The Demotion of Strilo

So to summarize in an overly simplistic manner:

1. There was a failure to "reel" Strilo in. The failure was compounded for years

2. The failure has been corrected by his demotion

3. The demotion process was bungled

4. The bungling continued.

5. Despite the bungling, it stands. If it were math it would look like this:

Lack of action + Bungled Action/sorry it was so bungled= You're still demoted.

 

now someone says (in 18 paragraph form) that it's not the why, but the how it was handled.

And we make another lap!

 

You failed to consider a few other points:

1) Hindsight is 20/20
2) Maybe sometimes there just is no easy or clean way to do something, especially when dealing with emotional beings.

There is never a clean answer that will make everyone happy, so some people are going to be upset. The Administration can't let disagreement stand in the way of action, no matter what the issue is - they need to have confidence enough in their authority and their conviction that the decision is the correct one.

In the few demotions and/or bannings of 'celebrity' users that I had to deal with, I can tell you they all looked something like this. The fact taht it is so messy and difficult is not a reflection on the person being removed or the administration, it's just the way of things.

Now, I have no insight into anything that happened, nor do I really care. I'm not here to judge anyone, just to provide my perspective on the silly notion that there's some way the administration could have handled this (or any other banning/demotion) that would have left everyone smiling and confident that it was handled beautifully.

Also, I'd just like to respond to this:

If that person is causing major problems due to his/her obnoxious behavior and ultimately cripples the rest of the team in some fashion, and they do not respond to corrective actions, you most certainly do removed them from the team. Failure to do so is absolutely foolish. Asking people to put up with rude, counter-productive behavior because that person simply won't be changed is bad leadership. You don't put up with it, you correct it - either through changing the person's attitude, or removing them. Allowing a festering cancer to exist simply because its removal would be 'messy' is an act of cowardice.

Anything that must be done eventually should be done immediately. You just have to have the courage and leadership to do it.

 

So Vertical, just out of curiosity... what is your take on the head admin having himself banned for getting nasty / rude in a PM?

 

At Strilo's request, this thread is being locked. The policy issues brought up in this thread are being discussed in MS, and will be announced here in Comms in separate threads.