Response to Community Code of Conduct

I don’t dislike @alexs

But I do think that if Monzo want you as such a prominent person on their community forum, then your attitude needs to change towards criticism received.

(Nobody needs to reply mentioning my attitude, I already know)

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Honestly, I think it’s less this (he has made changes to criticism) and more just the initial responses to disagreements seem (trying to word this kindly?) blunt. But part of that could be just from how often he’s responding to posts and who he is.

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Ok Yeh that is fair.

But Alex, I’m sorry and on behalf of anybody else for this all coming out the way it has. Genuinely

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I think you’re really right, and as I mentioned earlier I think this could be avoided by clearer guidelines and expectation setting for leaders from the community team!

I can totally see why - no examples needed. There has been similar feedback on responses given by non leaders too. I think a lot of the tone is lost when writing on a public forum and I think we all should be open to giving this feedback on specific occasions be it to Leaders, regulars or staff. Generally there’s no malice intended and those posting usually appreciate being pulled up so they can make sure new posts don’t come across this way :slightly_smiling_face:

The code of conduct applies to everyone, Leaders, regulars, newcomers and staff alike! If you feel that this isn’t the case- please flag with myself or @cookywook and we’ll look into it!

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@anon72173902 We can’t, because it’s topic about mods. :wink: I can’t help but think how quickly it would have been mentioned in next conversation like this.

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Just to weigh in here, it seems there’s actually several issues being discussed.

I do think the “Leader” program in it’s current format has probably come to the end of the line. We’re discussing a revamp at the moment, in which we’ll be providing some clarity about what we expect, what’s most helpful, and what isn’t helpful. We’re also brainstorming new names - it seems the “Leader” title gives an air of the “Leaders” being representative of the company, when they aren’t.

Ultimately the “Leaders” represent our users, not the company. For example, if a difficult decision needs to be made for the good of the company, we need our Leaders to represent the viewpoints of how our users want us to proceed, not how we as a company might feel, because internally we’re at risk of being an echo chamber otherwise.

So with that said, if you disagree with something a leader has said or the way they’ve said it, you need to hold them to the same standard as you would any other user.

We’d love to bring a little bit more moderation in-house and we’re exploring how we can make this work. Stay tuned for more details on that. Something that’s related to that is having stronger enforcement for harassment, trolling and bullying. These things aren’t acceptable and we’ll be having more eyes on the forum to make sure it remains an inclusive place. Please continue to flag posts - particularly when harassing language is being used.

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I think Leaders here do a very good job keeping everything clean and tidy for all of us and yes with the community growing, it would be difficult for them to manage so Monzo staff’s direct input would help.

Just on this point, if you want leaders to represent all types of users here then you might want to have few people who’ve sort of unbiased view. Some people might find them critical of Monzo but a lot of users here make some very valid critical points and listening their viewpoint might balance things up a bit.

Note that I am not saying have leaders who just try to bash Monzo on every opportunity available. :slight_smile:

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I think the leaders are the people most passionate about us and most invested in our success - some quite literally!

We’d hope that that translates into them letting us know when and where things can be improved and when things aren’t working for them, and relaying legitimate concerns and constructive criticism.

I don’t personally believe our leaders are in the habit of suppressing criticism, as a whole. People are naturally going to disagree on some issues, but as long as everyone feels they’re able to freely express their thoughts, then things should be OK :grinning:

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Thank you Simon, I can’t say how much you’ve done to make the community forum an awesome place!

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Leaders is a better name than Gurus. But I’d welcome an alternative.

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For what it’s worth, the Starling forum works slightly differently. There isn’t a leader role ie, a volunteer with Moderator powers.

The Starling volunteers (“Gurus”) will occasionally suggest posters take some heat out of a conversation, though are likely to be more visible in welcoming new members and redirecting to existing threads. They may also flag issues to Starling team members who have specific responsibility for forum oversight.

In essence, the volunteer role is very light touch and it works for us.

Those Monzo forum members who dip into the Starling forum will probably acknowledge they are very different animals (the forums, not the members :wink:).

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I think there is an odd mix:
some of the newer members on here think leaders are part of the staff, while others think they shouldn’t be given so much “power”.

I think they’ve done a wonderful job helping to manage the forums but I think it’s clear that some people aren’t happy with them or aren’t sure about their role entails and this should be made clear.
Not sure how this can be done but I think there was a thread that explained their role that was locked and it would have been helpful to be able to direct newer members to it.

Imo I think the staff should give the leaders a bit more support or explain their role/ lend some weight to their actions as it might seem like it’s just 1-2 leaders managing the forum however they like to newer members/ the staff has just stepped back and let it be run by users.

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I think the Starling forum is far quieter than the Monzo forum - not a criticism - just what I have observed - and there is less discussion of “contentious” subjects, a lot of the Starling discussions are how great everything is - which may or may not be the case :slight_smile: - I also think the speed of Monzos recent development has left a vacuum for “dissent” and unfortunately argumentative “discussion” from some community members which at times does feel like it needs a heavier moderation touch :slight_smile:

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Why don’t we just not give them a different name & I’m pretty sure Discourse allows users to moderate themselves as they get higher up levels etc?

I feel there’s too much inconsistency in approach from people sometimes too.

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The Starling approach does seem to work better

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In a nutshell, Ian. :grinning:. I’ve no doubt that when the Monzo developments luck in, the conversations will reflect that.

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Graham, have to agree with Tom’s uncle @anon95680666 Monzo and Starling’s communities are just too far apart that an equal comparison is not possible. Just look at the figures below, I’ve filtered top threads and showing top 5 from both communities.

Monzo

59

Starling

39

Sorry, I don’t mean to be rude just trying to show how different both places actually are even in numbers.

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How does the numbering make the difference

A lot of people now answering

A real buz here

It shows how active it is…?

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