discription of a community manager

[Becky]

Chrissy,
I am a regional manager over 6 communities, I have different site managers under me for each one. I put out a quartly newsletter for each community with info pretaining to each community. My site managers for the most part are fairly new at managing, and our residents are over powering them with complaints of children playing in the streets, children name calling, children fighting, adults making faces at another resident, stray animals running through the community, you name it and they hear about it. Most of which in my opion is very childish complaints. My advice to the site managers when they get a complaint of such is to ask the complainer if they have addressed the problem with the offener or his/her parents and if not to advice them to do so before bring it to them. However, the complaints just keep coming. Our communities have a very detailed set of guidelines which we do our best to enforce. I believe our residents have the wrong opion of what a site manager is and I was wondering if you have or know of some sort of witty discription of a site manager. I am thinking of including it in our next newletters. Something that spells out that a site manager is not the parent of all the children that live in the community, a marriage conselor, a banker, a taxi driver or any of the other hats that the resident thinks she may wear. Maybe that would be overboard for me to do such a thing, but I have no better ideas. I just know that my site managers are being run ragged trying to cover all these complaints. If you know of any such writings or have any other ideas please let me know.
Thank you,
Becky

[chrissy]

I understand only all too well what you want to accomplish, but the bottom line is that you are talking about your customers and their relationship with one of the companies (yours) that is an integral part of their life. Urge all residents to put their complaints in writing. Discuss with them what they want you to do to resolve the issue. This is VERY important. Too many times we assume that we know what they want us to do. By asking them, and forcing them to put it into words, many times they realize that what they want is impossible. But, if we just jump in there and try to do what we think they want without asking first, we start an endless cycle of them complaining and us jumping. Ask what they want, and if seems to be impossible to you or your managers, ask them if they have any suggestions as to how it might be accomplished. At times, when we get to this point in the conversation, I have had residents look at me and say, "Well, I guess there's really no easy way to do this. I just wanted you to know about it." They don't always expect the impossible - we just sometimes assume that they do rather than asking. If they ask for something that the Guidelines (rules) don't give you permission or authority to do, tell them. Then, ask for suggestions.

[Lance Nerland]

A site manager, in my opinion does these main duties

1. Collect Rent

2. Repair any physical plant problems ( OUTSIDE the persons home, unless you have any rentals).

3. Bring in new, outstanding tenents into the community and try your best to prevent crime.

4. Landscaping, however I use subcontracted work.

That is all, no more, no less

What I did with my new community in Tennessee, is that when I first started getting complaints about kids playing in the street, I put up 2 playground systems ( total cost was $5000 ). It added to the value of the park, the curb appeal of the park, the kids loved it, and they no longer played in the streets. The other complaints, I told them to handle it themselves, I call it the joy of home ownership. I told them in my newsletter to handle the situation as though if they were on a private lot. I also told them that each time I had to handle one of their " problems " for them I would charge them. If they wanted me to babysit them like renters do, I would then charge renters rates, or an increase of about $300/month in lot rent. Needless to say, the complaints I receive are few and far between, and the residents seem to have a greater sense of self-reliance and community.

If you have any questions you can e-mail me.

Lance Nerland