When does a moderator become a community manager?

  • When does a moderator become a community manager?

As we’ve said in previous posts, the roles within community management are becoming ever-sharper defined and standardised job titles are creeping into the general web dictionary. ‘Moderator’ means something to most people using forums on a regular basis, even if ‘community manager’ still sounds a bit high-handed to them.

But when does a moderator become a community manager? What tasks set the two apart and can a good moderator naturally become a good community manager, or is this like saying the best football player will automatically ace the game of rugby too?

In most organisations, a ‘moderator’ is a reviewer of content and a ‘judge’. A moderator can often edit or remove, and can flag up and generate reminders and warnings. Essentially, moderators keep order and control: moderators are the referees.

Community managers don’t just deal with potential problems: they generate and promote positive activity and content. They get to do the nice stuff, the touchy-feely stuff, the boosting conversation, recognising opportunities for new message boards or functions, giving the community gifts of time and tools. They also think ahead and plan for the community within the context of a wider organisation. To continue the sport analogy, community managers are somewhere between team captain and team manager.

Sue John, community manager for BritishExpats.com describes the community manager as a “’front’ person, receives the direct contact community emails, deals with complaints, guides the direction of the community, etc”.

Alison Michalk, community manager at Fairfax Digital, says: “I think managing a mod team adds extra dimensions to community manager roles, not all people are cut out for – like all business really!”

She adds: “Also, a community manager may need to balance business needs more, whilst mods represent community needs first.”

So can someone adept at spotting and removing troublesome content, automatically spot and promote good content and good behaviour? Can they write content for their communities, source external news and content to link to and generate chatter? Can they forecast opportunities, challenges and external pressures on the community in the coming months, and strategise how best to use resources within the team? Frankly, I don’t think they can.

Before I get a pitchfork in the eye from an enraged moderator, I’ll explain. I think it’s unlikely that a moderator will naturally fall into these extra tasks – that’s expecting a lot. Being an excellent moderator is a kitbag of skills enough without expecting an automatic ability to do a raft of other, often more senior, tasks too. But that doesn’t mean a moderator cannot learn, grow and develop into an amazing community manager.

I’ve known awesome moderators – firm, fair and efficient – turn to jelly faced with a decision over what community content to promote or how to handle pressure from the community up and pressure from management down. I’ve known brilliant moderators, confident, self-starting moderators, write complete gibberish when they need to generate their own copy.

To land a moderator in a community management role with no training and plan for development is absurd and it’s unfair. It’s also a shortcut to losing a great moderator and gaining a poor community manager.

You wouldn’t promote a nurse to a doctor with no extra training or support. Or perhaps less life-threateningly, a waiter to restaurant manager.

Robust, positive and comprehensive training, with ongoing support, should be the step on any promotion from straight moderation to comprehensive community management, without it, you’re taking a huge risk with your community and your staff.

To find out more about the community management, web writing and social media training that Spoke Digital offers, see our Training page.

  • janetgershensiegel
    I think, as has been said before, the Moderator role mainly comes first and then you become a Community Manager. It seems to have a lot to do with questions of scale. E. g. you can be a Moderator (and, often, the only one) when a community has less than about a thousand people or so. But at some point you begin to hit critical mass and moderation begins to recede into the background more.

    You trust your users more, in particular, your super-users, the ones who feel they have a personal stake in the community and its health. You let the conversations take their own courses more and more frequently. You become less ... visible.

    And you bring in more Moderators, because you need to start covering off-hours, and suddenly you wake up one day and you're a Manager.

    A community exists when more than two people talk. A Community Manager exists when those talkers are given more leeway and promoted positively, rather than restricted and controlled.
  • sibylle
    This is a very interesting discussion. I guess I come from a very different background to most that have commented before me (Hotel management, managing over 100 staff, then maternity leave, became a member of a a parenting community, then a volunteer moderator for that community as I wanted to give something back and have just taken on my first paid moderator position)
    I totally agree as well that for moderators it's more black and white, but looking at it from a volunteer moderator community, there are different moderators as well...the ones that are only there as they want to know what's going on and love the community, and the ones that can see beyond that and want to take it to another level. I for one am very grateful to our awesome Community Manager (the great Alison Michalk) that could see the capabilities in me, and pushed me further (and suggested me for my current position). I believe that if you know your moderators, take the time to find out about them and get to know them it will be very easy to spot the ones that can take the step to community management and the ones that are better just at moderator level or, as in a volunteer community such as ours, the ones that really should not be there....).
    A great moderator will see beyond just the rules and regulations of the site and look at the "overall picture" of the site, including what is best for the business. (or maybe that's just the ex-manager in me that thinks like that...) Generating content and finding news to link to and promoting chatter depends on the community and how much freedom the moderators have...Again I believe that as a Community Manager if you know your team and are a good manager (and more than that, a good leader ;) ) you will know who would be capable and willing and you hopefully go on to mentor those people and offer opportunities to them. So I agree, that robust, comprehensice and positive training is the way to go...once you have identified the right people.
  • "I personally found pure moderation a lot more black and white in terms of decision making, than when I stepped up to become a community manager."

    It is very different. A moderator's primary function is to review a post, determine if it violates the community standards/guidelines, and take action if necessary. A community manager, on the other hand, sets the standards and guidelines that the moderator is enforcing in the first place.

    Further, a community manager should be able to step back and look at the overall situations the moderators are handling and determine the correct course of action, if necessary. Is the community "acting out" because they're unhappy with something? Is there a negative opinion leader that needs direct contact with the community manager to resolve the issue, or, in extreme cases, needs to be removed from the community? What changes in policy might need to be made because of the introduction of new tools, products, or other changes?

    So when does a moderator become a community manager? One of the first steps is probably when they begin to shape and influence the community, rather than keeping it within the bounds that someone else has established.



  • It's a rhetorical question but sparks an interesting debate. I think you have to look at the history of the "moderator" and "community manager" roles to address this question. Community managers WERE moderators; forum leaders actually in the early days. They produced content, managed forums (pre real-time chat discussions), hosted, guided, wore the tech hat - they built it and people came. Since 2002 or 2003, Community roles have been confused with editorial, content, marketing and PR roles [in the EU in particular - not as true in the US, imo]. There's a difference between an Editor, a content producer and a Community Manager. I think globbing them all into one is an unfortunate by product of corporate misunderstanding. Community Managers *can* be editors but editors are not necessarily Community Managers. I would make the same argument re: PR, Marketing folks. Community Managers encompass many of the 'ombusdman' sentiments and skills. Now that community is mostly corporate (hey, someone's gotta pay for this skill set!), the Community Manager represents the corporation primarily, while still fighting the good fight for the community members (the people who financially support the corporation, usually). I have a Community Editor as part of my staff. I don't expect that person to manage moderation, customer service, or safety online. I expect that person to produce content (they used to called 'site producers' - not sure what happened to that lot!).

    Moderators are facilitators (or should be, again, imo). Like any other position in the business world, some people become victims of the "Peter Principle" (rising to the level of one's incompetence) because they are mistakenly thought of, or mistakenly think of themselves as experienced enough as a moderator to be a community manager. I've seen this occur over and over in the past 2 decades. It's a sad state for everyone. I've also seen excellent Moderators progress naturally to a Community Manager role. It's really about the person and what they're interested in, whether they're a natural leader, and whether they are interested in shouldering the responsibilities of managing teams, interfacing with senior management, etc.

    It's really about the person, and not about the role, don't you think?
  • Great insight from Rebecca as ever. I think some moderator roles are very tightly defined (I'm thinking high volume, pure approve/disallow type functions) but it's great when people's roles can be shaped to the individual's strengths too.

    You're so spot on about corporate misunderstanding and glooping together, although I think this is starting to change and roles are becoming better defined and understood.

    Thanks for all the comments so far, guys!

    Holly
  • Sue
    I founded the community I currently manage, however it was a hobby to start, and I suppose I started off more in a moderators role. But as the community grew into something far bigger then I had envisioned my role changed. I had to recruit moderators, train them, nurture them, create site guidelines/rules, source and edit content, drive traffic to the site, and I had to learn how to deal with advertisers, etc, etc. I don't have a editorial background, but after 10 years in the trenches I do know communities, and the people who use them, because I learnt from the ground up.

    I do agree that for moderators things are more black and white, and if they come across a situation they don't know how to deal with then they come to me. It's certainly not easy being the one out front and center and you have to have nerves of steel. Not everyone is ready, or wants, the responsibility. It isn't just about moderating the community, a CM does so much more behind the scenes than a moderator ever does. However saying that, it's the moderators who help set the tone of the community and without them a CM would be lost. The moderators are wing men and women :)
  • It's a fascinating subject and one that I have a different take on as we provide both Community Managers and moderators to clients all the time. There are some people within my company who are absolutely fantastic moderators but are not comfortable being 'front of house' as the role of the CM is completely different. The key thing is that a Community Manager requires a unique set of social skills, communication skills, confidence and general party hosting/entertainer/facilitator skills (delete as necessary) but also they must be a real buffer person between marketing teams, customer service, technology and of course the people right in the middle - the community itself.

    Moderators are specialists and sometimes the ability of an individual to manage a live virtual world with the equivalent of 5000 children shouting at the same time whilst staying sane defies belief. Equally knowing exactly the right moment to calm a forum down with some strategic deletions or behind the scenes words or quietly saving a brand a whole PR disaster by spotting the misuse of a logo or a racist image is what puts moderators firmly into the camp of quiet heroes.

    There are some people who can do both roles or some that move camps but the ideal team approach is to have both specialists working together. I suggest it's more like a TV chat show host and the TV crew behind them.

    Tamara

    p.s. waves at Jesse
  • Tamara, I love your images here, especially the TV crew/chat show host and the idea of moderators as "quiet heroes". In many ways, good moderation is often unseen, problems dealt with efficiently and cleanly. I also agree that working together (and playing to individual strengths) is the best way to get the best from the whole team.

    Holly
  • Great discussion to start as I think there can be a lot of confusion about the difference in these two roles (particularly from colleagues that don't directly interact with the community). I agree with Jesse in that community managers must have a firm grasp of moderation and have done it because they often are the ones managing the moderation team. I also see the dynamic between moderators and community managers often as the bad cop/good cop variety. It is helpful to have both types of interaction with community members.

    I think Blaise gets it right here - moderation is typically high volume and fairly black and white while community management requires a lot of balancing between various constituent groups and the judgment to walk the fine line in the middle. Moderators too are often not trained/experienced in communications - in some ways I feel like the Nestle Facebook page issue was created by someone who may have been a moderator stepping in to navigate a sticky situation with the community - completely different skill set and the results demonstrated how important it is to linguistically be able to strike a balance.
  • The Nestle situation raised the importance of very clear and effective escalation procedures; as you say Rachel, the skillset for dealing with the humdrum moderation issues and exceptional circumstances is different.
  • Hi Jesse and Blaise,

    I agree with both of you on this. I think that, while it's unfair to expect a moderator to be able to slip into a CM's shoes without the tools and training to do the 'extra' stuff, it's also unworkable to have a CM that doesn't understand moderation and the role of a moderator. Ideally, I'd like all CMs to have spent time as a moderator OR have some level of moderation built into their role, at least initially, so that they understand all aspects of the community and the way that it works.

    My experience was slightly different actually, and I wonder whether this is atypical, I became a community manager because of the heavy amount of content-writing that was built into that particular role (my background was in writing) and had to learn moderation on the fly. It was a baptism of fire to say the least and a steep learning curve and if I'd had my time over, I would have pushed for more training!
  • Hi Holly,

    Most Community Managers I come across seem to have an editorial background, more so than pure moderation. It's possible that more people get into moderation because of the flexible hours and the oppotunity to earn a bit of pocket money on the side, rather than see it as a career, as opposed to edotiral professionals?
  • Hey Blaise,

    I think it's also that when community was first emerging, the extra 'jobs' community features created got dished out to staff writers and editorial assistants in many cases. It was a blessing for me as I found that I loved the community side of things more than the writing, and that sent me off on a totally different career path long-term!

    Holly
  • I personally found pure moderation a lot more black and white in terms of decision making, than when I stepped up to become a community manager. It required I opened my mind a bit to the gray areas of debates, and certainly being the one to make the difficult calls rather than just escalate anything that fell outside of the community rules was a shock to the system. However I think a community manager will be more successful with a strong moderation background than any other (especially when they are alone and don;t benefit from relying on a team!), and agree with Jesse.
  • Is there such a thing as a good community manager who hasn't previously been a good moderator? The two roles are very different, as you've said in this article, but I think the skills of a moderator are still vital for a CM. I believe the very best CMs are those who are still involved in the moderation of the communities they manage because it tells you so much more about your members than the analytics pages or even reports from a managed moderation team can.
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