The Role of a Community Manager in the Corporation

In recent years the Internet has been ablaze with chatter over where community management should fit into an organization. Is marketing or engineering an apt destination for the reporting line? Do we expect our community managers and representatives to report to the director of marketing or the chief technical officer? More specifically, when you bring a community manager into your organization, which of these two teams do you feel can most effectively support and enable a community builder to actually build a great community?

I firmly believe that community management is a tale with both marketing and engineering story lines flowing through it. If one is missing, community can feel unbalanced, misrepresented, and ineffective. We should always seek to celebrate and market the opportunities and importance of community, but that means nothing if you are not willing to roll up your sleeves and build and reinforce the collaborative technical groundwork in your community.