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Yeah, I know. I agree with you. I think that could be a good idea, but again it might be a bit awkward to implement. Like, would we all have to re-apply to get various statuses (sp?) or what? I think it may be a bit too complicated for what it's worth, at least in the short-term.

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I don't think the whole who'd-go-where problem would be hard. We could just send a message out to all support leaders, letting them know that we are being divided into two categories, and it's up to them to reply within a week or so to what they'd like to be. We (the CURRENT support leaders of LW) would by default be both eHelp and forum support leaders, but all SL's must reply within a week saying whether they'd like to stay this way or be demoted. After the one week, those who haven't replied will just be sorted out by who has replied to an eHelp in the past 30 days. Those who have will remain eHelp SLs, those who haven't will be made forum SLs.

After this one week (it doesn't necessarily need to be this period of time, just whatever's decided), those who are forum support leaders will have to send in an application to go back up to an eHelp support leader.

We could just create a group where all SLs will post what they'd like to be so someones inbox doesn't get spammed.

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Depression support on Myspace
Add my: Purevolume | MySpace

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I like the quota idea, but I think having separate eHelp PSL and Forum PSL might just make the system more convoluted. As Nikki said, would current SLs have to reapply? And what if we wanted to do both? Would eHelp PSLs be recognised strictly as eHelp PSLs or could they have the status of both? It's just going to be more confusing for people I think separating it out into the areas, though the idea is nice.

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It's not really that confusing when you think about it. It's just a pretty big change, so a bit hard for us to process.

I wrote about the whole re-applything thing in my previous reply.

About the whole doing both thing -- my initial assumption was that it would sort of be a rank thing. All eHelp support leaders would automatically be forum support leaders too (after all, what are we going to do, deny ourselves access to the support forums?), we'd just in addition have access to the eHelp system.

It'd also be a cool way for members to try out how they like being a support leader. If they're not quite sure, they can become forum support leaders before deciding they'd like to take the further step out and start tackling the eHelps.

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Depression support on Myspace
Add my: Purevolume | MySpace

I'm not saying to force people to answer them because my support level will drop just as fast as everyone elses.  However, we need to do something about this system.  I think by separating the Support Leaders into categories will significantly minimize the amount of eHelps that we receive.

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The bestest big brother: Mark

But what would then doing all that achieve? We will just end up with less eHelp PSLs, and though they need to be dedicated and fill the quota, I don't think that it will address the problem. Those that reply to eHelps and spend their time on it now are already dedicated enough to fill the quote easily. Those that don't just won't bother to become eHelp PSLs and/or will be demoted from the eHelp PSL position. Those that soend their time will continue to do so, so we might not see any positive impact.

Essentially what I'm saying is that is the quota enough of an incentive to drive people to reply to eHelps more, or will it alienate those that might not do it that frequently?

Post edited at 1:34 pm on July 9, 2008 by marshmellowman

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Intelligence is the ability to avoid doing work, yet getting the work done.

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They still have other options (The forums, the serious forum, individual PMs to SLs)... why do questions about whether or not you are pregnant, how to lose weight, what is love? need to be in the e-helps?  We don't even need to delete them, but to maybe direct them as to where it can go?  I suppose that already exists and it still doesn't work... I dunno, just a thought.

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Pregnancy is an emergency, in my opinion. It may seem easy to solve, but it definitely belongs in eHelp -- and hey, that makes it easier for us!

You know, I don't think the main problem is people submitting eHelps that belong in the forums. If they're "easy", they shouldn't take long for us to answer anyway, and therefore the only issue would be sorting them out -- but that's really not THAT big a deal.

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Easy or not, it takes ~time~.  When e-helps come in, it takes time for me to read them (I'm a slow reader).  Even ~easy~ topics take me a long time to type out, and I don't often have the time.  I don't mind them being in there, like you said, it's easy to answer.  But when it comes to seeing 27 flashing as opposed to 22 flashing, I feel that psychologically it does impact some SLs, not always in a positive way.

I guess the way I see it, is that if people are going to continue using the e-help system, then they have no room to complain about not getting answers immediately.  I have seen many topics in the e-help system, AND on the forums (made at the same times).  I have also seen posts in the e-help system, and then with an intro of 'because no one bothered to help me with my e-help', they change their post to a normal forum topic...

My question is... if their post could have been placed in the normal forums, then they should do that ~first~.  Pregnancy is an emergency, but just because you are an SL doesn't mean you have any more knowledge than someone else in terms of birth control and how effective it is.  A post saying, "I'm pregnant, what do I do?" is different from, "am I pregnant, I had unprotected sex."

IF someone has eHelp activated, then the number of eHelp replies they make will be generally monitored, and if someone doesn't reply to many, we can encourage them to either reply to more, or to switch their eHelp sign off.

If people don't want to have eHelp activated at the moment, they don't have to.

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.:Faut souffrir pour etre belle:.
He still gives me the butterflies - [06.07.07] ♥
She was everything beautiful and different

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I understand that there will be some topics where you feel that you cannot provide your input on and I totally understand that.  However, I'm sure in a span of a month you will be able to find at least two that you can reply to.  And if not, you can explain why you felt that you could not meet the quota and therefore will be excused for that particular month.

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i think we have about 150 SLs; assume 25 of them do 0 per month, 25 do 1 per month, 50 do 2 per month, and 50 do more than 2 per month

we've recieved about 300 ehelps in the past month; assume that number doesn't change.

so, under this model, in one month, 50 people would be demoted. the total number of replies from the people who make 2 or less replies is 125, leaving 475 replies for the 50 other people...do you think we can get 50 people to average 9.5 replies in a month, and then 10 per month afterwards?

Post edited at 1:36 pm on July 9, 2008 by hithere

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Essentially what I'm saying is that is the quota enough of an incentive to drive people to reply to eHelps more, or will it alienate those that might not do it that frequently?

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I believe it will just alienate people, and end up with pointless demotions. Just because someone doesn't reply to eHelp, doesn't mean they're a bad support leader.

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.:Faut souffrir pour etre belle:.
He still gives me the butterflies - [06.07.07] ♥
She was everything beautiful and different

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I don't really know. I think this whole system clearly needs a big revamp. This PSL/eHelp PSL idea isn't entirely nescassary, because, if you all remember, we CAN turn off eHelp in our profiles anyway. SO, why not have this:

IF someone has eHelp activated, then the number of eHelp replies they make will be generally monitored, and if someone doesn't reply to many, we can encourage them to either reply to more, or to switch their eHelp sign off.

If people don't want to have eHelp activated at the moment, they don't have to.

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I am in favour of this.

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The bestest big brother: Mark

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Quote: from hithere at 4:17 pm on July 9, 2008

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Quote: from Nikki at 12:40 pm on July 9, 2008

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Quote: from hithere at 8:38 pm on July 9, 2008

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i think we should give the serious forum more time...it's only been back for 5 months...

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But the reason it was scrapped before is because no-one used it. Over half the topics in there have no replies.

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oh okay, i didn't know that...  

 in other issues, i'm completely against forcing people to make ehelp replies, if only because i think people like me are valuable to ehelp. i can't answer most ehelps to any extent that is above anybody else, so i don't. even if it doesn't seem like my reply would be bullshit, i just decide not to answer because i feel they wouldn't get anything out of it besides something that's probably drilled in everybody's brain. there are only a few topics about which i feel i can really give exceptional support. i don't neglect ehelp, not even close, i just rarely see something that really sparks my interest. i expect that there are many other support leaders like me, and each one of us, although hardly contributing to "stop the flashing" that we care so much about, contribute to the system in a valuable way.

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I understand that there will be some topics where you feel that you cannot provide your input on and I totally understand that. However, I'm sure in a span of a month you will be able to find at least two that you can reply to. And if not, you can explain why you felt that you could not meet the quota and therefore will be excused for that particular month.

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That won't make a difference.  I went throught.  For the month of June there were 306 e-helps made.  Already for the month of July there have been 60.  Your right, making two replies IS easy enough... but it also doesn't change anything.

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Quote: from marshmellowman at 9:32 pm on July 9, 2008

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 Essentially what I'm saying is that is the quota enough of an incentive to drive people to reply to eHelps more, or will it alienate those that might not do it that frequently?

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 I believe it will just alienate people, and end up with pointless demotions. Just because someone doesn't reply to eHelp, doesn't mean they're a bad support leader.

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Quote: from Nikki at 4:32 pm on July 9, 2008

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I don't really know. I think this whole system clearly needs a big revamp. This PSL/eHelp PSL idea isn't entirely nescassary, because, if you all remember, we CAN turn off eHelp in our profiles anyway. SO, why not have this:  

 IF someone has eHelp activated, then the number of eHelp replies they make will be generally monitored, and if someone doesn't reply to many, we can encourage them to either reply to more, or to switch their eHelp sign off.  

 If people don't want to have eHelp activated at the moment, they don't have to.

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I am in favour of this.

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It also means if people are having a tough month, they can turn off eHelp and not risk losing any kind of support status due to personal problems.

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.:Faut souffrir pour etre belle:.
He still gives me the butterflies - [06.07.07] ♥
She was everything beautiful and different

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Quote: from Define Your Line at 1:19 pm on July 9, 2008

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I understand that there will be some topics where you feel that you cannot provide your input on and I totally understand that. However, I'm sure in a span of a month you will be able to find at least two that you can reply to. And if not, you can explain why you felt that you could not meet the quota and therefore will be excused for that particular month.

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2 replies per month? is that enough?

i think we have about 150 SLs; assume 25 of them do 0 per month, 25 do 1 per month, 50 do 2 per month, and 50 do more than 2 per month

we've received about 300 ehelps in the past month; assume that number doesn't change.

so, under this model, in one month, 50 people would be demoted. the total number of replies from the people who make 2 or less replies is 125, leaving 475 replies for the 50 other people...do you think we can get 50 people to average 9.5 replies in a month, and then 10 per month afterwards?

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Like I mentioned before, if someone couldn't reply to any eHelps in a month for a specific reason and they present that reason with logical facts, then they will be excused for that month.  I mean, it's worth a shot.  Besides, many Support Leaders respond to more than 9.5 eHelps per month.  I do that sometimes in a week, if not a couple of days.  

Read Nikki's post about the Support Leaders who have the eHelp system turned on.  That may be a good short-term solution.

We can always see how things go after that.

However, I think we should sort the Support Leaders into categories and create a list available to all of the members.  This will probably decrease the actual amount of eHelps that will be submitted.

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The bestest big brother: Mark

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However, I think we should sort the Support Leaders into categories and create a list available to all of the members. This will probably decrease the actual amount of eHelps that will be submitted.

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I agree with this (:

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.:Faut souffrir pour etre belle:.
He still gives me the butterflies - [06.07.07] ♥
She was everything beautiful and different