[EBC Exclusive] Goodnight, Europeia III




Goodnight, Europeia III
CSP's Presidential Diary
Written by CSP (duh)​


Dear Diary,

Inspired by former Presidents Oliver Grey and Sopo, I will be endeavoring to share my experience of being President and the work we're doing in a more informal format and with greater regularity than we might normally expect. I won't post here every day but I will do my best to make sure it's multiple times per week for the rest of the term. I hope people will feel encouraged to engage in this thread. I'll be sure to link future entries in this original post to make things easier for any readers who join us a little further down the line.

I've been President of Europeia for more than two weeks, which is frankly a bit of a mind fuck. I'll be honest and admit that it's taken me longer than I had hoped to get our administration organized to the extent I would have liked. I think that's a function of a few things. First, as you probably know, my campaign for president was not one that was planned weeks in advance. We had to scramble to get a platform ready that we could be proud of, to make sure the right people had input before it was posted. We had to assemble a prospective Cabinet and, of course, actually campaign. There wasn't a lot of time to lay down runway and get ahead of the game in that window. Second, I moved 1,400 miles away to start a new job last week and I underestimated the impact that would have on my ability to drive organizational imperatives forward. Finally, I also forgot just how much time it actually takes to be President before you actually get to do any work. When you log on every day, there are several people waiting for answers from you. Sometimes it's a quick sign off or something to be delegated but sometimes it's a deal where you need to spend a significant amount of time or an initiative simply isn't going to move forward. In any case, I think I'm adjusting well and we remain on the right path, from a team-wide organizational perspective.

The better news is that I have so many talented, enthusiastic leaders to depend on. To no one's surprise, I obviously chose the right person to be my Vice President. @Writinglegend has been patient with me, I can tell. I haven't seen him this motivated in years and feel very lucky for it. He has a unique ability to assess what I haven't considered or prioritized and make sure important projects aren't slipping through the cracks. He's been everywhere but he's been especially invaluable when it comes to coordinating the ministries as we prepare for big events like UCR Con or our upcoming Founding Day festivities. These events present great opportunities to employ the ideas and labors of more of our ministry staff but keeping it all on track, focused, and delivered on time across multiple ministries isn't an easy thing to do. I am grateful for him and his basedness.

The Cabinet have been such good sports. From our very first day in office they've balked at nothing that's been asked of them and we've asked a lot, I think. People are quick to raise their hand and make shit happen and the vibes are just on. They're excited to do their jobs every day. They're excited to help each other. They're making real progress on deliverables every day. We haven't had to pull many teeth to this point. I feel a great responsibility to keep that going, to make sure they have the things they need to maintain the optimism and productivity they've shown so far.

In the coming days I'm looking forward to the AMAs we're doing on the Regional Message Board and further content those conversations will create on Radio and in the EBC. I'm hyped on planning for Founding Day. I'm excited about preparing a formal address to update everybody on what we're doing and how we're doing it for next week. Senate elections are getting close too. It might be time to bring the Smoke. Not going to make any promises there just yet. In any case, I'll be back here soon and I hope to dig a little deeper into our day-to-day and what this experience is like for me, personally. Until then...

Goodnight, Europeia.
 
Click to expand...
I love these updates, WL
 

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Goodnight, Europeia IV
Volume IV, Entry V
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend ​
Some may have noticed, but my activity did take a noticeable dip last weekend and early this week. That is on me! I had graduation earlier this week (whoo) but that left me with understandably little time to complete what is expected of me as President. I take ownership of that. The Europeian people deserve an update for what the government has been up to, and I hope this diary entry serves as that update (along with something that will be posted in Goldenblock!). I have been working this week to catch back up, make sure our Cabinet is on track, and making sure expectations for goals are known.
  • Culture has been hard at work wrapping up the Short Story Contest, planning for NSGE, and planning for Media Day. Culture also hosted an event with TWP, and an event with TP is forthcoming.
  • Radio has been completing our transition plan to Spotify, and we have a graphic for EBC Radio, a guide published, and personal training sessions being hosted this weekend to ensure our hosts are prepared.
  • Interior has completed revisions to the Newcomer Handbook which will be published, Our welcoming committee has continued along with our weekly programming on the RMB.
  • Communications has published an article on the FOIA and Mothers Day, and will be publishing an article for Senate polling.
  • WA is seeing another HoV commendation pass for Andusre.
  • FA saw the ratification of a new treaty with The League. We are being proactive with our allies abroad.
  • The GAO is continuing to track our views for articles abroad, is pushing forward the newcomer focus group, and is creating forum citizen research that will be launched soon.
  • The ERN announced Fleet Wars teams, ran a joint tag op with TWP, and assisted our domestic delegacy transition.
Furthermore, the Executive is already working to finalize Executive Media Week along with our FA Based Media Week. The dates for these activities are on the Europeian Executive Calendars (which I hope everyone has downloaded).

Despite being a little behind where I want to be, I am super excited. In the coming weeks we are going to see an official transition to Spotify and our first Spotify show, we are going to see continued cooperation militarily and culturally with our friends, and we are going to see movement on key campaign promises such as the newcomer focus group and other research initiatives. We are also going to see the creation of an Executive Taskforce to create a gameside upvote squad. Additionally, we will be beginning our Media Week after the mid term. I am also excited to be able to #nolyfe the presidency now that I have graduated. ;)

We have really exciting Senate elections coming up soon, and a slate of communication initiatives surrounding it. Best of luck to all the citizens running for election, and I hope to see great turnout to demonstrate our robust political process.

Goodnight, Europeia.
 



Goodnight, Europeia IV
Volume IV, Entry VI
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend
​
Dear Diary,

I think this is the best place to detail what goes through a President's mind when a resignation happens. I figured that it would be a good topic to write about because it is not often that we really get that insight into, "Dang, what does the President think about and how do they make decisions about replacements?" I hope this diary dump will be helpful for anyone else that might be in the big chair in the future!! I am writing this while on the front lines of the anti-fascist raid of Layem with the ERN.

When I was first informed of Monkey's resignation, my first thought was that this would be a disaster to be honest. It is no secret that finding people top fill the Cabinet this term was extraordinarily difficult. Both Kuramia and I mentioned it in the presidential debate. A lot of our active leadership decided to take a step back this term, which is great for getting new leaders into these roles but also really limits the pool of options. The case of the GAO was even more grim, in my view, since the department is very specialized and there are only a few individuals that I think would be highly successful in the role since it is so new in our community. It needs strong leadership to cement itself. I didn't know if I could replace Monkey and was really really worried no one would be interested.

I talked to Monkey about my plans for the office. I was struggling to find a suitable replacement. I approached Sincluda about potentially rolling the department under the Vice Presidency with additional staffing assistance, although in my opinion that would leave Sincluda with a lot of responsibilities and things to manage considering his great work with game side affairs. We talked about our hopes for the office, the role of the office, and where we can take it the next half of the term. I talked to a few people around the region, including UPC, about individuals that would be great for this position. The one person that came up in every conversation, and that was in my mind originally when Monkey resigned although I was unsure if he would accept, was GrandfatherClock. GC is a brilliant individual and helped the last two Director's, so he already has extensive knowledge about the role and the responsibilities that come with it.

I was really nervous to approach GC about the position. Not because he is a scary person, but because if he said no I quite frankly did not know what to do. I would really have to think outside of the box. I approached him with both my fingers and toes crossed, and he thankfully said yes!

And then I got the news that Sanju was resigning. I am still a little uncertain about whether I prefer successive resignations to get it out of the way or whether I prefer resignations to be spread out. I think with successive resignations you get a, "THE SKY IS FALLING!" feeling but everything is out of the way administratively, whereas with resignations spread out you might get more consistency throughout the term from one department. Not sure. Either way, Sanju is a good friend and someone I admire in the region and I think he reminds me a lot of myself when I started this game, but I understand real life happens and people need to take good, healthy breaks from the game. You kind of enter every term with almost an expectation that one person will resign due to IRL, just because it is good to be on your toes.

Filling in Interior was a little more easy simply because it is a very structured department and, in all honesty, Poseidon deserves a shot and he has been working hard in Europeia for terms now. He was a long tenured deputy and was the obvious choice from the jump. I was lucky that there was such a name that was a clear person to fill in. Sometimes it can be very difficult, even with tenured deputy ministers, as they might be too busy to accept the position. I talked with Sincluda about filling this position and we were on the same page, and I talked with some Interior minds/staff and thankfully everyone just kind of knew. Poseidon was the person for the job.

When both accepted, we had discussions about my plans for the office to ensure our visions aligned. I always try to get a feeler about what the nominee is interested in themselves to see if I can personalize any projects. In this case, we did not have any major problems with vision not aligning -- which can happen!

So that is where we are today. This was my lil "executive resignation journey" lol. Really, when someone resigns you sometimes have to think creatively if there is not an obvious name that pops up. The first place you look is at tenured deputies, assistant ministers, and if no one is available you really look for people who have strong qualities that make them well suited for the position -- whether that be organization, ability to poke or inspire people, you name it. As President you really just have to continue with the punches. As many can see we have been very busy this week with the transition to Spotify, planning for Media Week, figuring out the RMB, a super exciting victory in Layem, etc so it can feel like resignation on top of it seem like a lot. But you have to keep pushing forward with the agenda! And now Senate confirmations happen, which is kind of what is occurring now : D

Much love to Sanju and Monkey. I hope everything goes well IRL and I want to thank them for their work and service to the Executive!
 
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I appreciate the insight from you. I remember when Shuf resigned as my Culture minister during a time when Culture was ... well ... let's say "moribund." There were no active deputies, no one was really doing anything in that role at all. I had previously been Min Cult but the folks who worked on it with me were running Comms during a time when it, too, had to basically be rebuilt. So ... uh ... I disastrously tried to handle it myself. I understand the pressures you felt in trying to find people to fill these spots and think you did a great job doing so. Putting together a team is incredibly challenging even in the best of circumstances, and scrambling to replace not one but two ministers add a whole new dimension. I think you did a great job with it, and I wish the new Ministers well in their positions!
 
These pieces are always fascinating to read– it’s very interesting and helpful for the public to read the challenges and thoughts that race through one’s head in a role like the Presidency.

I’m glad you were able to find successors, and such great picks at that!
 
I love these!
 

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Goodnight, Europeia IV
Volume IV, Entry VI
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend ​
Dear Diary,

It has been a little bit since I have written to you, and for that I apologize. I have been busy abroad talking to friends, allies, and partners to figure out a path best forward for our region. Foreign affairs is always complicated and tough, and it relies on a lot of strategic thought about what Europeian interests are and how best to accomplish them. I would like to point out some of the stuff I have done this past week and a half, so people do not think I have been inactive!
  • I hosted an interview with the Senate Speaker, and our several Executive Media Week shows (Sarah, Kuramia, Sopo).
  • I have been working on organizing our foreign affairs media week, and contacting friends abroad for their participation. We currently have a great series of EBC articles, RMB AMA's, and Radio Shows lined up and I look forward to releasing that schedule soon.
  • I have been helping plan our pride month celebrations with Culture Minister Sarah and Radio Minister Icarus, and they will be rolling out a special project in celebration soon.
  • I have been active in honestly discussing foreign policy and our considerations publicly, both in my midterm address and in response to the repeal of the Treaty of Quilor.
  • I have been manually recruiting, and our numbers have looked fantastic (Poseidon is awesome).
  • Talking to friends abroad <3
Needless to say, it has been a busy week and a half. With Executive Media week over and the mid term done, AND mid term poll results out I would like to discuss some high's and low's I have had thus far this term.

Highs
  1. Unironically, I think we are headed in a strong direction with our foreign policy and a high has definitely been our decisive decision-making with the treaty repeals and the opportunities that lay in front of us.
  2. Layem op, where we again broke our pile record (33!).
  3. Spotify transition!
  4. Short story contest and SPARK activities.
  5. Our excellent EBC FA publications.
Lows
  1. I think the Government Accountability Office has not gone as well as I would have liked, and that has been complicated by some IRL factors leading to Monkey's resignation, GC's power going out, etc it kind of feels cursed at times I will not lie! But the blame lays on me, and I need to provide a very public, action agenda item.
  2. We definitely hit a road-block in Interior with our manual recruitment this term, and I should have engaged in more manual recruitment earlier.
  3. We are still trying to strike the right balance between WALL and our domestic MoWAA ministry, and we definitely need to tinker with some new organizational methodology + ways to engage staff.
  4. I think I have hit some roadblocks, just because of dealing with FA crises, with pushing forward our gameside upvote squad project and I have not made as much progress in that as I would have liked!
  5. I think across the board we are facing some human resource problems in ministries, and we need to adjust our goals and strategy for motivating people appropriately. I need to do a better job about staying on top of weekly speeches or radio shows to inform Euro what is happening in the Executive!!
Running the government is definitely a team effort, and I can't do it alone nor can by Cabinet. So if you have any input on the lows, and you want to help me make them highs, message me!! I am really proud of my team: our Ministers have done an extraordinary job of putting a lot of time and effort into completing our objectives thus far and I could not do anything without them!!

ok that is all I have for this edition much love. I will have another one soon I promise!

Goodnight Europeia.
 
These updates are absolutely fantastic, thank you Gleg - hearing about the roadblocks you've encountered along the way definitely shows how hard your Cabinet is working to combat the resource difficulties too, nice work!
 
I love these updates!
 

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Goodnight, Europeia IV
Volume IV, Entry VII
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend ​
Hi everyone!

This week has been insanely busy. I have been trying to work overtime in order to push forward some projects that have been in the works, along with ensuring Europeia is successful in Defender Olympics. Our FA Media Week also wrapped up this week. I want to go over some things this week that I have personally done to give some context to how busy it has been!
  1. Did three batches of welcoming for the welcoming committee.
  2. Hosted three FA Media Week interviews and edited them for publication, including Walrus, GK, and Gorundu. I also pointed an RMB AMA for Queb from The League.
  3. Participated in a total of eight military operations this week. Participated in Defender Olympics contest(s).
  4. Helped message people for Defender Olympics pile off. Coordinated our Grand Hall thread. Held Eurochat hostage for an hour.
  5. Continuing to talk to players abroad and currently existing Europeian allies. Defended our regional interests in NSGP, in response to the statement from Kantrias.
  6. Helped coordinate our launch of EuroPride: The Collection. Helped launch our newcomer intake form.
In short: busy, busy, busy.

I am getting a lot of questions about re-election, so I wanted to address that here and what goes into the process of determining a bid for re-election. Presidents are often well-aware of when the election starts and when standing opens. In my experience of running for re-election, I like to try and plan a week before the earliest standing date if I am going to take that leap into another term.

There are a few factors that play into the decision of committing to this important role for another seventy days, and I will briefly outline that and what has historically played into these determinations. First, activity. Are you going to be active enough for the next seventy days to make such a large commitment and do you have the sustained energy to do this for 140 days combined? Two, vision. Do you feel like you have a natural evolution to your term and previous platform to argue is the direction Europeia should go down? Three, politics. Do you feel like you still have a base of support, are you happy with your term, and do you feel like you can realistically have a pathway to win?

Analyzing these factors takes a back-seat to the current presidential term. I am still president, and obviously that is my focus. We still have goals to complete and an agenda to wrap up. In my experience, this makes planning a run as an incumbent difficult, as you need to balance the now with the future.

Election season after your term is also a time filled with a lot of anxiety. People directly judge you, your performance, and your term. That can honestly be a very scary thing. Back in the day, I would often skim or even fear opening up platforms after I was president out of just straight nervousness of how critical people will be. The community at-large directly analyzes your term and leadership, which can be a hard thing to deal with. This is because the discourse in a presidential election is often about what happened in the term prior and how things are going. Obviously, these things are natural ways to run campaigns and will happen, but there is a human element from being on the other side or on the receiving end that can make the process of running for re-election, or being a lame-duck, particularly challenging.

So while I will not state if I am running or not again now, I wanted to give just brief insight into what goes into making such a decision. You will hear from me soon, I suppose, on what the next move is. Until then, PILE FOR THE DEFENDER OLYMPICS!

Goodnight, Europeia.
 

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Goodnight, Europeia V
Volume V, Entry I
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend ​
We'reeeeeee back!!!!

The Cabinet is up and running with their week one goals. We are asynchronously hosting our content calendar meetings in order to fill out the executive calendars for the term, and boy do we have some exciting activities and content planned!! I can't wait to release everything in due time. We already have some awesome content created due to the Senate By-Election (which was a super close contest!). Our Republic Day activities also featured a lot of engagement, which was awesome to see!!

Obviously the administration hit a setback with the nomination for Minister of Interior. It is pretty rough going seven days into a term and not having a confirmed minister for the position, and it is an obvious administrative setback. Nonetheless, our recruitment numbers this week looked excellent and I was (just barely!) spared from having to sing live on EBC Radio (for now....). Be on the lookout for future opportunities to get awards and achievements, and to embarrass our leadership. APPLY TO RECRUIT!

The campaign this election definitely lacked fireworks or big moments, but it was still a fun contest. Seriously, big thanks to Monkey and Calvin for giving voters an alternative choice. One of the most irritating things I have EVER experienced is running unopposed in a presidential election, and that (rightfully!) being held against you for seventy days. I was happy to have a democratic contest against an actual opposing ticket with tons of experience and intelligence.

To give some idea of how simple the transition over from the last administration was because I was re-elected: I was immediately able to carry over conversations from last term with friends abroad, I was immediately able to ensure proper hosting of our activities this term, and I have a great idea of the trajectory of each ministry for our new ministers. I did not have to start from ground-zero, or a place with less understanding, which means we were relatively immediately able to start working on our big projects. This is really crucial in seventy day terms.

I was thinking of potentially turning Goodnight, Europeia into a mixture of once-a-week pre-recording content from the Presidency along with these written diary entires. Might save me some time and also would create more radio content!! What are your thoughts on potentially transitioning some of these diary-entries into short-form rambles/presidential insights for future people in this role for radio? :p
 
I think I don't mind either way, but if there are some players who are more likely to listen to your updates than read them here, what's the harm?
 

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Goodnight, Europeia V
Volume V, Entry II
Writinglegend's Presidential Diary
Written by Writinglegend ​
୧༼ಠ益▀ ༽୨ ARRRR PIRATE DECK OR WALK THE PLANK ୧༼ಠ益▀ ༽୨

Hi mateys. I just wanted to provide an update here!

I have not written much in the presidential diary thus far into the term because....I have had pretty massive writers block. Not sure what to write. I figured I would try and make a concerted effort to type something up today even if it comes out bad.

I have been pretty happy with how the term has gone so far. Honestly, this has been one of the easiest teams to manage. Everyone is super on top of their game, very organized, and easy to get in touch with. No one has resigned (knock on wood) and everyone is hitting their core objectives. I mean, just today, we saw the release of the Gameside Upvote Squad, which I am super super excited about (shoutout to the best, Seva). It almost feels a little weird to have a team that is this...simple?

It IS a little weird to almost be at the halfway marker for the term. Time kinda flies, doesn't it? I'm going to be in touch with my team next week about how everything is going and how I can do better to manage them to make sure everyone is satisfied!

Pirate Week is AWESOME. Go check out the action and make sure your avatar is changed to a pirate. THANKS!

I am sorry I don't have much more to add. Like I said --- pretty massive writers block recently. Will try and think of some new content ideas!
 
I appreciate this update; it's simple and sweet.

The release of the Gameside Upvote squad looks great (and I'm not just saying that because I designed the awards :p)! However, it doesn't seem like it was publicized much: besides your speeches, no announcement was made either in the Communications thread or in the gameside itself through the RMB. Are there any plans to bring broader awareness to this new program?
 
Le Libertie said:
I appreciate this update; it's simple and sweet.

The release of the Gameside Upvote squad looks great (and I'm not just saying that because I designed the awards :p)! However, it doesn't seem like it was publicized much: besides your speeches, no announcement was made either in the Communications thread or in the gameside itself through the RMB. Are there any plans to bring broader awareness to this new program?
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It was also mentioned in our newsletter dispatch, which was telegrammed to all nations in Europeia.

Last week was focused on implementation. This upcoming week is focused on promotion, per weekly objectives that are being posted in Tomlinson. Our goal was to develop a base before we branch it out.
 
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