This article is dead on. It may be more for new guilds, but every single thing he said, I agree with (from personal experience.)

@ Oteo
I also think that you have to be very careful who you promote to officer. You want your friends to be officers because you feel you can trust them... but you're more lenient on them when they don't do what they're supposed to... because they're your friends. There's also the issue of control of the gbank and perceived favoritism and extra perks for officers, that are only extended to them because they're the GM's friends.

I was in a guild that I eventually became a class manager of... I was demoted during a xcountry move (dick move IMO) and the only officers left were the GM's girlfriend and his good buddy. A guild with 1 million gold in the gbank, takes your BOEs and sells them, and only 3 people have access.

Lets just say I'm not in that guild anymore... Be transparent about the gbank.

You can (insert relationship here) for frat buddies. Girlfriend, wife, husband, boyfriend, cousin, brother, father, son, neighbor - the point is not to hand out an officer title who is simply using that as a power trip or lording it over people or who have special access to the guild bank. It needs to be merit-based, or at least effort based, to have an officer position, or you run the risk of a lot of drama that scott has written about over the years.