One of my favourite sessions from Northern Voice‘s 2nd day was by Crystal Henrickson, Yelp Canada’s Community Manager. Tales, Trials and Teachings of the Community Management World, as the title suggests, gave a glimpse on what it’s like to be a community manager.
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard from Crystal — I had the privilege of hearing from her at Social Media Unplugged last January and at a Net Tuesday meetup shortly after. As usual, she brought spunk and personality to give life to her presentation.
Crystal’s presentation was actually packed with lots of good info, but some resonated more with me. Here are the top 10 things I learned from Crystal’s presentation:
- Strive to be organized. You’ll get lots of emails — learn how to deal with it.
- Manage your time well. You’ll have lots of events to attend. That’s in addition to projects. Crystal recommended Skitch, Evernote, gCal, and Task Manager to be on top of everything. She also has a super cute Yelp watch that she uses to stick to her schedule.
+1 RT @: Oh man, I want a @ watch! #nv11
- Play nice with everyone. You’ll need to when dealing with trolls and with naysayers.
- Give people the benefit of the doubt. It’s integral when things don’t work out (and sometimes, they won’t).
- Read. A lot. It will make you smart and stuff. Some of Crystal’s suggestions: Getting Things Done (David Allen) and Non-violent communication (Marshall B. Rosenberg).
- Learn how to deal with trolls. Specifically, Crystal advices that you don’t take things personally when dealing these creatures.
- Find your passion! It will be hard for you to manage a community if it’s for something you don’t have an interest to begin with. Faking it will not get you there.
- Have a coping strategy. With a busy schedule, you’re bound to have bad days. For Crystal, walking away from the computer and calling friends work. What works for you?
- Un-learn how to multi-task. This might seem counter-intuitive, but Crystal recommended that you do NOT multi-task. She doesn’t think it works. She suggested that you focus on one task at a time. (I agree with this, by the way.)
“I don’t believe in multitasking. I don’t think it works.” - @ #nv11
- Leave time for play. If you’re not having fun, you’ll likely hate your job.
The need for Community Managers is popping up everywhere these days, so it’s a privilege to hear first-hand how it’s like to be in this position. I really enjoyed Crystal’s presentation, especially because she made sure to leave plenty of time for questions. Community management surely isn’t an easy job, but it sounds like it could be also fun.
Photo: Raul P.
