Picking the best administrator for your forums

[Brandon]

Hey guys,

What do you guys think on picking the best forum administrator for your forum?

I'm looking for opinions, what really makes a good side administrator with you, and when should you open one up? I've made my best guy administrator, he left...great! Now, a secondary administrator isn't always necessary, I agree. However it can be beneficial to your website to have a guy on your side trying to help as much as you are. I think that in some cases, like my current situation, it is best to remain sole admin for the benefit of your community. However, I was wondering what you guys look for in an administrator? Someone who has contributed a lot to the community, yes? Someone you KNOW will be helpful. I personally don't think experience with a certain software's admin CP is an issue. I've found that all of them are virtually the same with - or + features and if you've done 1 you can do them all. I'm looking more to the side of community management wise and how they would help increase activity to the best of their ability, come up with great ideas, etc.

So, what do the members here think?

[DAMINK™]

Dont offer Admin to anyone.
Offer Super Mod only or Mod. Thats what i do and it works fine for me.
If you want to have a member appear as Admin although not, then just change to suit.
Sure it means more work for you. But from my experience you cant trust many people online.

[Omniscient]

Dont offer Admin to anyone.
Offer Super Mod only or Mod. Thats what i do and it works fine for me.

Agreed. Very few people ever get admin access to my sites.

[Brandon]

Thanks guys.

I only offered admin to someone I knew for at least (almost)a year and was an active. contributing, mature member to my site. He was also my only super mod. However, I was at first deciding on who was the most active and willing to help, designed for us, promoted us, did all that! Unfortunately, he's more interested in halo: reach(ugh, F U halo) than really buckling down and being a serious administrator of my site.

I would not trust many people either, and I suppose I should keep it as one administrator rather than developing into a multiple administrative site. I can easily manage the entire site.

I was just curious as to what you guys look for in an administrator. I like to plan, honestly. My current project isn't extremely successful however It's building and going smooth for the time being, so I always like to think and get advice from other webmasters.

[DAMINK™]

Thanks guys.

I only offered admin to someone I knew for at least (almost)a year and was an active. contributing, mature member to my site. He was also my only super mod. However, I was at first deciding on who was the most active and willing to help, designed for us, promoted us, did all that! Unfortunately, he's more interested in halo: reach(ugh, F U halo) than really buckling down and being a serious administrator of my site.

I would not trust many people either, and I suppose I should keep it as one administrator rather than developing into a multiple administrative site. I can easily manage the entire site.

I was just curious as to what you guys look for in an administrator. I like to plan, honestly. My current project isn't extremely successful however It's building and going smooth for the time being, so I always like to think and get advice from other webmasters.

And its a very good question.
Too often i see new sites and the creators offering Admin permissions in a desperate attempt to get posts and members.
Ultimately an Admin (use Omni for example) is often working in the back end and it ultimately take away from "forum" time. So upgrading a member to Admin and then giving them requirements will take them away from the forums. (the life blood of any forum except for FTW )
Use HF as another example. At that size i would assume its common to need other Admins around simply because of the activity and the fact Omni needs to sleep.
Knowing someone for a long time is not the be all end all. Hell i have known Omni for years and have been loyal to him and you dont see me with a mod position.
There is a reason for that i feel.
Firstly i can be a prick and for that alone i dont get it. But also i am a poster. My position is best suited as a member, not as staff. Third. Although i have send hundreds of pms to omni and chatted to him countless times i am still a stranger ultimately. Hell we could walk past eachother in the street.

My point. All be it a long one is this mate.
Dont offer Admin to anyone. If you really really need one then look for family or similar.
I have heard too many times where a "trusted" member gets a senior role only to screw the owner.
Hell i think its even happened here?

[Brandon]

Thanks for the thoughts.

Personally, I have to agree with the "EVERYONE GETS STAFF IF YOU POST 300 TIMES" Bull crap. I never was apart of that, and I never would be. Those are bound to fail...As a webmaster, I should be doing things myself and taking control. I also had an experience with this idiot(he did graphics work for me) so I allowed him temporary FTP access when we were first starting this other site of mine. I told him no, I was not interested in him being a permanent administrator and he deleted my site(again an attest to how dumb he was because I obviously backup at all times).

[jeremiah]

Brandon, here's some sound advice.
Never take advice from anyone.

No disrespect to DAMINK or Omni or anyone else bound to reply in here, but that's just how I've managed to survive. Does not mean I don't hear people out, but even if they have the upper hand experience wise, and I'm not sold on something, I'll go ahead and fudge up just so I can gain that little more experience myself.

But then, in my world, there is no such thing as a perfect admin, you yourself are never the perfect admin. The perfect admin is unbiased. I'm biased, most admins are, I mean anyone who claims they're not a biased admin at some stage is a liar...it's their forum, their baby, there will come a time when they make unfair calls based on what THEY think and feel and need. But hey, that's just my opinion and most times it goes against what the flock is bellowing so don't pay any attention to me.

If you need an admin, pick the best one for you, to do what you want, someone who wont give you a hard time, whether they're the best admin or not is irrelevant, they're the best if they do what you expect them to do and nothing less, nothing more. Just my 2cents.

Passes the bottle of Jack around...

[DAMINK™]

No disrespect to Deminik or Omni or anyone else bound to reply in here,

None taken. Everyone is entitled to there opinion.
However if you keep spelling my name like that you will offend me.

[itylernallen]

Hey guys,

What do you guys think on picking the best forum administrator for your forum?

I'm looking for opinions, what really makes a good side administrator with you, and when should you open one up? I've made my best guy administrator, he left...great! Now, a secondary administrator isn't always necessary, I agree. However it can be beneficial to your website to have a guy on your side trying to help as much as you are. I think that in some cases, like my current situation, it is best to remain sole admin for the benefit of your community. However, I was wondering what you guys look for in an administrator? Someone who has contributed a lot to the community, yes? Someone you KNOW will be helpful. I personally don't think experience with a certain software's admin CP is an issue. I've found that all of them are virtually the same with - or + features and if you've done 1 you can do them all. I'm looking more to the side of community management wise and how they would help increase activity to the best of their ability, come up with great ideas, etc.

So, what do the members here think?

Admin should only be givin to someone who is dedicated and who knows what they are doing. They should be someone who has great admin experance and someone who can get the job done. An admin should not be a kid who just wants the position and someone who applies for an administration job should be turned down. It shows they only care about high positions rather then working for it.

[jeremiah]

it has been a long day (1am almost here.) sorry about that DAMINK (fixed)