What are Boba-Sitters?
Boba-Sitters are BobaBoard's resident group of expert fannish advisors, specializing in community management, engagement, and communication. They are not the same thing as Realm administrators. Boba-Sitters can apply to manage their own Realm, but the position itself comes with no such obligation.
What do Boba-Sitters do?
As "fandom community experts", Boba-Sitters may take on a series of tasks and roles to help BobaBoard communities succeed and thrive. For example, they might:
- Poke holes in our code of conducts, community guidelines, and community values statements to anticipate potential issues and refine our policies.
- Advise on best practices for community management, and define our strategy for the onboarding of new communities.
- Interview and/or mentor prospective Realm administrators, for example by reviewing proposed policies, community values, and by guiding them in resolving complex community issues as needed.
- Create best practices for community engagement to help both specific Realms and BobaBoard as a whole create vibrant and active communities.
- Use their practical experience to review and evaluate proposed features, aiding the technical team in design and prioritization.
- Collaborate with the writing team to enshrine their community knowledge and wisdom as part of our documentation.
Boba-Sitters will also have access to the broader volunteer community, and can choose to participate in roadmap planning or other activities as they see fit.
What is the philosophy behind The Boba-Sitters Club?
When it comes to effective community building, there is no substitute for practical experience. Despite this, the erosion of enclosed, private online spaces has made it harder to recruit and nurture new and effective community leaders. While Boba-Sitters are experts in community management, being a Boba-Sitter is not a position of authority, but of care and empathy. Boba-Sitters do not make unilateral decisions, but work together and with the broader BobaBoard community to grow new experts, and widen our understanding of how to build healthy, thriving online spaces.
This survey
Given the important nature of the role, we didn't want to rush out a full survey. Instead, we're currently collecting emails, fandom history, and a short write up about your interest in the position. We'll be in touch with next steps once the project is further underway.
Note that your answers do not need to be formal, and this survey should take no more than 15 minutes to fill.
