Office of the Chief of Staff – September 2019 Report #1

Introduction

Hi, everyone! My name is Noel, and I am fortunate enough to have been selected as your new Bravo Fleet Chief of Staff. For those of you who know me, hello again! For those of you who do not, I have been lurking around the fleet for the better part of a decade. Outside of the internet, I’m a mature student with a love for most things sci-fi/fantasy, and I have been writing some form of fan fiction or original fiction since around 2004. In short, I’m a Canuck with a passion and deep love for Star Trek, and a deep love for this organization.

This first report is going to be relatively short and sweet. My intent is to briefly outline my role as Bravo Fleet Chief of Staff, provide an overview of my duties and projects that I’ll be working on in the future, and announce the winners of our first ever fleet competition! I will conclude with a few tertiary thoughts, and a reminder to the Hall of Honour team that I will be getting a hold of you folks soon (I’m just in the throes of school and trying to stay reasonably afloat).

The Chief of Staff – An Overview

According to the Bravo Fleet Charter, Article III Section 2.4, “The Bravo Fleet Chief of Staff is charged with maintaining the roster of the Fleet. They are also responsible for overseeing awards, competitions, and promotions.”

It is a pretty straight-forward position, but I’ll take another few sentences to break it down a little further.

• Roster maintenance implies making sure the Fleet roster, including players and games, are up-to-date and in the right place;
• As Chief of Staff, I administer the Hall of Honor (HoH) (also it’s honour, grr) and make sure that it fulfills its sole purpose to reward the players of the community (past and present) for their effort and participation. This means I oversee the development of potentially new or amended awards and promotions, make sure award nominations are written properly, and that all issued awards or major promotions are processed and logged. In regards to awards, just a reminder that you can view the whole list of awards here: https://www.bravofleet.com/hall-of-honour/ooc-awards ; and
• The new component of the HoH is fleet-wide competitions, which I intend to discuss in more detail a little later in this report. But the HoH approves and administers all competitions run in the fleet. I highly recommend you take a look at the Hall of Honour page here and try to run a competition: https://www.bravofleet.com/hall-of-honour .

Notable upcoming projects:

• Development of new awards to recognize more types of participation, and
• Promoting and running Bravo Fleet competitions!

Competition Results: Design Bravo Fleet’s Hazard Team Logo!

Speaking of competitions, the Bravo Fleet Hazard Team logo competition has closed and the awards have been issued! Please congratulate the following for their amazing logo submissions:

• MJ, awarded the Hall of Honor Gold Star,
• Sam, awarded the Hall of Honor Silver Star, and
• Markson, awarded the Hall of Honor Bronze Star!

The logos can be viewed here (click on each logo to see them fully):

Keep an eye out for more Fleet-wide competitions in the future, and congratulations again to these wonderful participants.

Other Thoughts

Folks, we are fortunate enough to be living in the era of Star Trek resurgence. Regardless of individual opinions about some of the new programs, Discovery is a major network hit headed into its third season. Star Trek: Picard is likely going to be a huge commercial success, and I am confident with Patrick Stewart and the announced cast it will be a solid addition to the renewed Star Trek universe. Though non-canon, Star Trek: Online is also a consistently active and engaging platform. Embrace the fact that, for the first time in over a decade, we have the chance to meet, make friends with, and convince a new generation (or returning generation) of fans to watch the show and, importantly, perhaps invite them into the Bravo Fleet community.

As Chief of Staff, my job is mostly behind-the-scenes work. But as a member of this admiralty team and of this community, I promise you that I will do my part to make sure Bravo Fleet remains the premier Star Trek fan group on the internet for years to come.

Conclusion

I want to conclude by really stressing three things:

1. Reward your members – our members. Whether you are a member staff or a member of one game, if you feel that someone is active and deserving of recognition, nominate them for an award of that caliber! If you’re not sure how to go about doing that, feel free to contact myself or one of the HoH team. Recognition is awesome!
2. The ways to reward members is expanding. Competitions are a fun way to showcase your activity, and a fun goal to strive for! It’s even more fun when you propose and run a competition. 🙂
3. The most important aspect of this club is to have fun. Have fun, everyone. We’re here in common purpose, to celebrate our love of Trek, write collaborative fan fiction, to game, and generally to have a good time!

More to follow on some August monthly award announcements, fleet-wide competitions, maybe some new awards, and more!

If you ever have any questions, please reach out to me via Discord, where my username is Browsden.

Until next time.