Penner’s Piece

SizeCon is still small, even though we’re working to become a larger thing. We’re not at a point where we have a full staff that we can delegate work unto. Be prepared to step up and fill the gaps where you see them. If you don’t step up for anything and remain inert, we’ll notice.

As safety & security director, it’s my job to keep the attendees safe. As staff, it’s your job to keep the convention safe, for attendees, each other, and yourself.

On your conduct as staff:

• Don’t make statements or do interviews on behalf of SizeCon or its staff. You don’t have to make it known that you’re staff with SizeCon; that said, if you do, understand that any statements you make about SizeCon and its staff can be interpreted as being made on behalf of its staff or the event itself. If you are contacted for an interview, please direct them to Giant Gripper.

• Don’t promise special treatment, and don’t ask for special treatment. Don’t use your status as staff to extract offers or favors from anyone. Ever.

• Don’t fanperson at folks during official events, or while behaving in your capacity as staff.

• Please be polite to your fellow staff. We’re not gonna agree on everything; please accept there will be disagreements on matters of opinion. On that note, PLEASE don’t publically voice staff beef. Rather, escalate issues you have with other staff to senior staff!

• Please don’t share backstage stories either. A surprising amount of backstage stuff can be linked to ongoing or past security issues, no matter how minor it seems.

• Follow our anti-harassment policies! As members of staff, you are going to be held to the highest standards of conduct. We’ve done our best to establish and maintain a safe community. Leading by example is required of our staff, and this includes your behavior in and out of the convention spaces. If you feel you’ve been subject to harassment yourself, please contact Penner.

• Follow out Seatbelts Policy! This policy is designed to protect you as much as it protects attendees. If there is a mutual attraction, the Seatbelts Policy is partially meant to put the onus on the attendee, the person in the dynamic with less power, to do something about it. If they don’t make an advance, move on. Do not convince an attendee to make an advance upon you. This gets you fired.

On handling attendees:

• Be at home with establishing boundaries and enforcing rules that are gonna make people unhappy. Be honest, pleasant, helpful, and clear on reasoning when you can. 

• Don’t let a particularly truculent attendee pull you into a debate regarding a warning you have delivered to them. 

• You cannot expel someone from the Discord or an event without discussing with the rest of the moderation team and at least one member of senior staff save in sufficiently extreme situations, and long-term bans are at the discretion of senior staff and the board.

• Take notes of issues. Screenshot anything on the Discord that breaks the rules before deleting it. If you’re at an in-person event, carrying around a notepad wouldn’t be the worst idea.

• If you feel comfortable helping an attendee, don’t promise anything beyond trying to resolve their problem.

• If you don’t feel comfortable helping an attendee, escalate to senior staff! Issues can be tossed toward either Giant Gripper, Penner, Astra, or Chwani.

• While attendees can submit a complaint with you, as a member of staff do not take a full incident report without another staffer present. 

• Never disclose the identity of a complainant to anyone outside of staff.

On escalation processes in the Discord:

• Get to learn the Rules! #server-rules carries the ruleset we use for Discord and social media, and #event-code-of-conduct outlines expectations for behavior during in-person and online events.

• You will be given access to a shared Google Drive for depositing screenshots; you can also post screenshots in #mod-channel.

• Low-priority issues, like non-malicious flooding or honest mistakes regarding underage characters, can be corrected and noted in #mod-channel. Issue a gentle warning via reply or PM.

• High-priority issues, like virtually every other rule violation, should be brought to #mod-channel for discussion. Take screenshots, note in #mod-channel, and compose a report in the Disciplinary Log. Issue your warning directly via PM.

• High-priority issues that require immediate attention, such as malicious flooding meant to disrupt or incapacitate the server or posting of images that clearly violate our obscenity rules, can be dealt with immediately with no need for discussion. Screenshot if possible before deleting offending posts, remove the user’s Member status or ban them if necessary. This kind of issue will likely result in a warning direct from Penner.

Astra’s Piece

On technical onboarding:

• SizeCon will be utilizing two major organizational platforms from here on out: Google Workspace & the Asana Project Management software suite.

• Both programs are used in companies globally and any skills learned here, from admin to project management, can be applied to future careers and resumes.

• Only Senior Staff or staff with external communication needs will be given a seat in Google Workspace, as it has a monetary cost attached to it, but provides the user with email.

• All staff will be given access to specific folders in the convention’s Google Workspace Drive. These folders and this drive will be the master storage space for the convention -- no more keeping documents, assets, images, videos, etc. in personal drives.

• Post onboarding, Astra will be working with you to get your account setup. You will need an email address to use for the convention, if you are not being provided with an email account via Google Workspace. This may be a personal email, or it may be one you make for the convention to hide your identity. The choice here is left up to you.

On Asana:

• The Asana Project Management software will be used to hold the current status of all applications and convention planning. Dates, needs, panel approval, volunteer approval, staff approval, and other major plans and their current status will be stored in Asana.

• Each piece of the convention is broken down into a separate project: Volunteer applications, for example, all go into the volunteer project.

• Once someone applies, for example, submits a panel, a “card” will appear in Asana with all of the information they enter.

• We will be reviewing the cards and then pushing them through the process of contacting them, making sure they can come, approving their content, etc. At each step, as it is done, the card will move under that step. (For example, if a group applies to host a panel and we’re confirming with them that they can come to the convention, the card will be under the “confirmation’ step.

• Cards can be dragged around at any time, like post-it notes.

• If you need to store notes on a specific application, enter it into the “comments” section of the appropriate card.

• If you need to do work on a task, the card will be personally assigned to you and you will be notified via email.

• Cards can also be created by convention directors and assigned to staff members. Each card represents a single task that needs to be completed.

• Larger goals, like “creating a schedule for the convention” are known as Epics. These are long term goals that require multiple steps to complete.

• A single task, or a single card, is known as a Story. Epics are assembled of multiple stories, AKA, a goal is made of the various steps you need to do to complete it.

• Major deadlines are known as Milestones. For us, our milestones are drop-dead dates: The end of panel, volunteer, and vendor applications, announcing the dates of the convention, and launching the convention are all examples of milestones.

Moderation Tips From An Old Community Manager:

• Always be polite and courteous, even when someone breaks the rules. You have no clue if they just misunderstood, are just not socially adapted to being a moderated kink space yet, or are just having a bad day.

• In a research paper from Riot Games, after reviewing League of Legends matches, found that over 70% of moderation reports are for first time offenses, or for one-off incidents that don’t match a pattern of bad behavior. This is called the “One Bad Day” problem, as someone having a bad day can rub off on someone else, who carries the bad mood into their match and sours the fun for someone else, causing them to go be pissy in another match… etc.

• If they really yank your chain and complain about an appeal, escalate them to senior staff and let us handle the problem -- not you.

• DON’T TRUST SCREENSHOTS. People love to manipulate screenshots or falsify them by copying lines from other servers and passing them off as ours. If someone reports something and you don’t physically see it said in the server, speak up in moderation chat and let us know. We’ll look in the server’s chat logs to see what was said -- logs persist through deletions. THE LOG IS ALWAYS GOD.

• If someone harasses YOU, immediately report it so we can take action. Going off on a mod/member of staff is ALSO not okay and not tolerated here. We’re a community. We handle our disagreements like adults, through agreed-upon processes. YOU are not a punching bag.