First, Cuppycake was talking about Community Managers, not about PR folks. They are not the same thing.
Second, whether or not you dislike PR folks, Jacobs just (probably without thinking) sabotaged both his PR folks AND his community managers very badly by becoming an internal company voice that they can't do a thing about.
If he post about something related to Warhammer, for example, and he's *wrong* (face it--it happens with executives because they can't keep up on all the detaily stuff), the poor bastards in the PR and CM and support trenches are going to have to live with that forever. Not just for a few days while they correct the information privately, so as not to offend their boss, but forever. People will always be going to Jacobs' blog and saying "BUT IT SAYS THIS HERE AND HE'S AT THE TOP SO HE SHOULD KNOW." Then the community begins to spin conspiracy theories: are the PR folks right, or are they just trying to cover something up? Do you go to Jacobs for the "truth," or can you trust the community manager, if something differs? The folks lower on the totem pole are going to end up cleaning up his mess, and there's no stopping because a) he's their boss and b) he has demonstrated that he has no idea how to handle himself in terms of managing a community.
That said, I generally agree with Jacobs that people need to take a chill pill about the beta issues. They aren't going to, though, and now they have a highly visible person at whom to rail and moan.
Reader Comments (1)
Posted: Sep 10th 2008 2:49PM KaTing said
Second, whether or not you dislike PR folks, Jacobs just (probably without thinking) sabotaged both his PR folks AND his community managers very badly by becoming an internal company voice that they can't do a thing about.
If he post about something related to Warhammer, for example, and he's *wrong* (face it--it happens with executives because they can't keep up on all the detaily stuff), the poor bastards in the PR and CM and support trenches are going to have to live with that forever. Not just for a few days while they correct the information privately, so as not to offend their boss, but forever. People will always be going to Jacobs' blog and saying "BUT IT SAYS THIS HERE AND HE'S AT THE TOP SO HE SHOULD KNOW." Then the community begins to spin conspiracy theories: are the PR folks right, or are they just trying to cover something up? Do you go to Jacobs for the "truth," or can you trust the community manager, if something differs? The folks lower on the totem pole are going to end up cleaning up his mess, and there's no stopping because a) he's their boss and b) he has demonstrated that he has no idea how to handle himself in terms of managing a community.
That said, I generally agree with Jacobs that people need to take a chill pill about the beta issues. They aren't going to, though, and now they have a highly visible person at whom to rail and moan.