I have run this by several people in staff chat and so far it's been mostly positive response, but I figure I need to bring it up here for it to be discussed properly.
We have several members of the community who perform functions well above and beyond that which normal users do. Yet for one reason or another either they are not the type who we would want to have on Senior Staff, or perhaps they aren't the type to be interested in it in the first place.
Despite this their actions and contributions are worth recognizing, and their level of visibility in the community ends up making it so people assume they ARE staff in one capacity or another already.
Thus I propose that we add another section of staff for those members who contribute to the community in ways outside of writing or voting. Junior Staff, or Technical Staff, or Advisory Staff, or whatever we decided to call it, these people would have a section of their own added in the Newbie's Guide to identify them and what they do.
This would also give other members another avenue to achieve recognition without necessarily putting them in charge of moderation or deciding site policy, and provide greater motivation to come up with ways to get involved. It brings them into the fold rather than being renegade agents and also defines where they stand on the site instead of people getting the wrong idea about who does what.
The main two members that come to mind to promote into this kind of position are Raven Mackenzie and Bland. Gene R is another possibility, various chat ops might be worth adding it, or others that I perhaps do not know their contribution level.
What are the Senior Staff's thoughts on this?