In connection with the moderator elections, we are holding a Q&A thread for the candidates. Questions collected [from an earlier thread](https://rpg.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/6901/2017-moderator-election-qa-question-collection) have been compiled into this one, which shall now serve as the space for the candidates to provide their answers. Not every question was compiled - as noted, we only selected the top 8 questions as submitted by the community, plus 2 pre-set questions from us. As a candidate, your job is simple - post an answer to this question, citing each of the questions and then post your answer to each question given in that same answer. For your convenience, I will include all of the questions in quote format with a break in between each, suitable for you to insert your answers. Just [copy the whole thing after the first set of three dashes](https://rpg.meta.stackexchange.com/revisions/66136145-ff6e-4448-a35a-f3e566dd8862/view-source).Please consider putting your name at the top of your post so that readers will know who you are before they finish reading everything you have written, and also including a link to your answer on your nomination post. Once all the answers have been compiled, this will serve as a transcript for voters to view the thoughts of their candidates, and will be appropriately linked in the Election page. Good luck to all of the candidates! **Oh, and when you've completed your answer, please provide a link to it after this blurb here, before that set of three dashes. Please leave the list of links in the order of submission.** To save scrolling here are links to the submissions from each candidate (in order of submission): --- >1. In terms of working relationship, the current moderation team has a good level of alignment — and a lack of diversity. In what ways do you see your skills and philosophy complementing the skills and philosophy of the existing (and future) moderators? In what ways do you see your moderatorship aligning? In other words, what about *yourself* do you expect to bring in terms of diversity of modding approach, and what in terms of similarity? >2. As a moderator, how would you respond to learning that a user, or group of users, feels unfairly treated by another moderator? What steps would you take to learn their complaints, verify them, and what would you do with them if you felt they were valid or invalid, respectively? >3. As a moderator, how would you respond to learning that a user, or group of users, feels unfairly treated by <strike>another moderator</strike> *you*? What steps would you take to learn their complaints, verify them, and what would you do with them if you felt they were valid or invalid, respectively? >4. What is your view on current moderation policy on this site? Is there anything in particular you disagree with? If so, why? How would you reconcile this with needing to work with existing moderators? >5. How will you, as a moderator, react to community consensus that you disagree with? How will you, as a moderator, handle issues on which the community has failed to reach consensus, particularly when you personally favor one particular side in the debate? >6. Becoming a new moderator can be daunting, but is also a big opportunity. What are you worried or fearful about in your transition to becoming a moderator, and is there anything you're looking forward to? Is there anything we can do to help support you in those areas should you be elected as a new moderator? >7. Sometimes, we end up with multiple mid-to-high rep users arguing over a question, or a meta policy, or something else that happened on the site. These arguments can often range all over the site: from meta posts, to chat, to the main site. As a mod, what would you do to defuse arguments among users in good standing? >8. Being a moderator is a customer service/public relations job for which there is little to no extrinsic motivation. You will invest hours of your free time dealing with the worst the internet has to offer, and we expect you to do it with a patient demeanor and a smile. What is your motivation for candidacy, or in short - why do you want this job? >9. How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments? >10. How would you handle a situation where another mod closed/deleted/etc a question that you feel shouldn't have been?