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A thought on the Supervisor of Experiments role

Posted Aug. 16, 2019, 12:11 p.m. by Louis Harvatt

Posted by Thomas B in A thought on the Supervisor of Experiments role

Posted by Captain Owen Morgan (TECH) in A thought on the Supervisor of Experiments role

Posted by Fleet Admiral James Sinclair (President) in A thought on the Supervisor of Experiments role
Posted by… suppressed (3) by the Post Ghost! 👻
Recently I have been looking back over my time in the club, most importantly my one as the supervisor of experiments and what I actually did during my time in that spot. That’s when I realised that during my time I was effectively a LOA monitor for the ships that exist, which is more evident at this point with the application form being non-existant.

With my raised points I think we should look at dissolving the position “supervisor of experiments” from the cabinet as the limited duties that accompany that position are not worthy enough of a cabinet role.

Captain Hexagon,
TECH

SOX isn’t a cabinet role, but an Executive Assistant position. It’s a distinction that matters in a lot of ways. It was never intended as having as much work or as much prestige attached to it as being a Fleet Commander. It’s kind of an anti-FComm, considering that BOXES is sort of an anti-FCOMM.

There are still ships to monitor, so there is still work to do. There could still be X-Ships created in the future even without the application form being present. The Application form is not required to request an X-Ship. The fact that this isn’t much work compared to, say, actual cabinet roles, doesn’t change that it’s still work that needs to be done and that a human must do it.

If we want to automate the SOX out of existence because we feel that a computer is more capable of being an LOA monitor than a human, that is something I would probably agree with, current TECH workload notwithstanding. That is much closer to what the original proposal of X-Fleet was and something I’d like to see us go closer to instead of further from.

– Joe

I agree with Joe that SOX was never meant to be considered a cabinet role, and it is not considered a cabinet role. It is a semi-permanent EA position, with a set of administrative responsibilities, but little decision-making required.

However, I disagree with automating SOX out of existence. One administrative task that SOX has that cannot be automated is reviewing the X-Fleet ships on a regular basis to ensure no TOS violations. A computer cannot do that. There is no one else to do that or delegate that to as X-Fleet ships intentionally have no “official” CO - it’s just a group of random members who want to play some oddly-themed ST role-playing idea, regardless of those members experience level or ability to take on administrative responsibilities.

There’s also some non-official stuff that SOX can do to help remind the club what X-Fleet is, give opportunities for members to share X-Fleet ideas to see who else is interested (rather than it just being through Discord DMs), etc. But even withouth the non-official stuff, the ship review for TOS violations at a minimum makes it necessary to have a human administrator in that role.

Daniel

I agree with Daniel that the SOX is a role that should not be automated. Just having a person as a touch point for questions while on an X-Fleet ship I believe is necessary, especially considering it’s existence outside of the normal club operations.

And I, for one, have never thought the SOX was a Cabinet position. It is an Executive Assistant position only.

James

The word “cabinet” was my bad, I used the wrong terminology when writing the original post. However, the SOX does not have the duty of responding to questions that members playing on an X-Fleet ship have unless it is relating to BOXES, which is extremely self-explanatory itself. The Automation of it would allow the process to be more efficient and would ensure that BOXES is being enforced correctly as there is plenty of time that it hasn’t.

Yes, you may say that there needs to be a person there to check for TOS breaches which I fully agree in but X-Fleet is tiny & one person to check two ships for a TOS issue seems like a waste.

Owen

I can see where Owen is coming from, but I agree with the others. It’s not so much a “may say” such much as a capital M “Must do” when it comes to monitoring TOS compliance. While the role is tiny now, we need to keep in mind that X-Fleet has the ability to grow and shrink somewhat rapidly and somewhat unpredictably. There was a time when X-Fleet had a myriad of very active ships (even if that time was short). One person is the minimum number of persons we could grant to this. The alternative would be encapsulating the role into someone else’s job and I doubt anyone wants that or the bureaucratic action that would have to happen to enact it.

If I were the SOX, I would probably enjoy that the role is currently small and allowing me to put time into other parts of the club as well.

-Thomas

Thomas is quite right here with regards to how the fleet has the ability to rapidly increase and decrease its size. During my time in the club so far I have observed this first hand. I have known the fleet to house anywhere between 1-5 ships at a minimum. Although the fleet currently consists of a small number of ships I am confident that this is set to change in the upcoming future.

Hello Owen,

To begin with I would like to thank you for voicing your concerns regarding the position of Supervisor of Experiments. As the present SOX I would like to voice some of the reasons I have regarding your proposal and how I feel the role of SOX is not only a required role for the fleet but an effective one.

Firstly, I would like to state that I fully agree Joe and Daniels comments regarding the current need for a human Supervisor of Experiments and how they are also quite right with the role been not that of a cabinet one but that of an Executive Assistant similar to that of the CMM.

The need of a Supervisor of Experimerients is a role that in my opinion as the current SOX should not be dissolved or automated for a number of reasons some of which were outlined by Daniel in his most recent response. Below I will briefly outline the reasons I believe the role should stay as it is currently.
Although the SOX may at present be felt by others as one that is not currently necessary it is my hope that upcoming discussions will change peoples feelings towards the role.

  1. Monitoring of TOS violations in regards to adhering to criteria set out inboxes.
  2. Responding to questions and queries regarding Xfleet and BOXES.
  3. Providing feedback and information regarding the status of current Xfleet application.

and much more…

I look forward to receiving further questions regarding this topic.

Regards,

Captain Louis Harvatt
Supervisor of Experiments.


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