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Rating posts

csco365798
Level 1
Level 1

Hello,

I have been following the Netpro forum for a while now, reading posts for their excellent technical content, and appreciating the enormous effort everybody makes to explain issues, and to get problems resolved.

I understand that rating posts is supposed to be a way to quickly browse through the forums and find the right answers. I noticed, though, that some forum members explicitly ask people to rate their posts, almost regardless of the content. The idea seems to be to quickly catapult oneself to the top of the list, or maybe to use the rating system as a way to enhance one's resume. While this is, in my opinion, not only unfair to all other members (those who do not scream for points), it also makes the rating system rather unuseful, since the rating often does not make sense with regard to the content of the post. So my suggestion would be to either make it obligatory to rate all posts from everyone, or to leave it up to the original poster to rate a post. It should not be allowed to explicitly demand points.

This, of course, doesn't take away that the Netpro forum is definitely the place to be when you need quick answers from top experts !

Regards,

Jim

31 Replies 31

s.conway
Level 1
Level 1

While I understand your concern, I feel differently about the 'please rate this post' comments.

I don't think that people are tryimg to boost their ratings. I think that it's just a reminder to the original poster to acknowledge the effort someone has taken to help solve that persons problem.

Also, I think that some people may have a signature that adds the comment to the end of their port.

Sean

Please rate this post :)

If posters should acknowledge someone?s effort, that should be the case for everybody, and not just for those who scream the loudest. It should then be a general requirement for using the forum. Otherwise it is simply unfair to all participants who are less prone to ego-tripping, and who just want to help...

Hi,

as I am among those people, who ask for rating of nearly ALL posts here is my comment:

Rating should help others to find useful content and sort out the "bad". Being a professional instructor it is the norm for me to get a rating from every student on every class. This is the right approach, as you only can improove yourself if you get an honest feedback.

Rating includes in my opinion also to rate a post, which is NOT useful as this will have two effects:

First, others will get the information that something did not help.

Second, it is a feedback to the poster about his skills (technical and language).

For me as non native english speaker it is sometimes difficult to express my ideas or to understand the problems described because of language.

Having written all of the above I have to admit, that it is quite pleasing for me to get good ratings. But I see nothing wrong in that.

One side note to everyone: PLEASE USE SEARCH!

Very often questions are asked over and over again, which could have been resolved by looking for a similar case first.

Regards, Martin

All I am saying is that if posts should be rated, even all posts, that should be the case for every post from every contributor, and not just for those who explicitly ask people to rate their posts. Everybody likes good ratings, and everybody learns from bad ratings. And if the whole rating system is some sort of a competition, that is fine as well, but the rule should be that everybody has the same chance. Artificially boosting your standing in the ratings by bugging people each and every time to rate YOUR posts is actually rather annoying, and above all, unfair to all others.

Obviously there is no way to dictate what one does or does not, so, in the end, you make your own decisions. I just think that every competition should have basic rules of fairness and sportsmanship...

Just to add my 2 cents in here I always close my replies with the line "Please remember to rate all replies". That request, coupled with a bit of common sense for anyone reading it is not out of line in my opinion. I request that "all" replies be rated, not just my own. Those here that take the time, energy and effort to respond with replies that are often times better than solutions offered by TAC or, in a large majority of the cases, really helping someone out who does not have access to TAC (not every company springs for SmartNets and SASU).

Now the common sense part. Sometimes I will reply to a post with a joke or some other trivial information that does not warrant a rating of any kind. Were NetPro to make the rating of replies mandatory somehow the this in my mind would skew the system as I would end up with people having to rate my occasional dry wit. I want to be rated here for my answers related to Cisco and not by lack of prowess as a standup comic

I don't get how you feel that by reminding someone to rate your reply (and people do forget) is 1) quote "actually rather annoying" and 2) quote "unfair to all others"

So from your perspective my asking someone to rate me based on asome insight or technical solution that I went out of my way to provide my fellow NetPro is annoying. OK, so be it. I don't like tomatoes but then opinions are like....well you know, and you are entitled to yours.

I would ask how is it unfair to others? Everyone who posts here has the same opportunity to get rated on the same scale. Some of us remind people to do so because to be quite honest most people like at least acknowledgement for helping out. Its just human nature to want to help others and while many here do it for the sheer pleasure derived in helping our fellow man (or wo-man)it gets down-right frustrating to solve a problem for someone on not even get a "Thank you" posting let alone a simple rating that takes about al of 3 seconds to do.

In the end I don't see this as a competition. As the moderators here well know, I have had issues with the lack of response from my posts getting rated so I can fully empathize with those who ask that their replies be rated each and every time.

Not knowing you at all I cannot say of your opinions are based on you personally not being one of the NetPro All-stars or something else but this forum has been an invaluable resource for many people. I doubt anyone really realizes how significant this forum is to Cisco's bottom line. I personally think it is huge.

I hope you don't take anything I wrote as an attack on you. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Debate is healthy as long as rules of civility are followed.

I hope I have shed some insight. I hope it helps and as always:

Please remember to rate all replies

OK, I just want to add one more thing (and am pretty sure I can make clear what I want to say): let's say you work with 10 colleagues, and you all work in a technical team, and you solve customer's problems. Now let's say you are the only one within your team who asks the customers to tell your boss, as well as everybody else, how great you are and how valuable the information is you provided, so basically asking the customer every time to give you a slap on the shoulder. Within a short while, your name is known everywhere, while that of your colleagues is not, although they help the customers as well. Your colleagues do not explicitly ask customers to tell everybody how great they are, because they might think that modesty is a virtue, or they might think that professional service speaks for itself. What that annoy your colleagues ?

Jim,

I don't have a problem with the rating system. As you know, most things in life and especially in our business, need to have some kind metric system. The only way to gauge how useful some replies are, it's by using metrics, on this case ratings.

I'm sure every year you are reviewed by your manager on how well you performed. If those reviews included ravings from customers, well you deserved it. If you didn't receive any ravings from a customer throughout the year and your cohorts received plenty, this would raise a red flag on your customer relation skills (which is also part of the job description).

You find people asking for their posts to be rated annoying ? Well, how about working 25 minutes searching for an answer, post an elaborate suggestion and never receiving a response back ? How about seeing the same user posting in another group or thread with the same question and not even acknowledge yours ? With a rating system, at least you know, in a kind way, if your response was helpful or not.

Do you get annoyed when Cisco sends you the survey after closing a TAC case ?

I don't, for me that's the time for ranting or raving that technician who took his/her time to help me on a moment of crisis.

Again, all I am saying is that the playing field should be level for all. You ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and you get them. Somebody else does not ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and does not get them. That is what I find unfair. It is indeed frustrating if you never get a response, and that is why I think that all posts from everybody should have to be rated, as a rule to use the forum.

As with regard to being reviewed by your manager: how would you feel if your fellow technician, the guy sitting next to you, would ask each and every one of his customers to give him points for his work, which he then shows to your manager as proof that he is more valuable than you are, while you do the same work, but somehow feel that a little bit of professional modesty is more in place, rather than screaming for recognition with everything you do ?

Jim,

On NetPro, my experience is different. If you are helpful enough, you will be rated whether you ask for it or not.

As for rating all posts, I disagree. There are many posts where you ask for more information, those shouldn't be rated. There are also posts where you make off-topic comments.

No system is perfect and I believe you are picking on a small flaw within the NetPro forum system.

If the NetPro scoring system has enticed clever individuals to post here, by all means, it should stay the way it is.

You will find that those with not-so-useful posts, will get 0 ratings, even if they ask for their posts to get rated.

Hi everyone.

I just want to add my experience on this.

Jim said:

You ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and you get them. Somebody else does not ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and does not get them.

and that's exactly what happened with me.

I replied to a post with the correct answer.

The original poster didn't trust my solution and requested for more help. After some posts from many people, he got the same solution as mine. He finaly tried it and he saw that it was actually working.

The author who "gave" him the solution the second time, requested for a rate in his post.

He got a 5 and I got nothing even though I gave the solution from the very first reply on his post.

So, like Jim said

You ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and you get them. Somebody else does not ask for points after 25 minutes of research, and does not get them.

The truth is that this puzzled me a bit, but the original poster just wanted a solution to his problem. That's all that mattered to him. The rest is meaningless.

Many posters share the same opinion and this is definately NOT the way to make this rating work correclty.

Regards

Marinos

I've been reading the thread since it started, some excellent points on both sides have been made.

As a "non-asker," I find myself waffling but I believe I will continue not requesting the rating.

I can see some point in indicating which posts ultimately solved the problem ... but that can be done with just the red check mark .. on a scale of 1-5 you end up with "This post 'sorta' fixed the problem(?)' for anything less than a "5."

I'm always a little warmer & fuzzier when I get a rating, and in some cases, I find my self remembering people I know I've provided a good answer to that don't rate .... and maybe I'm not so interested in making the effort to help them again (it's a fault, I know).

I believe it (at some level) goes to the motivation to participate in the first place. Many of the top folks here never ask a question ... they are here strictly as a voluntary resource. Why?

Personally, I get a lot of questions answered without having to post; most of the answers are available with a search.

I also get the benefit of see what kind of problems people are having with the newly-released product or stuff I haven't had a chance to play with, but may have to support some day.

While I'm here reading posts, if I see something I can answer, I try to answer it, even the probable non-raters, because on occasion, someone else recognizes the effort and rates it.

I've rated other people's answers when I see that the OP didn't rate it, and the responder has the solution nailed or it has been helpful to me.

I've been the person that's exhausted every option and needs some new ideas to fix something. Having the diverse universe of experts offered by NetPRo as a 24X7X365 resource is a Very Good Thing.

Being an active participant helps me to stay up on things I (used to) know, helps me learn/re-learn/update myself on the technologies, and gives me some indication of things I ought to know (or know better).

The ratings are just the icing on the cake (for me) ... don't get me wrong, I like frosting and I like getting the ratings, it's just not my primary reason for participating.

Like so many things, there's a jillion points-of-view. If a person asks for a rating, and the answer solves the issue or answers the question, they certainly deserve it.

Questions like "What color is a Cisco 2650?" answered with a "5" rating seems a little suspect though ....

Thanks to all of the answering participants; you have all been very helpful to me over the time I've spent here.

FWIW

Scott

Thinking about it again, maybe that is the way things are these days. I opened a TAC case a while ago, and the TAC engineer called me back to ask me if I could give him a good rating, because that would be good for his career. I personally feel that jumping up and down to get attention is a thing rather for kindergarden than for grown ups and professionals. I did not give him a rating BECAUSE he asked for it, and I would have done it if he would NOT have asked for it. My experience is that real knowledgeable people are modest. Check around in your own company, how do you recognize the CEO ? It is the guy that says hello to you in the elevator and opens the door for you. How do you recognize the mail room guy at the bottom of the career ladder ? It is the one that screams the loudest...

Look, if I ask for credit for someone ELSE'S work.. THAT is an injustice. NetPro is a nearly perfect meritocracy. The current rating system makes the most sense.

richmorrow624
Level 1
Level 1

As someone that only posts questions here, I find it extremely valuable as a resource of information.

I get caught up in the problem and I do forget to rate the posts.

I do not find that a reminder to rate the post offensive to me at all, if that means anything to anyone.

I didn't realize how important it is and I will in the future be sure to rate all answers to my questions.

The only thing is, I find all replys to be a #5 as far as I am concerned.

Thanks to everyone.

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