CSM: What To Look For

In early 2007, a CCP employee was caught interfering in the sandbox by spawning Tech 2 blueprints for his friends and revealing to them insider information. After a very public outcry, and with the threat of losing customer credibility, CCP announced the formation of the Council of Stellar Management. Tasked with providing transparency to CCP, the player elected group was originally formed to serve as a watchdog and help restore faith in CCP. As time went on the the process went through different iterations, the role of the CSM gradually shifted from a watchdog group to that of a player advocacy group. Serving as a bridge between the EVE community and CCP, the CSM over the years has made a significant contribution to both the game and how CCP develops it.

Last Friday, CCP Dolan released the names of the 34 candidates for the next iteration of the CSM. With the official list out, various EVE celebrities and bloggers have been releasing their ballots. Because I have a conflict of interest (three guys from my alliance are running; as well as an additional two CZ staff), I’ve decided not to release my ballot until after the election. Instead, I’ll be talking about the two important characteristics I look for in a CSM candidate.

The most important quality I look for in a candidate is finding out how well they work with others. The job requires massive amounts of time discussing things with not only CCP, but both other CSM members and the community as a whole. Even when you don’t agree with what’s being discussed or proposed, it’s important to be able to work with everyone. Having the proper social skills and being able to articulate your positions well is key. You can be the smartest person in the room, but if you are incapable of working with the other community representatives, you’re not going to get anything accomplished.

The CSM is almost never completely unified on a single issue. The complexity and diversity of EVE Online will almost always guarantee that. Being the classic stick-in-the-mud and being unwilling to work with others not only slows down the work as a whole, but also impairs the collective cohesiveness needed for an effective CSM. Having conflicting ideas is healthy as long as everyone is willing to work through their disagreements.

The other thing I look for in a candidate is figuring out what exactly they bring to the table in terms of knowledge and skillsets. CCP has rules barring employees from doing certain things as players, which makes their knowledge on certain matters poor. Is the candidate a FC? Is that person a CEO? Does he or she build supercaps? Those are the kind of upper level things I look for in a candidate. Voting for a candidate that brings something unique to the table instead of just voting for the bland nullsec, wormhole, lowsec, whatever guy is a much better way to vote.

While I don’t believe it was the best CSM by any stretch, CSM8 was well represented and had the most production from its members from top to bottom. Electing hard working players trumps electing the EVE celebrity or a default regional candidate. If we’re lucky, the players we elect to CSM9 will work just as hard as the ones we elected to CSM8.