Alliance leader in need of guidance

I became an alliance leader due to the absence of the leader of my former alliance. She gave notice about her departure & return, along with the reason why she wouldn’t be unable to do check-ins. She didn’t pass along leader to any of us co-leaders (we didn’t know that was an option), but we agreed to wait for her return. Unfortunately, that was a lot easier said than done when members of various ranks decided to offer their butts to kiss. After taking to much nonsense I stepped up and warned, then kicked those I was able to as a co. Morale and new member joining was still being hurt by those who were to good to speak when spoken to, and long term crumb snatchers that would be absent for days and weeks then tip toe in & out to collect. So another co-leader suggested we create a new alliance with me as leader. I agreed and left my alt account behind with a message naming the members we wanted to come along. They joined us but morale was still low, and there was a falling out between a co. and myself due to the lack of special treatment of his sons. The 3 of them left, and I felt better. Then I demoted an elder and she finally left. She thought it was ok for her to alternate skipping War just as long as she got in her titan hits. Then the last member who joined the new alliance was the last member to leave recently.
So you see, I know how to get rid of people but I don’t know how to get real members. I have about 6 real members left and I don’t want to lose them. They are good people and deserve to be apart of a thriving alliance, not a failing alliance. But that is exactly what I’m doing, I’m failing them due to lack of structure and know how. I know It’s my duty as leader to protect the real members from the fake and to inform members of upcoming events, quests etc., and recruitment. I’m stuck on recruitment because I’m at a lost for words and I don’t know the basic points I should state. I also don’t know the roles of co-leaders and elders, so the only duty I have delegated to them is to answer any questions that are asked. Which is something they have always done, I learned a lot about the game from them. I’m grateful for any & all guidance on “How To Step-Up As a Real Alliance Leader”. Thank you all for your time.

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I’ll start with - You’re probably not doing anything ‘wrong.’

Leading an alliance can mean many different things to different people. It sounds like what’s most important for you is to retain your core members, and have a group to play with. If that’s the case, I recommend finding an alliance to MERGE with. That way, someone else is keeping track of titan hits, war flags, etc., and you’re free to enjoy the game again. Many times one or two members from a merged alliance will get co-leader status, so you’ll still have direct control to some extent.

Put out a post about what you want out of an alliance, provide the approximate power level of your crew, and believe me, the requests to have you join will come pouring in!

Growing an alliance is aggravating, because everyone wants to make their own, but no one wants to join an established one (especially newcomers). You’re not alone in that.

Best of luck!

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So the 1st thing I would ask is - do you want to lead ? It seems you fell into the job but care enough about your alliance to want to do a good job.

If you dont want to lead I would definitely look for a merger

If you do want to lead then caring about your alliance is a great start. There are some threads already you can reference which I will link you to, and 1 close to my heart around how we migrated in a similar situation to you.

My key pieces of advice would be, set the expectations and manage them firmly but with consideration. You never know what’s going on in peoples lives especially in these uncertain times.
Try and have multiple co leads you trust - dont take the whole responsibility on yourself, it will get tiring

And always remember this is a game and it should be fun !

Good luck

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I agree with this completely. Shame I don’t have that many spots!

OP, look for a merger that makes you a co-lead (assuming you want that). Consider all offers carefully… ideal would be someone else just like you.

Best of luck.

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Annieb already gave some excellent advice.

Here some more ideas:

1: After you answer the question if you want to lead with yes ask yourself and your remaining core players what type of alliance you want!

Examples:

Relaxed
Must hit titans
Must participate in war
Organisation grade of war,

If you have decided what type of alliance you want formulate rules!

Example of my alliance:
Reasons to get kicked:

14 days of inactivity
Not participate in war if you checked the war box.
Not using all flags.

Point 2 and 3 are buffered with the possibility to communicate why you didnt participate/use all flags.

After you have establisched the rules you have of course to communicate them to new members if possible with an aknowledgement they understood them.

Now you have to decide how you want to structure your alliance.

You can either have a lean steep hirarchy or a flat wide hirarchy.

Example:
My alliance ( 28 players ) has a leader and a coleader and members.
Of cours that means quite some work for the leader ( me )

After implementing all this you should be on a good way with your alliance.

Good luck and best regards.

Elayanith

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Having a leadership team that shares your same goal is essential… y’all don’t have to share the same opinion on how to achieve the goal, but must have the respect of one another… so that these differing opinions can be shared and discussed.

This is an interesting read & may be of some assistance:

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Tbh it doesn’t sound like you have a goal or vision to actually lead. You had a goal, which was to kick out inactives and stop the “butt kissing” and you achieved it, pared the alliance down to member you want, and now have no idea what to do next.

With 6 members i don’t think a co-leader is absolutely necessary, so i wouldn’t worry too much about that.

I’ll say again, it doesn’t sound like you have a goal you want to achieve. And it feels to me like you’re more looking to be someone else’s co leader: someone who gets told the rules and then enforces them rather than being expected to provide the overarching vision. There’s nothing wrong with this at all: every great leader and organization needs a good number 2. My recommendation is for you to discuss with your members your situation and find out if they have any ideas or goals, then to scout for an alliance that already has a set of goals and rules that appeals to you all. Negotiate to join them, and make a condition of your joining that the leader regularly helps train you how to lead. Eventually you’ll be more comfortable as a leader yourself and you’ll develop your own ideas naturally, or you’ll realize that sole leadership isn’t for you and you’re happy where you are.

I’ll throw out there too that recruiting is a mother trucker and it’s bloody hard to get new members to stick around reliably. Just had to kick a half dozen myself for inactivity, was nearly half my alliance ㅠㅠ

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I can only echo many of the great ideas posted here, but the one that worked for me is to define what kind of Alliance you want to be. Define the parameters that will achieve that and use it to create a covenant with the membership based on fairly applied rules. Everyone then knows and understands what is expected of them then and everyone knows how the rules will be enforced with no fear or favour.

That is your part of the deal, in exchange the members get a well managed alliance, where they feel that everyone is contributing, no one is getting a free ride and no one gets special treatment.

Fairness, honesty and transparency are some of the keys to this.

I have led my alliance for over 700 days and many have been with me for most of the ride.

I wish you luck and success.

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The weekly recruiting thread on Reddit has been the best place for me for recruiting.

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@ffphier, thanks for that, can you post a link?

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They start a new post every monday around 1PM US eastern time. I usually add a new one then when I have open spots.

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I don’t know if you have figured this out, but if not we have six spots in Dreadlords-[Swords]

Hi CQ,
You don’t mention, what size and level your remaining team is? We merged once about a year ago after our leader did similar, booted us all and went off the grid no notice. It worked well, balanced the co-leads, we have no big personalities, natural wastage after a number of players at the 2 year point getting frustrated with game play changes means we are looking to do the same again. We have 9 spaces but a number of alts too. Check out Devil Monkies Treehouse if you want to visit.
Stay safe
DILLIGAF

My advice is to stay a simple player (or coleader "at worst) and let someone else take of the hard work.

Because that’s what we’re talking about: being a leader is something only few people are cut for.
You have to be incredibly patient, be there for anyone who seeks for help and advice (a good group of coleaders can greatly help in that). You have to deal with all annoyances and be sure that at some point someone will not be happy with this or that (very often stupid reasons), and possibly leave… which may lead to other leaves.

I am now in a very good alliance, with a really great guy as a leader. Recently we merged with another alliance and (as usual in this case) there were people who were not happy and left. The alliance ran the risk to collapse but this guy managed to fix the situation.
I honestly admit I couldn’t do such a good job… it also helped that the vast majority of the players are smart people and understood they had more to lose that to gain by leaving the alliance.

Rally the people you really care about and you know are good and smart, and find a good alliance to be with

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Thank you thank you all. From the very first comment of “do I want to be a leader”, yes I do. I don’t want to merge because I don’t trust anyone else to care for my peeps as much as I do. Also, we are living in trying times, today and tomorrow are very unsure. We have already discussed certain issues that can arise and cause a sudden absence especially for those who don’t live in the USA. So their positions are safe in our alliance and someone who doesn’t know absence is out of character may kick us. I’ve read the article on how to migrate an alliance prior to this post and I’m reading all of the suggested articles. I thank you all, please be assured that your time wasn’t wasted due to my late response. I have also started a group page for us so I can share all of the information I have collected from the community forum, and it will be ten times easier to answer the questions of the new player who joined. We had some rules prior to, but now I see specifics are needed so everyone is on the same page. We are also working on a War stragedy before posting recruitment to make it easier for new comers to jump in. I think that’s why we’ve had so many players pop in & out. Thank you for giving me the confidence and push in the right direction. That plus the new player have resparked my love for the game, even though Small Giant tried to crush it with their “Nerfing” nonsense. Good Luck to you all. Stay safe, healthy, and most important happy.

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You made a difficult choice, kudos to you.

Be as sure as possible that you and your people have the same goals. So if you have to kick someone out because he/she doesn’t follow the rules (hopefully not), there won’t be (almost) anyone complaining.

And I fully agree with your idea of waiting to develop and testing some war strategies before recruiting. It is very important to have a solid group that moves together and knows what to do and how to do it, before introducing new people. After you achieved this, I would recommend not to let in more than 2-3 people at each recruiting. Let them sink in, adapt to your alliance and then look for more.

As for the rest of the game, it is a long run. Don’t rush things.

Good luck and be safe

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I have been running my own alliances for over 2 years. So, if you would like any advice or have questions feel free to contact me via line at wolfwarrior66.

Can I ask you a question