Ingredients of a Community Manager: Everyman and Ethics

chaos
Photo owned by Katie Tegtmeyer (cc)

Been thinking about the role of community manager. There are so few people that do it professionally in Ireland. Speaking to someone recently, we agreed that it seems like there are so few capable folks out there.

On seconds thoughts, looking at the attributes that community managers have – we all do it in a way.  A community manager is an advocate for that everyman in a project. His greatest skill should be listening and then preempting the slow bureaucratic machine of a company. Feeding back into the machine and being a catalyst for change in that same organisation. If constant change be chaos, then the community manager is its soul.

He thinks about new ways to talk an audience that is abseiling from one social nook to that cranny. He cuts the time to wait for customers and the cost of support. He has fun with the tool. He’s humanises the organisation.

I’d like to think we’re all kinda community managers of something. Nowadays on the web, everyone has a project. We’re playing with tools and building treehouses – blogs like Liveblog.ie and IrishElection. Being active in a community means trying to instill an ethos of sharing, openness and humanity. A community manager does this, but with a business bent.

Before you quit you job, to professionally whore Facebook groups, there’s more…  You have to be subtle. Knowing how to use tools isn’t enough. Being a professional whore that links to everything and anything isn’t enough. Being that Johnny Social Connector isn’t enough. Were I hiring someone as community manager for an online project, I’d like them to have an independent voice, but more importantly, strong moral fabric that’s part of their DNA. Were I starting a project as a community manager, it would be one of the first lines I draw.

How important is following ethics when balancing a community management role? Where do you draw the line?

June 3rd, 2009 at 2:18 pm • Filed in Blogging, Business, Geekery



Comments

5 Comments to “Ingredients of a Community Manager: Everyman and Ethics”

  1. Will Knott Says:
    June 3rd, 2009 at 3:45 pm

    Strong moral fiber? Apart from sounding like a breakfast cereal (Strong Moral Fiber, now with more nuts!) you need to be careful about how strong…

    How far can you let slagging and or name calling go? In text its hard to tell lighthearted from dead serious.

    Do you remove flame bait? What if it is a timely hot button topic (e.g. pick a headline)

    Does the hot button topics of the moderator hold with the hot buttons of the company or community? If not, should the moderator moderate his/her own views on the matter?

    Knowing when to stay out of the way, knowing when to close topics, knowing when to shut down.

    There are a few technical things, and legal ones (trawling comments for re-opened legal cases as you don’t want the community to be held in contempt)

    Is there such a thing as a training course for community managers, and for those who have to hire them?



  2. Alexia Says:
    June 3rd, 2009 at 7:06 pm

    A training course for morals, sense and judgment? Tell me you’re joking, Will.



  3. Will Knott Says:
    June 3rd, 2009 at 8:42 pm

    No. A training course to identify morals, sense and judgement in people.

    The technical side can be trained, the personal parts have to be ingrained.
    Not of like those ethics courses given to large corporations so that they can say they were give if the lawyers call around.

    Interviewers can be fooled. But you can’t fake it forever. Morals only show over time. Judgement is something that must be observed.

    Training in observation of morality and judgement is, in theory, possible. The problem is “it takes one to know one”. If the hiring person is amoral, how do they identify morality?



  4. Ian Says:
    June 8th, 2009 at 8:07 am

    About 10 years ago I was a manager at AOL, and they actually had ethics training available. Of course this was back when they had the money to spend on stuff like this, but it proved beneficial. Having your team be on the same moral page can really save you a lot of time and frustration, I’ve found.



  5. Jay Says:
    June 23rd, 2009 at 11:17 pm

    It’s funny when I sit here googling my job (community manager) in relating to Ireland and I can find little if anything that makes me think I will ever find another role in this arena in this country.

    I work for a well known e-commerce site but feel hamstrung by the business.

    I agree completely that a community manager should be passionate both about customers and members and the business. That voice at the table that represents the person asking “why do they keep moving the goalposts?” I’ve managed to affect some change in my time but would love to be able to take it to the next level and get to grips with the people destroying my forums and the community vibe we have.

    Until the company stops focussing on the “letting our customers adapt to our changes” instead of engaging them.. it’ll never happen.

    Alexia: gis a job on that online venture you’re talking about. Sounds good :O)



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