time' or showing motive or a pattern of behavior.

I'm torn on this. I can see why it is beneficial to say we don't have
jurisdiction in private spaces, however, I also think that if you
admit that you've broken the rules - it doesn't matter where you do
it, it's still actionable.

> 2) Appeals should never be on the "Clearly Incorrect" basis. They
> should be on a standard that promotes fairness and an equitable
> resolution. I think we've covered that elsewhere but it bears
> repeating.

I agree with this. I hate clearly incorrect with a burning passion. I
have a standard that I think is better but we can get to that when
we're discussing this chapter.

> 3) At the end of the appeals chain, publish the DA. Keeping them
> secret does way more harm than good.

This kind of goes hand in hand with what I said above. By reducing
DA's to specific offences such as cheating or rumourmongering, there
is a compelling interest in publishing them because of (a) what the
offence is and (b) what the punishment is for the purposes of
satisfying principles of open justice and deterrence. It also means
that the officers who are writing DAs have to make sure that their
judgments/opinions are of a top notch standard because based on what I
have seen in some cases the standard is not high - we need ours to be
better.

Lesser infractions can be dealt with on the spot and don't need to be
published. I would be in the mind of publishing the most serious
offences which require a DA.

[Jessi Sauter]

> I'll do that once we get a consensus on the outline. I want to have a list
> of things we're going to discuss before I break that list down into a
> timeline or set deadlines for things.

Cool. We will want this thing finalized preferably before the June
1st chronicle launch.

Jessi

[Luke Hill]

Jessi,

Cool.  We will want this thing finalized preferably before the June 1st chronicle launch.

I'll bear that in mind when I'm publishing the schedule. It looks like that will be in the next 24-48 hours, unless someone has serious objections to what has been posted so far. I don't have work tomorrow, so I should be able to do that in my post-WoW downtime come the morning.

Luke

[Kelley McMahan]

> Without getting into Liam's idea about having officers who are
> specifically tasked with investigations (which I think may be a good
> idea) here are some take-aways from my time as an Ombudsman and my
> review of a large number of DAs and Investigations:
>
> 1) IF YOU SAID IT, YOU OWN IT. Period, full stop.
> This has a few implications:
> a) An investigating officer should never be allowed to keep
> evidence from the accused. The accused has no way to rebut what is
> being said about them if they don't know what has been said. Nor do
> they have a way to challenge the credibility of witnesses if they
> don't know who said what.

I see a potential bit of confusion, I suggest exchanging the work
"keep" with the word "withhold". The word keep could be confused in
that it could read to some as files are destroyed after any
investigation. I come from a security and investigations background
and you always retain notes and transcripts of interviews involving
potential actions. In the possible event or a recurrance.

> b) It doesn't matter where you said something. If what you said
> violated your perpetual responsibilities as a member, it doesn't
> matter if you said it on a sanctioned list, at a game, on IRC, on
> social media or at your local Denny's. You're responsible for that
> statement.
> c) Things that are said in a "non club" environment (such as
> social media or the local Denny's) that don't violate perpetual
> responsibilities can't be the *cause* of a DA, but can certainly be
> used as evidence when determining if wrongdoing was done 'on club
> time' or showing motive or a pattern of behavior.
>

>

> 2) Appeals should never be on the "Clearly Incorrect" basis. They
> should be on a standard that promotes fairness and an equitable
> resolution. I think we've covered that elsewhere but it bears
> repeating.

I see this as spot on.

>
> 3) At the end of the appeals chain, publish the DA. Keeping them
> secret does way more harm than good.

Again, I agree with this. although I do agree that some privacy should
be conferred on this. Where precisely that line should sit I am far
from the best person to ask.

>
>
>> 4. Problems between members: conflict resolution
>> a. When to use conflict resolution
>
> And when it is completely inappropriate to force conflict resolution.
> I've seen situations in the past that people tried to shoehorn into CR
> inappropriately, in part to avoid having to deal with an investigation
> that most likely should have happened.

This is a very valid question and I think we can all agree on the
obvious "worst case" scenarios it will be how we handle the not so
obvious that will define us as a good governing body.

I would like to suggest a odd numbered review panel for this as well
as DA review.

Just my 2 cents.

Kelley McMahan
GWB2007060149

[Luke Hill]

Hey guys,

The adjusted topic outline may be a bit delayed, because I hurt my hand at work today. It hurts like a sonuvabitch to type, so I want to not do it more than I need to. I'll try to get it ASAP though, rest assured.

Luke

[Luke Hill]

Hey guys,

Hand is still hurt, so forgive typos if they are present. I'm henpecking at present. Also, if we want to speed up the schedule, now's the time to note it. At present, it's scheduled to give us a final produce by mid-June. That's obviously a bit later than is preferable, but I wanted to create a reasonable schedule first and let the group decide from where time gets cut, or if anything needs more time. I've figured a week for writing each section after discussion ends, and then a week for final adjustment and it being accepted for publication. Does that work?

Preliminary discussions: WILL NOT GO IN THE HANDBOOK

Discussion start(ed) 26 March 2013. Ends 31 March 2013.

1. What do we want most?

2. What do we want to avoid the most?

3. Five words (to summarize your most important desires/fears re: this project)

Chapter 1: Introduction; The Basics

Discussion starts 01 Apr 2013. Discussion ends 07 Apr 2013.

1. What is the GWB? Existential questions galore!

2. What am I entitled to as a member?
3. What is expected of me as a member?

Chapter 2: How to take part

Discussion starts 08 Aor 2013. Discussion ends 14 Apr 2013.

1. Starting fresh

a. Venues

b. Domains

2. Organization above the local level

b. Affiliates

c. Global interaction

3. Global rules and restrictions

a. Rules addendums

b. Special approvals

Chapter 3: So who does what, exactly?

Discussion starts 15 Apr 2013. Discussion ends 21 Apr 2013.

1. Officer positions: An Overview

a. What a Storyteller does

b. What a Coordinator does

2. Positions within the organization

a. At the local level

(i) Venue Storytellers

(ii) Domain Storyteller

(iii) Domain Coordinator

b. At the Club level

(i) Genre Storytellers

(ii) Board of Directors
-- Director of Storytelling
-- Director of Coordinating
-- Other Directors

c. Working between clubs

(i) the Master Storyteller

(ii) The Club Director (or Global Coordinator, or Master Coordinator, or so on)

Chapter 4: Receiving your just rewards

Discussion starts 22 Apr 2013. Discussion ends 28 Apr 2013.

1. Prestige

a. What is prestige

b. Earning Prestige

2. Member class

a. What is member class

b. Earning member class

Chapter 5: When Things go Awry

1. When the rules are broken

Discussion starts 29 Apr 2013. Discussion ends 05 May 2013.

a. Corrective Action

(i) What is corrective action and when is it appropriate

(ii) How to apply corrective action

b. Disciplinary actions

(i) Life cycle of a disciplinary action

-- Complaint

-- Investigation

-- Decision

-- Punishment / Documentation

(ii) How to handle investigations

-- Member privacy, and what to/not to reveal

-- What is and is not appropriate evidence

-- What is a witch hunt, and how do I prevent it?

-- Assuming the best, seeking the truth

(iii) Appropriate levels of action

-- Types of punishment

---- Making the punishment fit the behavior

---- Why being fair is more important than being tough

-- Trivial actions / infractions

-- Minor actions / infractions

-- Moderate actions / infractions

-- Major actions / infractions

-- Severe actions / infractions

2. When officers make bad calls - Appeals

Discussion starts 06 May 2013. Discussion ends 12 May 2013.

a. What is an appeal, and when it should happen

b. To whom do I appeal?

c. How do I file an appeal?

d. What an appeal can and can't do

3. Removal of an absent/unacceptable officer - the vote of no confidence (VoNC)

Discussion starts 13 May 2013. Discussion ends 19 May 2013.

a. When and how to VoNC

b. What must happen prior to conducting a VoNC

c. Who oversees the VoNC, and how do they do it?

4. Problems between members - conflict resolution

Discussion starts 20 May 2013. Discussion ends 26 May 2013.

a. When to use conflict resolution

b. What is conflict resolution

c. The conflict resolution process

(i) Direct discussion

-- When to step away for a moment, and when to let others do so

(ii) Mediated discussion

Chapter 6: How we choose - officer (s)election procedures

Discussion starts 27 May 2013. Discussion ends 02 Jun 2013.

1. General (s)election procedures

a. Calls for election, and appropriate applications

b. The question & answer period

c. Voting, and counting votes

d. Identifying a winner

2. At the local level

a. Venue Storyteller (s)election(s)

If we want VSTs to be selected rather than elected, here's the place to say so

b. Domain Storyteller (s)election(s)

c. Domain Coordinator (s)election(s)

3. At the affiliate level

a. Genre storyteller (s)election(s)

b. Board of Directors (s)election(s)

4. At the global level

a. Master Storyteller (s)election(s)

b. Club Director (s)election(s)

Luke

[klmcmahan1969]

Luke;

This is a great idea template wise, granted I think given some of the discussions thus far some of these topics will not take the amount of time allocated and that could well accelerate the time frame.

Kelley McMahan

GWB2007060149