Why Community Management is NOT like Parenting

Community Management = Parenting? Really?

There has been a recent upsurge in community management/moderation blog posts comparing the care and nurturing of a community to that of a parent. As both a parent and someone who has helped companies build and moderate successful communities for over ten years, I couldn’t disagree more. Here’s why:

• The best moderators and community managers are passionate about the success of their community in meeting its goals. They are not passionate about or emotionally attached to the individual members.

Think I’m crazy? Look at the photo above. When two members go at each other in a community an emotionally attached community manager will take sides based upon who they feel is more important to the community or worse, based upon their interpretation of what happened. So rather than staying above the fray, they take sides. We’ve seen it time and time again. We work hard with our client teams to understand the downside of this behavior by the manager or moderator. What’s the fall-out from this behavior by the manager/moderator? Simple, it intensifies the problem rather than defusing it. Members want moderators who are impartial to settle disputes. So unlike a parent, the most successful community managers and moderators must remain emotionally detached.

• Getting too close to a member emotionally reduces your credibility as a moderator/manager in the eyes of the other members who aren’t close to you.

It matters what others think, even if incorrect. The most vocal and longest lasting problems in B2C communities that we’ve managed always revolve around the initial problem being compounded by claims of unfair treatment and support for one side over the other.  If you enter into a situation like this, your credibility will suffer in the eyes of many members. For example, at AARP the political action is fast and furious. We’ve seen members attack each other over many issues. (Liberals against Conservatives. Democrats against Republicans. Capitalists against Socialists. Wingnuts against Moonbats. ) Each time our moderators have stepped in, it has been to enforce the terms of service rather than take sides. While we are often accused by someone of taking sides, other members are quick to point out to the community that the moderators take action against them as well. That achieves a certain balance that while fragile is non-partisan. If you are emotionally attached to a member who is attacked, you are likely to over-react and set off a chain reaction. So unlike a parent you must stay above the fight and be partial. (Yes this sounds like a parental ideal, but in practice it’s almost impossible to pull off with your own kids because you are still too emotionally invested and want to settle the fight NOW!)

• The myth of not needing moderation continues to stay alive

This one is really interesting in my opinion. How can you compare community management to parenting and then say that:

“In fact moderation is rarely necessary where an effective community manager runs the community.” – Simon Phillips

Clearly, he’s never dealt with a two year old throwing a tantrum or a member doing the same in a community. As I mentioned in my comments:

“At the early maturity stage of a public community, the community manager must moderate in order to establish the community norms of behavior. That means removing offensive content or language or attacks. It also requires that the community manager contact the members whos content he/she has removed/edited. Otherwise the wrong example is set and the behavioral expectations are going to be harder to realize. If you don’t step in early, the bullies and soapboxers will dominate and reinforce the behavior that you don’t want to see (or that your client doesn’t want to see). Once that happens, your growth in realized value will slow as members join more to fight or spam or advertise rather than to contribute to a meaningful goal.

As the community matures, the need for behavioral moderation remains. Why? Because members don’t want to self-police and if they do, they often go after people they disagree with rather than true violations of the community norms or ToS.”

So here is the bottom line from Impact Interactions’ view of the online community world. In order to succeed in driving the results you want, act like a professional facilitator not a parent. Remain emotionally detached from your members to stay impartial. Focus on the results and in maintaining the norms and behaviors you want in your community rather than on the personalities. And don’t act like a parent, act like a professional.

Here are a few other takes on this idea:

Raising Good Communities – The Community Roundtable

You teach what you accept: As true in parenting as it is in online community management – FreshNetworks

Leading a Community is Like Parenting - Connie Bensen

Please feel free to add your thoughts on this analogy…

Mike Rowland, President

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9 Responses to “Why Community Management is NOT like Parenting”

Rachel Happe says:

February 16, 2010 at 1:07 pm

Hi Mike -

From my perspective when I think about community management as parenting I think the ‘community’ is the child, not any one member – maybe a bit more of a conceptual leap – but the goal is a healthy well-functioning community. I wholeheartedly agree that you need to be a fair and impartial arbiter of disputes and enforce the rules – but so to is that the goal of parenting. In neither do we always get it just right because we are all human.

The other perspective that I have which you may not agree with is that none of us who feel passionately about something are ever emotionally unattached – that’s the nature of being passionate. I think knowing how to recognized and acknowledge our own emotional bias – and be able to evaluate whether our own bias is affecting our ability to moderate – is a critical skill for a community manager. If we find that we do, in fact, feel so strongly that we cannot effectively moderate acknowledging that allows us to find a different person to step in and handle a situation. This I think is also similar to parenting – sometime it’s best to get the other parent to handle particular situations because it is a hot button for us that gets in the way of effectively negotiating a solution.

I do agree that every community needs a community manager that ultimately upholds the rules – and that while some communities will learn to self-moderate more than others, they all ultimately need a community manager to manage the disputes that do arise. Members rarely want to self-police and when they do, there are other issues.

Thanks for your take on this.

Rachel

MRowland says:

February 16, 2010 at 1:30 pm

Hi Rachel,

I agree that the community is the child (not the member) if you are to use this analogy. But in terms of passion, you must stay disciplined in your management even though you are passionate about the community. This is especially true for moderators and community managers handling large public, multi-topic communities. Too often managers cross the line because they personally disagree with a point of view and side with one member (or faction) over another. This behavior will destroy a community.

Where I think all of us agree on this topic is that without someone in the managment having passion for the community, the results will never be as good as if you did have that passionate person. To me, it’s about where you apply that passion and how. (So perhaps we’re simply splitting hairs.)

Thanks for the comment and your thoughts.

Mike

MatthewLees says:

February 18, 2010 at 3:52 pm

Actually, Mike, since the topic relates to parenting, you and Rachel are simply splitting “heirs.”

(Sorry about that.)

No analogy is perfect. (If it were, it would be an identity, not an analogy.) Seems to me there are indeed aspects of community management that are like parenting, and aspects of community management that are not like parenting. I wouldn’t call the parenting analogy invalid; I’d just call it limited.

I think what really has got your goat are those community management efforts that don’t follow best practices. There’s a pretty good folksonomic body of knowledge out there now on what these best practices are. Many organizations that run online communities follow them. Surprisingly, many still don’t.

~ Matthew

Sue John says:

February 24, 2010 at 9:17 am

You can’t grow a community if you are not a passionate about the reason the community exists, and the people who use it. Personally I feel if one is emotionally detached then you fail to understand the needs of community members. However, I agree that a CM needs to be unbiased, and moderate and manage the community according to the terms of service and/or community rules. Perhaps rather than parents we are Grandparents, or Aunts and Uncles. Overseeing and guiding, but not on the verge of becoming “helicopter” parents.

Alex says:

February 24, 2010 at 9:31 am

I would be inclined to agree with Sue here. Fair, impartial, emotionally even moderation is the cornerstone, but that doesn’t mean a lack of emotional connection with the community and even certain elements within it.

So yes, not quite a parent, but something of a relative!

MRowland says:

February 24, 2010 at 9:31 am

Hi Sue,

Thanks for your comment. I do like the Grandparents/Aunts/Uncles idea much better. Passion is a funny thing in communities, as it can help and hurt. Unchecked, passion can evolve to too much control of the community or worse favoritism towards those members who are “in line” with the goals of the community. Passion for the site and its goals is one thing that is absolutely necessary for success. But it’s a fine line when we are passionate about members individually.

MRowland says:

February 24, 2010 at 9:38 am

Hi Alex,

Looks like we’re starting to build a consensus! Thanks for visiting our blog and commenting.

Online Community Links Roundup 26/02/10 | Community Management | Blaise Grimes-Viort says:

February 27, 2010 at 7:37 am

[...] Why community management is not like parenting [...]

Lauren Bittner says:

April 16, 2010 at 9:53 am

I agree with the viewpoint that staying emotionally detached, rather than acting like a parent, is the best way to proceed in moderation. I’d also like to add that while good moderation is about professionalism, rather than parenting, professionalism in a moderation situation is about staying connected as much as it is staying detached.

While this sounds like an oxymoron, I have found that successfully getting a community off the ground is about coming to understand enough about the members that you are familiar with their strengths. Once you have that knowledge you can facilitate connections between members that result in a productive, profitable knowledge exchange that ultimately drives the client’s business objectives. This translates into activity because when someone in the community has a question in a specific area of expertise, instead of letting the question go unanswered the moderator can reach out to the right expert member and say “You might not have noticed that a member has a question in your area of expertise. I think you would be able to answer it. If you can’t, do you know someone who can?”

Additionally, there are other ways to connect without getting emotionally attached. Some of these guidelines are the very courtesies we see in positive professional environments in the offline world:

1) Always say thank you in response to contributions. When a member contributes, whether it’s a post, a blog or anything else, the moderator should thank the member for it. This makes the member feel valued and encourages them to contribute again. It also encourages contributions from others who see this behavior.

2) Respond quickly. This way, members will understand that if they seek information in your community they will find it quickly. It also encourages member to come to your community for information before they seek out information from other venues that might not yield results as quickly.

3) Set expectations. Communicate the time frame for responses on the site so members can plan their research and won’t be disappointed if they don’t see a response on the same day if that is not realistic for your moderation team.

4) Recognize contributors who stand out. There are many ways to do this, ranging from associating icons with members who have made a designated number of contributions, recognition of members on external social media sites that link back to the community, increased opportunities to interact with your organization’s executives and special site privileges.