Young Association Professionals (YAP) yapstar.org

The rule of thumb we use at ASHA is that if someone asks a direct question of us, we answer those. If someone poses a question to the group to which nobody else is responding but it's something on our website--e.g. "Does anyone know when convention is?" or something like that--we post a response pointing them to the information on our website. But if it's just a matter of their opinions or a conversation in which they are not asking for our input, we don't intervene as long as they're abiding by community rules.

Maybe if you remind the staff who want you to shut down the discussion or intervene in some way that at least now you can see these conversations and be aware of issues--if you are too heavy-handed with the Big Brother stuff, people will take those conversations somewhere else and you won't have any idea about stuff that's going on. I'd try to sell the gain for the association--knowledge, being able to anticipate potential issues, etc--in having these negative discussions on your turf vs. having them take place elsewhere.

Hope that helps....

There are different ways to handle this.

My advice would be to let the community back you up.  Which does mean being part of the community and having people actually know you, the association staff, as individuals. I think this is a little bit more involved than Maggie's answer, but I also know her groups are pretty huge numbers-wise so it might not be so easy for ASHA.

ASAE does this very well - everyone knows people who are part of the staff there and who interact online and are friendly with members.  I would say ASAE gets much less criticism than it might purely based on the fact that we would feel bad if we criticized them because we know that Lisa, or Peter, or Reggie, or Wanda, or whoever might be sad about it.

Of course this is a longer-term answer, but if you are able to be part of the community like that, then when contentious issues arise, more likely than not someone will come to your defense and you STILL won't need to respond from an "official" point of view.

Another thing you can do when there is constructive criticism is contact the "criticizers" (directly and privately or openly in response to the group) and just say that you are hearing what they are saying and (if necessary) taking steps to fix whatever it is.  Often, complainers just want to know that they are being heard.

Thanks, Maggie and Maddie, for the insights. Both perspectives are helpful.

I have to live vicariously through other orgs' social media communities because discussion about packaging machinery doesn't usually bring people to blows (at least not that I've seen).

A while ago I found this flowchart designed and, theoretically, used by the Air Force to decide whether and how to respond to bloggers. It seems to provide a reaction to most actions possible in an online discussion whether discussion board, microblogging site, comment box, etc.

This is a very military thing to do. In fact, being former military, it's downright hysterical, but it also seems to fairly comprehensive and logical. Did the Air Force really manage to figure out a solution to most issues professional communicators face with online discussion?

I guess the one thing they didn't mention was Maddie's "Let the community go to bat for you" method. Good insight.

Anyways, thought this was interesting.

Michael

Thanks for sharing the link, Michael. You're right, the Air Force's strategy really does seem comprehensive. Also, the strategy presented as a flow chart idea will help me in an upcoming presentation to staff, i.e., easier to understand (hopefully!).