Why keep secrets?

I'd like to talk about secrets you might consider keeping from those you manage - be it in a guild, a club, or even a workplace. And I'd like to discuss why the amount of secrecy that I have seen from management in my time is something I believe to be unnecessarily high.

This topic came to mind earlier in the week when most of the management at my workplace were away for the afternoon at a meeting. When asked anything about where they were going, even so much as 'why are you away this afternoon?' the questioner got a simple, vague response of “in a meeting”. Now, I should stop briefly here to ensure that I am not naive enough to think that all company goings on, nor all meetings that occur in a company/organization/etc (henceforth I'll use 'organization' to define all of these forms), should be known by all in the organization. For instance, many topics covered in a review between a new employee and their manager have no reason to be told to everyone, and indeed could breach privacy or simply spread bad feelings toward the person who was reviewed or someone else they may have spoken about.

What I do feel should be shared with all members of the organization are basic company goals, ideals, and decisions going forward that affect the company as a whole. Be it good, and especially if it is bad, there is nothing wrong with keeping those you manage / lead in the know about where their organization is going and their relations with current clients and customers. It is my belief that this fosters not only loyalty, for it is generally accepted that people prefer knowledge to a lack thereof, but it also fosters input. And this drives the formation of new ideas. New ideas lead to not only giving you insight into those you manage, allowing you to take better advantage of their abilities, but also can assist in driving your organization in a positive direction through the creation of new ideas.

Let's take this concept and apply it to guild leading, since that is currently the form of management which I practice most. As I may have stated before, I am but a co-leader of my guild – we also have a guild leader and another officer in our management team. As a team of three, we do our best to keep our members informed about all goings on. New recruitment, where we decide to head next in content, roster management, guild bank needs and surpluses – I could go on. We also look to our members for input all the time, no matter the topic. There is very little that we, as guild leaders, keep from our membership – even for tasks that would normally be handled solely by the leadership. For instance, members are often turned to for input when evaluating a newer member.

This has proven a positive experience in many cases. Aside from our extremely low turn-over in the past two-three years, we have also gained better insight into the various management functions mentioned above. We've also been able to shape our guild into something more progressive. In The Burning Crusade, WoW's previous expansion, we did not progress nearly as smoothly as we have in the current one (Wrath of the Lich King). Part of this was due to the raiding structure at the time, but part of it was also due to our inexperience as guild leaders. As we learned how to take input, and how to ask for input, it has allowed us to grow and become stronger as a guild. It has also forged bonds throughout the guild that surpass simple organizational loyalty.

So why do other organizations, such as businesses, not attempt to do this as well? I am sure there are companies which do, but it has been my experience – and that of others I've spoken to – that many do not. Is it the fact that money is the on the line and they fear the loss of trade secrets? Knowledge is power, as the saying goes, so perhaps the management of these companies simply enjoys that grasp of power and fears to lose it. I have a feeling that the reasons are different in each case, but I also think that perhaps in some cases the management would not able to formulate a strong logical, or emotional, argument to back up their methodology.

I never did find out what that meeting was about, but I did stop caring about that particular question. I am glad however that it gave me the chance to think about some other questions. And hopefully if you're a guild leader, the head of a club or society, or a manager of employees that keeps secrets from those they manage you can now think about the reasons for why you do and analyze if they are justified, or even assist your organization in any way by keeping them as secrets.

How To: Motivate Your Guild

Well, it's been far too long since I've posted - let us resolve that situation.

In order to engage in my topic for today, I direct you to a 10m video by Dan Pink and RSA Animate.



Now that you've viewed that, I would like to argue that the three factors which Dan links to better performance in business are also highly applicable to those who are part of a group outside of companies - specifically, guilds.

Some may argue against this idea of mine because, theoretically, people play games (even MMO's) for recreational enjoyment - there is no 'goal' as the objective similar to how we need a job in order to acquire the goal of money. I agree that this is a key difference, but we can liken the rewards of character advancement to monetary rewards in some ways. We don't necessarily need money as a reward in order to enjoy a job, as Dan's video shows. Likewise, we do not need character advancement (or similar mechanic) in order to enjoy a game, but in the case of games which emphasize long-term groups these goals are an integral part of the machine.

So how do guilds, like a company, manage to draw in members (employees) and retain membership? What incentives do they use to motivate their guild members? The most widely used function is any of the various points-based loot systems. These take on many forms, such as the many variations of DKP, or the alternative which is gaining popularity EPGP. We also have systems which do not use points but work in a highly similar method, where once you gain your incentive reward you are placed closer to the bottom of the priority list for the next incentive reward (see: Suicide Kings) - but you can move up the priority list more quickly by putting more work in.

My argument is that all of these reward systems mentioned above, and by association the guilds which rely on them to dole out loot in an MMO environment, have the exact same flaws which monetary rewards in a business environment have. The guild leaders who use these loot systems have the same theory as those economists, company owners, managers, etc which rely on monetary rewards to get better performance out of their employees.

So how do we use Dan's three factors of autonomy, mastery, and purpose in order to motivate a guild membership? The solution is actually quite simple. The first method I have used in my guild is to get rid of any type of points or priority-based loot system. We simply use the in-game Group Loot system to roll for dropped items, with the threshold set appropriately for the content we're participating in. For instance, in a raid environment we set the threshold to Epic. If the person needs the item for their main equipment set, they click the dice button, and if they desire it for a non-main equipment set (off-set) or as a side-grade, they click the coin button and pass if they do not desire it at all. We have no restrictions on how much a person can win in one night, but instead rely on our recruitment procedures (and the guild leadership's watchful eyes) to filter out anyone who is extremely greedy.

Using this loot system, instead of a points-based system, already opens the doors for many incentives I could offer to my guild for better performance, utilizing those three factors mentioned above. For instance, someone could take a night off raiding to relax or do some other activity without feeling like they have dropped far in the priority list due to missed points - because there aren't any. This allows for some autonomy, letting guild members not feel pressured to always, always, always be scheduling around guild raids.

Altering our loot system is far from the only way we motivate our guild members though. Many of the top-guilds will argue that people should always use certain add-ons and should theorycraft or at least follow the most-regarded theorycrafters in order to always be playing and gearing their character the most optimally. This can be a turn off to many prospective, skilled members and can also be a source of stress as it requires even more time be put into research in order to play the game. While those of us leading the guild, and the majority of our members, do discuss various playstyles, blogs, theorycrafting websites, and general experiences we don't require any particular talent specs, gearing, or add-ons from our members. This increases autonomy in our members even more, as well as providing a means for individual mastery rather than following the flavor of the week "top spec".

Allowing for autonomy and mastery will in turn, along with stated guild goals from the leadership, drive us along to the motivator of purpose. Our guild leadership emphasizes that the point of playing a game is fun, and thusly we hold this true in declaring our guild's purpose as well. But fun in an MMO, or any game, can come in many varieties - exploration of the world, finding out about the lore and story of the game and its characters, crushing opponents in player vs player game modes, or conquering the dungeons created by the developers. While we are not a player vs player guild by any means, we try to encourage our members to do what they want in the game, with other guild members. This creates room for the fulfillment of all of the motivating factors Dan Pink mentions, and is facilitated by the guild leadership and its core, veteran members taking part in and discussing the various activities which members of the guild are doing.

Just like in a company, it is the leaders which form the outer shape of the group and decide on what incentives they will use to gain, retain, and motivate members - but it is the members themselves who really drive the company or group. All it takes is utilizing the correct motivating factors so that those members are driven to provide the best results.

Some study in words

Following up my sort of introduction from the last post, I wanted to examine a bit more what this blog will be about by examining what exactly strategy and tactics are. What makes them different? What makes them similar? Being the era that it is, Wikipedia of course assists in setting us along the proper path to begin.

"In military terms, tactics is concerned with the conduct of an engagement while strategy is concerned with how different engagements are linked. In other words, how a battle is fought is a matter of tactics: whether it should be fought at all is a matter of strategy."-Wikipedia

And so, we see that the idea of strategy and tactics began with military campaigns, not that this is surprising - war, or at least conflict, is an inherent part of humanity ever since we organized into tribes millennia ago. It is easy to see how the above definition could be applied to game theory, where we see the following definition given to strategy.

"In game theory, a strategy refers to one of the options that a player can choose. That is, every player in a non-cooperative game has a set of possible strategies, and must choose one of them." -Wikipedia

There are, of course, many disambiguations of strategy which are now applied to various interactions which occur in our society, all quite valid in my eyes. Strategy covers a wide array of human interactions, and through being applied to things such as game theory it has, in part, taken on the definition of tactics as well - since they are sometimes used interchangeably to refer to a plan of action in a game. This is because people tend to use both strategy or tactics to refer to both "how the battle is fought" and "why the battle is fought."

Hopefully this has given some idea of what I'll be covering. I will probably fall into the group of people who tend to use the terms strategy and tactics interchangeably, and thus incorrectly, but I will try my best not to. Nevertheless, I do want to cover both the how and the why of the plans of action which I use in gaming and life, and that brings us to the reasoning of the title to this blog.

Hoping to have some more articles up soon before my final projects begin swamping me for a couple weeks, so stay tuned.