Welcome to another update from the Master at Arms office. This report will expand on some announcements and previous discussions. As always, our focus remains strong communication with unit leaders to teach them to pick the right medal/promotion at the right time and, in turn, have less things remanded or denied.

The Academy

As noted in Sarin’s master plan, performing an update to the two MAA Shadow Academy courses is currently in the draft phase. Primarily these are wordage reductions, competitions include Clusters of Earth, and rewards expands its example recommendations to include those awarded crescents in recent months. These changes are being tracked among my staff and will be implemented in the near future.

The Policies

Upon request, we had the Chamber of Justice take a look at our policies for any thoughts or advice. Montresor and Jac gave great feedback that Howie has since implemented in the Wiki page. There are no major additions or alterations, mostly wordage, with one notable addition on the Deletion Policy about permanent deletion of a dossier being, per definition, permanent. Click me to take a look. We continually look to refine and expand upon our rules and guidelines per feedback from leaders and members.

The Recommendations

We are working on turning the long, confusing, and god awful Writing Recommendations Wiki page into a catalogue of golden recommendation winners. This page will list the recommendation along with a brief explanation of why we liked it. Note, super note, super double note that these are not templates. They are examples. Context is key.

Congratulations to Xen for grabbing June’s award for a great EQ2 recommendation. We skipped May and are working to remedy that.

Xen’s EQ2 promotion for Mayda stood out as a great example of tackling an overdue promotion in a clean and concise manner. First, he talks projects and accomplishments not quantifiable. This is the stuff we cannot look up on a dossier, so it’s great to be the first thing we read. After that, dossier history is summarized with competitions, crescents, and medals. The recommendation shows Xen’s appreciation for Mayda’s membership without being filled with “Mayda is amazing amaze amazeballs” fluff.

The Wiki page will continue to be updated with recommendations and explanations of why we liked them. In combination with the Shadow Academy courses, we hope these resources will be a first stop shop for leaders hoping to gauge current MAA standards.

The Competition

Landon brainstormed and is helping run a quick and easy MAA competition just to keep everyone thinking: click me if you like seeing things. Don’t put too much thought into it, have fun, and note I am a huge fan of any reference to Archer!

In previous reports I mentioned our willingness to take a look at medal or promotions ideas/recommendations via email or Google docs. While true, I pushed it too hard and skewed things. The website, thanks to James, continues to have the best way of processing these. You submit the request, it shows us the recommendations, makes it easy to check dossier history, we can comment, remand, or deny it. A remand is not a bad thing. It just means something needs work.

If you and your team think Bob is ready for a promotion and want an extra set of eyes, email [Log in to view e-mail addresses]. Key thing is is “you and your team.” The MAA is not the first step toward figuring something out. Ask your summit first. If no one can agree, email us.

Additionally, if you gather recommendations and are ready to submit, just submit it. Especially if you’re confident in what you want. If you aren’t sure if something is a Steel Cross or Grand Cross, shoot us an email. If you want to give Bob a Steel Cross, submit the Steel Cross.

I clarify these because submitting through the website will mean your requests are handled faster. It’s easier to check requests on the site than going between a dossier and Google docs, commenting, reply to emails, so on. The website was built for these things.

Finally, a note that any Elder promotions come from the Grand and Deputy Grand Master. If you think Bob is ready for Dark Side Adept, reach out to Sarin and Mav. Feel free to CC me, but if Sarin doesn’t buy it, I won’t even bother.

Email us if you have questions, concerns, or complaints, but email has turned into the first step recently when it is meant as a “in case of fire, break glass” option. As always, I send thanks to all leaders for being respectful and professional when talking things through with my staff…particularly when you don’t like the answers!

Shadow Academy course updates and the new Golden Recommendations Wiki page will be live within a week or so. Until then, keep submitting medals, promotions, transfers, name changes, and (coming soon…) updated path changes! Nothing too major will change when the new path stuff goes live, but we’ll speak more to that in the future.

Check out my highly positive review of the latest Star Wars novel, Dark Disciple!

MAA Resources

• MAA Wiki Category
• Promotion Guidelines
• Medal Statistics
• Rank Statistics
• Leadership Rewards SA Course
• Leadership Competitions SA Course
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