A Delphi Method Approach to Develop Anchor Examples for the

Self-evaluation of Corporate Community Managers

Verena Jautelat and Alexander Clauss

Chair of Business Information Systems – Information Management, TU Dresden, Germany

Keywords: Corporate Community Managers, Competence Descriptions, Self-evaluation, Continuing Professional

Training and Development.

Abstract: Corporate Community Managers (CCM) significantly support the creation and distribution of knowledge to

achieve common business goals. The job profile of CCM requires multifaceted competences. It lacks company

independent as well as scientifically rigorous descriptions of competences and related qualification

opportunities. The activity of CCMs is characterized by the organic growth of communities in companies,

which make it necessary to evolve with the communities. These characteristics encourage lateral entrants to

the profession and often call for on-the-job qualifications. A conceivable solution to meet these requirements

are competence-oriented micro qualification modules, as they allow individualized, need-oriented

qualification based on a persons’ current competence level. For a realization it is necessary to offer precise

tools for the self-evaluation of current competences. This can be achieved with detailed anchor examples.

Such examples reflect highly specific, observable actions by describing individual work performances on

different levels of skill proficiency. In combination with a comprehensive competence profile this allows to

identify individual qualification gaps systematically. Prior research results regarding the competence profile

and associated anchor examples for CCMs lack an empirical, multi perspective expert evaluation. This Delphi

Method approach aims to close this gap. Therefore, this article provides an evaluation and modification of the

CCM competence profile and its detailed description with anchor examples. Further, this research provides

general recommendations and good practices for the design of competence profiles and associated anchor

examples for job profiles in the field of digital communication.

1 INTRODUCTION

Collaborative problem-solving enables organizations

to address the diverse complex challenges of the

twenty-first century in the fields of research,

policymaking and industry (Graesser et al., 2018;

Nelson & Squires, 2017). Corporations of various

sizes, from almost all sectors, integrate collaborative

software extensively to adapt to the knowledge-

intensive networked working world. The networking

of employees in internal online communities is

promising as it allows them to work with colleagues

over hierarchies and time zones to exchange

knowledge and learn in the sense of continuous

personal and organizational development (Moore,

2016).

Especially the use of communities for intra-

organizational online collaboration (IOC) is a

challenge for companies (Graesser et al., 2018;

Nelson & Squires, 2017). A comprehensive

systematic literature review by Reeb et. al (2021)

indicates, that functioning intra-organizational

communities significantly support the creation and

distribution of knowledge to achieve common

business goals. This research reveals strong evidence

that numerous success factors for IOC require

specific management on multiple levels. To handle

these IOC management requirements professionally,

corporations need employees who possess the

necessary domain, social, and personal competences.

The Corporate Community Manager (CCM) is a job

profile to fulfill this role (BVCM, 2016). CCMs are

responsible for the planning, formation, operation,

growth and success of internal online corporate

communities, as they channel and facilitate

collaboration (Faraj et al., 2011).

On the one hand, the professional profile of CCMs

covers a very broad spectrum of competences for

586

Jautelat, V. and Clauss, A.

A Delphi Method Approach to Develop Anchor Examples for the Self-evaluation of Corporate Community Managers.

DOI: 10.5220/0011070800003182

In Proceedings of the 14th International Conference on Computer Supported Education (CSEDU 2022) - Volume 2, pages 586-595

ISBN: 978-989-758-562-3; ISSN: 2184-5026

which hardly any basic, company independent

qualification opportunities exist so far. On the other

hand, the professional activity is characterized by the

organic growth of communities in companies, which

makes it necessary for CCMs to evolve with the

communities. These characteristics encourage lateral

entrants to the profession and often call for on-the-job

qualifications, as the tasks of community managers

grow analogue to their communities (BVCM, 2016).

A conceivable solution to close these gaps are

competence-oriented micro qualification modules, as

they allow individualized, need-oriented qualification

based on a person’s current competence level. This

allows to shorten learning cycles, as measures can be

directly connected to existing knowledge and the

demotivating repetition of known redundant content

can be avoided as well. To enable the identification

of individual qualification needs, it is necessary to

offer precise tools for the self-evaluation of already

possessed individual competences. This can be

realized with detailed anchor examples. Such

examples reflect highly specific, observable actions

by describing individual work performances on

different levels of skill proficiency (Campion et al.,

2011). As they give concrete typical and therefore

relatable examples for work situations, these practical

descriptions facilitate self-evaluation (Leinweber,

2013) and allow to identify personal qualification

gaps systematically in combination with a

comprehensive competence profile (Leichsenring &

Clauss, 2020). This takes the evolution of a specific

competence into account, as it facilitates the

identification of missing "new" competences and the

identification of "old" competences that were

forgotten because had not been used.

The competence profile of corporate community

managers, the ideal competence levels, as well as an

initial non-evaluated version of the anchor examples,

were derived from the CCM job description from the

professional association for Community Management

(BVCM, 2016), as well as from Clauss (2017) and

Leichsenring & Clauss (2020). These prior results

lack an empirical, multi perspective expert

evaluation. The Delphi Method is an adequate

approach to close this research gap. The concrete

research object of this article is the evaluation of

CCM competences and their detailed description with

anchor examples. But this article is not limited

exclusively to the described prior research; rather, it

aims to provide general recommendations for the

design of competence profiles and associated anchor

examples for job profiles in the field of digital

communication. Their design and evaluation are

time-consuming processes, since good practices and

concrete design recommendations are rare and mostly

very company-specific (Leinweber, 2013). The

design recommendations identified in this Delphi

questionnaire can help to reduce this effort. This

results in the following research questions, which will

be evaluated using a Delphi Method approach:

- RQ1: Which anchor examples comprehensively

represent the competences and competence

levels of CCMs?

- RQ2: How should anchor examples be designed

for the representation of competence levels in

digital communication job profiles?

2 RESEARCH BACKGROUND

This contribution is integrated in an overarching

research context, which is presented for a deeper

understanding in the following. The article is part of

a design-based research project (see Figure 1) that

focuses on creating an innovative platform as artifact

for guided competence development for the

qualification of CCMs (see Figure 1 A). For this

purpose, a self-assessment tool was developed, which

enables a comparison between personal and ideal

competences of CCMs based on anchor examples.

This was done iteratively. As an essential basis, the

underlying competence terminology, a first version of

the corresponding competence profile, and a first

version of respective anchor examples have already

been designed by Clauss & Leichsenring (2020) using

in-depth interviews with field experts. Table 1 shows

the identified competences. The description of

necessary knowledge, skill and ability for a

professional task is referred to as KSA. KSAs are

typically listed in job descriptions and function as a

guide for professionals and departments (Sam

Houston State University (SHSU), 2020). In this

context, knowledge is referred to as subjects, topics,

and items of information professionals need in their

daily work life. It represents information that is

applied directly to the performance of work functions.

Skills are technical or manual proficiencies usually

learned or acquired through training. They should be

measurable and observable (SHSU, 2020). Abilities

are described as a present demonstrable capacity to

simultaneously apply several knowledge and skills to

complete a task or perform an observable behavior.

They may also relate to personal and social attributes,

which tend to be innate or acquired without formal

instructions (SHSU, 2020). The identified

competences are ranked in table 1 by their total

A Delphi Method Approach to Develop Anchor Examples for the Self-evaluation of Corporate Community Managers

587

number of mentions (N = Novice, I = Intermediate, E

= Expert, n = Number of mentions).

Table 1: Systematized competence profile of CCMs

(Leichsenring & Clauss, 2020).

KSA

I E n

Domain competence

Moderation skills X 7

Content management

knowle

Change management

knowled

etworking & knowledge

mana

emen

Knowledge of strategic

mana

emen

IT and tool knowledge

Organizational &

develo

mental skills

Professional expertise and

leadershi

X 5

Knowledge of monitoring &

ortin

Feedback skills

X 3

Digital expertise and

leadershi

X 2

(Inter) cultural knowledge

X 1

Legal knowledge X 1

Total number of mentions 59

Social competence

(Virtual) empathy

X11

(Virtual) communication skills

(Virtual) ability to work in a

team

(Inter) cultural competence

X 3

Motivational skills

X 3

Diplomacy

X 2

Total number of mentions

Personal comp.

Sense of responsibility

Willingness to change

Authenticity

Fault tolerance

X 2

Personal distance

X 2

Awareness for new wor

X 1

Total number of mentions 14

This research aims to validate and extend the

developed competence profile and anchor examples,

to prepare the development of an empirical founded

prototype of a self-evaluation tool. The purpose of the

tool is to enable the individual identification of

qualification potentials (see Figure 1 B).

Subsequently, concrete, scientifically based

recommendations for the development of these

competences need to be given through design

guidelines for competence development. Based on

this, specific micro qualification modules can be

developed, which will make it possible to gain

previously missing competences at the required level

(see Figure 1 C). Further on, it is planned to expand

the platform to a competence store and make it

accessible for commercial providers of qualification

Figure 1: Innovative Platform to qualify Corporate

Community Managers.

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588

measures, who can classify their qualification offers

based on the same anchor examples. Conversely, the

platform also offers them the opportunity to develop

new programs for the identified competence levels as

micro modules according to demand. In the outlook,

participants that used such qualifications should then

be able to evaluate how successfully the measures

have contributed to their competence development,

similar to customer reviews (see Figure 1 D).

This paper focuses on the preparation of the

development of the self-evaluation tool (see Figure 1

A). The anchor examples which are evaluated,

improved and extended in this context describe the

required competences of CCMs on different

performance levels based on concrete activity

characteristics. The evaluated anchor examples form

the content basis for the future self-evaluation tool.

Therefore, they are subjected to a quality-assuring

validation.

3 METHOD

To achieve the intended quality-assuring validation

and extension of the prior research on the competence

profile and anchor examples, expert opinions should

be gathered from multiple perspectives. These should

include both – the professional applicability as well

as – the pedagogical theoretical foundation. The

Classical Delphi Method enables the collection of

multi-perspective expert inputs through a structured

group discussion process (Rauch, 1979). The method

is based on a multi-step questionnaire procedure with

feedback, in which several experts anonymously

evaluate content. Delphi questionnaires can be

understood, as a tool for the improved collection of

group opinions and targeted control of group

discussions (Häder, 2014). In this questionnaire, we

deliberately deviated from the procedure of the

Classical Delphi Method with its quantitative

consensus-finding processes as defined by Rauch

(1979) and used an exclusively qualitative Delphi

approach following Häder (2000). This qualitative

Delphi approach is aimed to generate multitude of

ideas. In line with the research objective, this

qualitative approach is a rigorous cornerstone for the

further development of the existing anchor examples

through diverse multi-perspective ideas and allows

the identification of general design recommendations,

based on the experts’ knowledge and experience. The

absence of new ideas was defined as a stop criterion

for further Delphi rounds (Häder, 2000).

Anonymity among the experts ensures that – the

ideas and arguments are not influenced by the

supporting experts’ reputation and – unintended

collaboration and influencing pre-coordination

during the Delphi questionnaire can be avoided

(Rauch, 1979). The results are collected, clustered

and communicated anonymized to the experts as

controlled feedback. The experts are asked to reflect

on the results, comment on them, and possibly modify

their answers (Häder, 2014; Vorgrimler & Wübben,

2001). The central assumption in this process is that

concurring statements within the expert group have

more validity than individual statements (Köck-Hódi

& Mayer, 2013). The information, included in the

feedback gained during the documented discussion

processes, enables an improvement of content and

further decisions (Häder & Häder, 2019).

Following Rauch (1979), the overarching

criterion for the selection of experts is that they

possess similar concepts and interpretations of the

addressed problems, to facilitate a fruitful discussion.

Another aspect for the expert selection within this

research is ensuring the multi-perspectivity of the

competence profile’s and anchor examples’

evaluation. For this purpose, domain experts were

selected, who are familiar with the content-related

description of the competences of CCM and active in

this field as research or industry experts.

Complementary, methodological experts from the

field of pedagogy, who are familiar with the

description of competences were selected. Table 2

summarizes the characteristics.

Table 2: Questioned Experts.

4 Domain Experts 5 Methodical experts

Exper

s for the concrete

content of competence

descriptions for CCMs

Experts for the

pedagogical evaluation

of competence

descriptions

Research and industry

professionals:

Active in the field of

CCM in Germany

Pedagogical experts:

Advanced international

education and

technology research

anel

The initial anchor examples developed in the prior

research by Leichsenring and Clauss (2020), which

were used as starting point for the Delphi

questionnaire can be found in the appendix 1. The

questionnaire is collected and analyzed in a two-step

process, as follows:

 1

Round: Anchor examples are provided in text

form using a structured document, experts

comment on content and context (Köck-Hódi &

Mayer, 2013)

A Delphi Method Approach to Develop Anchor Examples for the Self-evaluation of Corporate Community Managers

589

 After 1

Round: Collected data is evaluated,

comments of all experts are implemented into the

anchor examples – Creation of a generalized

summary of all comments (Vorgrimler & Wübben,

2001)

 2

Round: Revised examples and summary of

comments are reported back in a structured

document – Experts compare comments and

critically reflect themselves before further

comments are made, mostly approval and rejection

or as well as extension and restriction by the

experts (Häder, 2014)

 After 2

Round: Results are summarized again and

implemented into the anchor examples –

Comments are compared and summarized to

determine the experts’ group opinion, the absence

of new ideas led to a stop of further Delphi rounds

(Häder, 2000)

The collected feedback data was clustered and

analyzed with reference to Mayring's (2014)

Structuring Qualitative Content Analysis. The

detailed documentation of the research process allows

later repetitions of the Delphi questionnaire to ensure

actuality. In the following, the key findings from the

Delphi questionnaire regarding the competence

profile and the anchor examples are presented and

supported with the associated expert opinions.

4 RESULTS

The analysis of the Delphi questionnaire

comprehensively confirmed the competence profile

from Clauss and Leichsenring (2020). No substantial

changes were necessary. The following minor

adjustments were made: The domain competence

"Intercultural knowledge" was removed, because the

experts see it as a part of the social competence

"Intercultural competence". Leadership aspects were

removed from the domain competences, because the

experts see them as integrated in the attributes on

higher skill levels of the domain competences.

Regarding the social competences, the aspect of

virtuality should be presented more clearly. The

personal competence “Fault tolerance" was changed

to "Dealing with mistakes" to emphasize activeness

and personality relevance. The modified competence

profile can be found in the appendix 1 in detail and in

appendix 2 as overview.

The further analysis of the Delphi questionnaire

showed that it was possible to determine how the

competence profile of CCM can be comprehensively

described with anchor examples. In contrast to the

competence profile, the adjustments were

substantially. Therefore, they are described in detail

in the following. It is important to note that the Delphi

questionnaire evaluated the results from Leichsenring

and Clauss (2020). Therefore, the presented

recommendations refer to aspects of this prior

research with potential for improvement and

modification. Aspects without further potential for

improvement are not addressed in detail within this

article. The experts’ feedback is used to derive further

general recommendations for the design of anchor

examples to describe competence levels in digital

communication job profiles.

4.1 Delphi Questionnaire

General Recommendations

The general recommendations of the first feedback

round referred mainly to the wording of the

formulations. The addressing of the respondents in

the anchor examples in second person singular was

criticized. An improvement of the addressing as

first-person singular is recommended. According to

the experts, such reformulations allow respondents to

identify themselves more intuitively with the

statements of the anchor examples. In the initial

version of the anchor examples, present and perfect

tenses were mixed, which was criticized as

inconsistent. It is advised that the tenses are

standardized to achieve a consistent formulation.

Therefore, a consistent use of present tense is

recommended, as the anchor examples refer to the

current state of the respondents’ competences.

According to the experts, the use of idioms should

be avoided. These are barriers for non-native

speakers of the used language and limit the inclusion

of this group in the self-evaluation. Furthermore, the

use of negative statements should be avoided. The

experts emphasize that formulations of this kind are

inappropriate in a self-evaluation, as they restrict

respondents' ability to reflect on their own

competences and have a direct negative impact on

their motivation to continue with the self-evaluation.

Therefore, negative statements should be transformed

accordingly. When using verbs, it is recommended

to use verbs that are measurable. More specifically,

the experts advise to replace the verbs “know” and

“understand”, with the abilities “recognize” and

“explain”. In addition to the experts' opinions on the

wording of formulations, the general

recommendations include a provision of short

definitions for various job-specific terms as a

general improvement in the structural quality of

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anchor examples. According to the experts, the

addition of definitions helps respondents, who are

unfamiliar with the job-specific terms to quickly

expand their knowledge and thus support further

comparison with the anchor examples. Based on short

definitions of the provided job-specific terms,

interested respondents can research more in-depth

information on their own.

The recommendations of the experts were less

general in the second feedback round. The use of

several terms was criticized. According to the experts'

comments, the verb "can" should be avoided if

possible, or only used at the lowest level of the

performance grading, since the alternative

formulation "being able" addresses the participants'

ability to evaluate themselves in a better way.

Regarding the word "community", the sole use of the

plural is recommended to formulate more general

statements. As limiting a statement to one community

may hinder respondents from selecting the

appropriate level, if they apply the content of the

statement in multiple communities.

Content Recommendations

The experts' recommendations on content in the first

feedback round covered a broad spectrum. In several

cases, the experts suggested that the anchor examples

should be expanded through specific reference to

concrete central concepts and methods to describe

the competences. According to the experts, this

promotes the understandability of the examples and

offers, similar to the definitions of job-specific terms,

a good starting point for further research by

previously unaware but curious respondents. The

experts also made suggestions for alternative

terminologies or for allegedly missing aspects of the

competence in many examples. In summary, with

reference to the content of the respective anchor

examples on a particular competence level, it is

recommended to continuously examine

terminologies critically to formulate them as

distinctly as possible. The experts state that overlaps

and duplications should be consistently avoided.

For this purpose, especially the underlying behavioral

indicators need to be analyzed and unified using a

standardized verb list. In this case, a verb list for the

formulation of learning objectives by Meyer &

Stocker (2004) was used. The experts point out that

the description of the concrete working

environment should be avoided. It is recommended

to remove all formulations with specific corporate

contexts to achieve a maximum of cross-industry

transferability. The experts state that the use of the

description of a "role model function" is critical

on the highest performance level (expert). From the

experts’ point of view this is not measurable and

represents a very subjective evaluation. The experts

warn that the personal external impact is usually

inadequately or even incorrectly evaluated.

Corresponding formulations should be removed from

the anchor examples.

The content-related recommendations of the

second feedback round addressed comments from the

first round, which reappeared or were previously

overlooked due to the multifaceted editing of the

anchor examples. In two positions, which were not

commented before, the extension of the anchor

example by naming concrete methods for the

respective competence was recommended and the

replacement of individual terms by better

formulations was suggested to avoid possible

misunderstandings. In addition, the experts provided

new suggestions for further aspects of competence

descriptions. These were checked for their integrity in

relation to the behavioral indicators, on which the

anchor examples were based and then integrated in

the examples using the standardized verb list by

Meyer & Stocker (2004). Furthermore, regarding the

competence "Digital Expertise", the experts noted

that the classification of the novice performance level

does not seem appropriate, considering the general

importance of digitalization in everyday work.

Therefore, a de-scaling was recommended to

acknowledge the specific context that even a person

at the novice level should already possess application

knowledge for digital media. This recommendation

was not included as modification to preserve the

integrity of the anchor example of this competence

within the underlying scaling structure. It is likely

that, in the context of the increasing digitalization of

the workplace, hardly anyone using the self-

evaluation will select the novice level, but it is not the

purpose of the anchor examples to reflect this. The

anchor examples merely describe the performance

levels for each competence consequently. In the

second feedback round, the experts also raised the

question of how honest the respondents answer the

self-evaluation. Is the respondent able to admit to

her/himself that she/he is not able to do something?

Regarding the experts, in the context of the present

anchor examples, this self-honesty might be secured

by a double question, which can be used as a control

mechanism for respondents. Regarding the naming of

examples for concepts and methods as well as

software applications the experts pointed out, that

brand neutrality must be ensured within the

A Delphi Method Approach to Develop Anchor Examples for the Self-evaluation of Corporate Community Managers

591

examples. In the given prior version of the anchor

examples, the name of a concrete software

application was used as a synonym for applications

with the same functionality. This formulation was

replaced within the modification of the examples.

Systematization Recommendations

Finally, in the first feedback round, several examples

were used to criticize the differentiation of the

performance levels comparing several competences.

The experts emphasize that the intervals between the

skill levels should be evenly and consistently

distributed on the underlying scale. Regarding the

content-related differentiation between several

competences, overlaps should be avoided.

Within the second Delphi round, a review of the

taxonomy used across multiple competences was

recommended at a different position from the first

round. This and two previously unmentioned

suggestions for improvement were implemented to

achieve consistent wording within the anchor

examples. It was observed that the level of detail of

the anchor examples varied and that aspects are

considered in certain competences, which are not

included in other competences or were not described

in sufficient detail. The experts point out that the aim

should be to ensure a consistent level of detail

throughout the anchor examples for all

competences. The level of detail was analyzed

extensively for the annotated competences during the

modification and the formulations were optimized.

Furthermore, the relation of the anchor examples on

the performance levels was criticized as uneven for

certain competences. The experts state that the

distances between the skill levels should be evenly

distributed on the scales.

4.2 Developed Anchor Examples for

the Self-evaluation

The presented results and modifications were

integrated into anchor examples. The following

examples of selected competences illustrate how the

final anchor examples were designed. This rigorous

foundation can be used as good practice for further

anchor examples in other professions in digital

communication. The following table 2 details how the

initial version from Leichsenring and Clauss (2020)

was redesigned considering the experts’ feedback

from the Delphi questionnaire. The technical

competence "IT and tool knowledge" is chosen as an

example, since this competence was extensively

modified. The key characteristics of the modification

can be seen very clearly.

Table 3: Example of the concrete modification.

Previous Version Modified Version

Novice

You have theoretical IT

knowledge and know

typical tools. However,

you do not use them in

your daily work or only

sporadically. You only

use provided tools for

your work tasks, e.g.

classic MS Office

applications.

I can explain several

typical tools, but I

only use them

sporadically. I use

tools provided in my

daily work, such as

Office applications.

Intermediate

You regularly apply

your IT knowledge in

your daily work. You

are able to analyze the

functionality of social

media tools in concrete

practice and their

usability in the

company. You use

well-chosen IT tools to

support your

rofessional tasks.

I regularly use my IT

knowledge in my

everyday work. I am

able to use different

tools for specific

urposes in the

company. I use

ersonally selected

IT tools to work on

my professional

tasks.

Expert

You are able to

evaluate social media

tools profoundly with

regard to their

suitability and know a

road range of tools

and can therefore

ropose suitable

solutions for specific

new problems. If there

are questions which

tools should be used for

what purpose, you can

rovide detailed

information in a broad

range of situations. You

are regularly the

contact person for IT

tool selection decisions.

I use various tools

with ease. I am able

to compare tools and

can therefore make

suitable suggestions

for different needs. In

case of questions, I

can provide detailed

information for

different scenarios or

configure the tools

according to specific

requirements.

I manage the access

rights for other

eople and am the

contact person for

technical problems.

Additional Description (in the modified version):

“IT and tool knowledge” is the know-how about a

variety of applications and social media tools. This

includes knowledge about how to use the tools, how

to perform a requirements analysis and understand

the associated risks and potentials.

The appendix 1 provides both – the version from

Leichsenring and Clauss (2020) and – the fully

modified version, allowing a transparent overview of

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592

all modifications. In the following, selected anchor

examples, which were finalized through the Delphi

questionnaire, are presented exemplarily.

Competences, which were identified as particularly

important by Leichsenring and Clauss (2020) were

chosen as concrete examples. Table 4 shows one of

the most frequently mentioned domain competences,

table 5 the most frequently mentioned social

competence and table 6 the most frequently

mentioned personal competence. All 24 identified

competences are comprehensively described in the

appendix 1.

Table 4: Networking and Knowledge Management.

Novice

I am able to explain concepts of networking

and knowledge management, such as mind

maps* and knowledge maps*. I am able to

describe central terms, such as best

ractices,

as well as concepts for networking other

eople, such as a

e-mixe

team structures.

Interm.

I organize knowledge and make it available to

other people. Based on my knowledge, I am

able to identify which people possess

knowledge or are new to a topic. I use my

knowled

e to network these people.

Expert

I organize knowledge within the company in a

format that is understandable to all employees

and I am able to promote the exchange of

knowledge. I connect people with knowledge

in a targeted way for

rofessional exchange. I

am able to network these people so that new

roblems can be solved specifically. I am open

to new ideas and tools. I am able to test them

for their suitabilit

Table 5: Virtual empathy.

Novice

I know that

eople can have different

perspectives. I am able to understand their

activities and their motivation.

Interm.

I understand other peoples’ perspective, even

if I do not share it. I am able to identify

differences and problems with my perspective.

My interaction with other people is based on

understandin

Expert

I communicate attentively and respectfully.

Due to my ability to communicate

considerately, other people contact me. I

recognize differences between different

perspectives early on and support low-conflict

communication between the parties involved.

If possi

le, I try to prevent problems by taking

reventive measures.

Table 6: Sense of responsibility.

Novice

I understand what it means to take on

responsibility for a task. I am able to solve

regular, easy tasks on my own. For new tasks

I seek help from other people instead of

continuing work independently. I know who

I can ask for assistance with new tasks.

Interm.

I try to solve all tasks independently and to

make as few mistakes as possible. I act

transparently and if I realize that I am not

able to solve the task, I admit it and search

for assistance.

Expert

I solve my tasks conscientiously and

dutifully. My solutions are optimal under

consideration of the cost-benefit ratio, if

possible. I take responsibility, also for

persons subordinated to me and their actions.

I am aware that I always guarantee the best

possible solution and the responsibility I

assume thereb

5 CONCLUSION

Despite its steadily growing importance, the job

profile of CCM, which is characterized by diverse

requirements, lacks company-independent and

scientifically based descriptions of competences and

related qualification opportunities. The modified

anchor examples in this article are a comprehensive

further development of the findings from BVCM

(2016), Clauss (2017) and Leichsenring and Clauss

(2020).

The empirical validation of the results based on

the Delphi approach enables a significant detailing of

prior research. The developed anchor examples

comprehensively represent the necessary

competences for CCMs, subdivided into respective

skill levels. On the one hand, this offers new profound

insights into the professional activities of CCMs. On

the other hand, it is possible to use the findings for the

individual self-evaluation of the current state of

competence development. This allows incorporating

the modified competence profile and anchor

examples as a diagnostic starting point for

competence-oriented micro-qualification modules in

the future. Such modules enable individualized, need-

oriented qualification, which can be realized for

instance through the innovative platform for the

qualification of CCMs presented in chapter two. This

article presents concrete comprehensive anchor

examples for the professional activity of CCMs on the

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skill levels novice, intermediate and expert for twelve

domain competences, six social and six personal

competences. An individual comparison with these

allows the systematic self-evaluation of individual

competences and qualification gaps (RQ1).

Based on the analysis of the Delphi questionnaire,

further recommendations were derived for the design

of competence profiles and the associated anchor

examples in the job profiles of digital

communication. The experts generally recommend

the use of the first person singular and the use of

presence as consistent tense to improve addressing.

The use of idioms and negative statements should be

avoided. When selecting descriptive verbs, it is

important to consider their measurability. In addition,

further definitions of job-specific terms in the anchor

examples are recommended. On the content level, the

experts point out that selected central concepts and

methods should be specifically mentioned. The skill

levels should be formulated distinctly without

overlaps. The description of the work environment

and the naming of specific software brand products

should be avoided. The self-assessment of a personal

role model function is described as unsuitable in the

context of anchor examples. Regarding the

systematization of the anchor examples, attention

should be paid to a clear distinction of the

performance levels within and between the

competences. To achieve this, a consistent level of

detail in the descriptions and a consistent relationship

between the anchor examples should be emphasized.

Furthermore, the article presents the in course of the

Delphi Method approach modified anchor examples

as detailed good practices, which offer a rigorous

orientation for the design of anchor examples in

further job profiles of digital communication (RQ2).

The importance of professionalized corporate

community management and appropriate

qualifications will continue to increase. The presented

research results are limited by their close reference to

prior research by Leichsenring and Clauss (2020).

The applicability of the generalized design

recommendations in other job profiles of digital

communication needs to be further examined. Focus

group interviews with professional experts might be

a suitable methodology. Furthermore, the article

leaves open in which way the individual qualification

gaps, which are identified through the self-evaluation

with anchor examples, can be filled. To this end, a

systematic literature review on the development of

(digital) competences, may be complemented with

expert interviews, might be used as a methodological

approach to provide a profound description of the

pedagogical design principles for such qualification

measures.

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APPENDIX

Appendix 1: Online https://cloudstore.zih.tu-

dresden.de/index.php/s/Wf9WWXjr6WfkMeR.

Appendix 2: Modified competence profile of CCMs

(N = Novice, I = Intermediate, E = Expert, n =

Number of mentions).

KSA

I E n

Domain competence

Moderation skills X 7

Content management

knowledge

Change management

knowledge

etworking & knowledge

managemen

Knowledge of s

rategic

managemen

IT and tool knowled

e X 5

Organizational &

developmental skills

Professional expertise X 5

Knowledge of monitoring &

reporting

Feedback skills X 3

Digital expertise

X 2

al knowled

X 1

Social

Virtual empathy

X11

Virtual communication skills

Virtual ability to work in a

team

(Inter) cultural competence

X 3

Motivational skills

X 3

Diplomacy

X 2

Personal competence

Sense of responsibility

Willingness to change

Authenticity

Dealing with mistakes

X 2

Personal distance

X 2

Awareness for new work

X 1

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