Caretakers Wanted

Caretakers Wanted

We are looking for more Caretakers of The Satanic Estate.

The Satanic Estate comprises three buildings-- The Satanic Temple Virtual Headquarters (TSTVHQ-- our communal home), Faction Hall (our event hall) and starting June 4th, our religious center for weekly services (our Temple.)

Opening and operating The Satanic Estate is an act of religious devotion for all Caretakers. It is a laborious yet gratifying combination of computer programming, project management, guest services, podcast production, email marketing, event coordination, tech support, website management, copywriting, transcript editing, social media management, video editing, graphic design and UX/UI.

We are growing very fast and we would deeply benefit from support in all of the above areas.

The Scale of the Estate
When the developers behind the software first donated it to The Satanic Temple in July of 2020, Assistant Director Jack Matirko and I never could have dreamed of what The Estate would become.

As of this writing, we have had the house open for about 40 nights. From our early tests in July 2020 to our inaugural 13 nights in October 2020, 10 days of Sol Invictus 2020, 5 days of Lupercalia 2021, 4 days of the World Congress on Moral Panics, 5 days of Hexennacht 2021--  we have had over 2000 tickets sold/gifted from over a dozen countries. 

Over the rest of 2021, we are scheduled to be open for 50+ more days including the weekly opening of The Estate for Weekly Services. In order to continue growing and improving, we need more caretakers to trim the hedges in the Garden and dust the oddities in the Tea Room. If you’d like to help, please fill out the form.

We currently have 13 Caretakers-- and we all wear a lot of hats. Any Caretaker may take the lead on developing an event or a campaign for our social media. Caretaking is not a volunteer position-- we split the small amount of profit that we don’t donate to TST amongst ourselves as per our involvement like a co-op-- but this is just a token and won’t pay your rent.

Developers: we have the two original primary developers of our webapp and our two secondary developers. We could use support with AWS Cognito, front end and back end dev. If you’d like to help, please send us your GitHub repo and we’ll send you ours. I’m especially interested in seeking a UX/UI dev as I’d like to overhaul this facet. My dearest wish for 2022 is that we will have a mobile optimized iteration of the Estate to accommodate guests without laptops or desktops.

Guest Tech Support: This occurs via Shopify Chat, email and Zoom. We have two caretakers who do email support and two caretakers who do Shopify Chat. I would love to have many additional people helping with this so we can support guests more efficiently.

Control Room / Performer Tech Support: We currently have one person who does the primary Control Room-- streaming videos and coordinating streamkeys and embeds with performers. We really need a second person to support this.

Graphic Design: Our still and moving graphics are the soul of the Estate and we take them very seriously. We currently have one (incredible) designer and me for (subpar) backup. I would love to see one to two more designers added-- these folks needs to have immaculate project management and communication skills as we do up to 6 events a night and each of them need a unified brand to them. Collating the assets is over half the battle for a designer. We use Adobe CC and Canva.

Social Media: We have three people helping with this across platforms. We could really use more support across channels, especially on YouTube and TikTok. Graphic Design and Social Media so far have been really closely linked. Sourcing handles, photos and info would be a huge help for a Social Media caretaker.

Shopify: We use Shopify. I am working on the Shopify at least once a day and I am perpetually behind. We have three people who use Shopify. We could use more people.

TSTTV: We work closely with TSTTV in a number of ways. We have three people who help with TSTTV. We could use more.

In-Estate Guest Services: We try to keep a Caretaker in every event room and on YouTube to support guests and we also keep one in the Cemetery / Illuminated Foyer as a concierge to help disoriented guests find what they are seeking. We have four Caretakers who reliably do this, but we could of course always use another.

Media Creation: We do a podcast and we edit a shit ton of pre-recorded videos for the events. These skills are enormously helpful and we could certainly use more of it. I believe we have four folks who do this now but they’re always strained as the load is heavy.

Transcript Writing, Copywriting and Email Marketing: We write a lot of newsletters-- one person currently does it and we could really use the help with copywriting and transcript editing and email marketing. Transcript creation is enormously laborious and support increasing the accessibility of the Estate with transcript writing would be wonderful.

Administration and Project Management: Project Managers are the brain and heart of The Estate. They keep everything moving and color the experience of being a caretaker. We need PMs and admins like we need air and water. PMs typically own certain projects and manage a production team to make every facet of that event happen. They also document and report project status on our Master Spreadsheet.

Project Managers help us all have fun and hail Satan. If things aren't fun, something is very wrong and PMs lead the charge to help change that. The project isn't the most important thing, it's the people. PMs help us maintain that perspective while making sure we get shit done on time.

The Ideal Caretaker
An ideal caretaker at The Estate is someone who has a wide angle view of the big picture with the ability to drill down on tasks and get shit done. They communicate concisely and clearly. They are not just one kind of person: they likely have a concentration for their skillset but they are open to learning and trying new things. They don’t wait to be told what’s needing to be done-- they can assess the situation and help triage instinctively. They take good notes, they ask fantastic questions and they respectfully question things that could use refinement. When they are overwhelmed, they express it. When they need support, they express it. When they’re kicking ass and think everyone else is too, they express it. Caretakers = expressive.

We aren't a hierarchical organization for the most part-- yes Jack and I have final say on most things, but we trust our Caretakers to take the lead and manage their minutiae. We hate tasking folks like dictators.

When the ideal Caretakers looks at a project and has concerns that there are items missing, they take the initiative to review the master sheet and confirm there is something missing, ask helpful questions in the relevant public Slack channel and meaningfully offer their support to make sure everything is in order. While there are leads on certain projects, we have a culture of collaboration that is built to prevent the sensation of toe stepping.

Caretaker Culture: The Two Phases

There are two phases to being a caretaker-- one a furious rush pre-event, one is a manic push during the event.

PRE-EVENT:
This is a lot of harassing performers and consistent daily work to keep all the balls in the air. We have weekly PM parties and weekly all-claws meetings (goth for "all hands"). Caretakers spend between 5 to 20 hours per week pre-event depending on their workload at the time.

DURING EVENT:
Typically the house is open for six hours, so this means most Caretakers are on the case for at least six hours. Some Caretakers on event days will be around and working on the Estate for 9 or more hours on Event days. More caretakers will mean that we all don’t have to do this for every day of a multi-day event. 

If you’d like to become a Caretaker, here’s a little questionnaire to get the process started. We’d greatly appreciate the support and look forward to chatting with you soon.

Thank you,
Ada King
Director
TheSatanic.Estate