Do you have sectional moderators on your forum?

[Ravenfreak]

I've noticed that it's very rare to see sectional moderators on forums these days. Back in the day when forums were very active, you'd see sectional moderators to help out global mods and admins. Now the only sectional moderators I can think of are on Promotional/Webmaster forums that offer services. Do you have sectional moderators to help out? Or do you think sectional moderators really aren't necessary anymore? I could also see sectional moderators being used to test out a person's skills to see if they can one day be a global moderator.

 

[Kale]

I have done sectional moderation before, but don't usually see it on a lot of forums. I was a mod of a forum where I only moderated 1-2 forums only, but was given global mod permissions 'just in case'. Weird, I know. It's just in case a big spam wave happens, and me or other mods could handle it etc.

 

[Shortie]

When I first started making forums I used to have section moderators but after a while, it made sense to just have moderators for all sections rather than for specific sections and that is now what I do when I need moderators.

 

[Arantor]

I think part of the reason for that is simply that forums just aren't big enough or busy enough *in general* to need sectional moderators the way they used to. I still see them in some specific places, e.g. support sites where you have people who speak specific languages being local language moderators, but other than that... small core staff.

I also think part of it is that the forum tech is a bit better now than it used to be, meaning that more automation type stuff is automated or just eradicated compared to forum tech 15 years ago.

 

[Cory]

I've had sectional moderators before, but all in all, it seems the global moderators can truly take care of most matters themselves. You want to hire staff that has knowledge of most of the subjects of your board. I too agree that forums just aren't big or active enough any more to need sectional moderators.

I have 1300+ members on my board and I'm currently the only staff member it seems to run smoothly with me being the only staff member due to my having knowledge of the subjects across the board and the inactivity of it, where it generally has 5+ posts a day. Most people come and go for the resources.

 

[Kyng]

No... I used to, but I found there was just no point. In fact, it was just a hindrance - because even when a member *did* cause problems, the first mod to see it was from the wrong section!

In my opinion, the only forums that should have sectional moderators are the really big ones that need 20 or 30 staff (so there's a good chance of at least one moderator from each section being online).

 

[Strawberry]

Agreeing with everyone else that sectional moderators are pretty redundant, unless there's a specific reason for them to just be moderating one or two particular sections (Package team moderating the package section for example). Global moderators can pick up any misbehaviour much quicker.

 

[Reverie]

Towards the beginning of forums for me, I recall seeing this frequently! Like @Strawberry said staff that were supposed to be focused in one area may only need staff powers in one place, and then team leads and global moderators may have powers in more areas.

I often experienced this also as a "I don't know you yet, so let me give you this section for now" and they then added more as they got to know people.

 

[Debashis]

If the forum is quite big, then sectional moderators might be helpful. Sometimes you might have moderators that have interest in a particular niche. You can ask them to manage the sections related to that particular niche. This way it will be all well organized and none of the staff members would feel worn out.

 

[Empire]

I have not seen mods or people take those roles in a very long time since most staff members are doing it all year-round and since forums are less active back ten years ago it's not needed unless a big site would need to have someone to step back if he or she is on a long holiday away.

 

[Paul]

If the forum is quite big, then sectional moderators might be helpful. Sometimes you might have moderators that have interest in a particular niche.

I have a few and for mainly the reason you said there. Some only take an interest in a couple of areas so are always useful for that.

 

[JennyorAlice]

I only saw this once on a forum I was a member on. They had a sectional moderator in each section and then they had one or two global moderators. I think the RPG section had two moderators but the other sections just had one, if I'm not mistaken. It's been a while since that forum closed down.

These days, I've normally only seen global moderators or community team members who moderate the entire board.

 

[Joeychgo]

I don't. Reason being is that my moderators are there to maintain order. And why have them only be able to do that in one place?

However, I wouldn't rule it out. There can be situations where it can be beneficial.