‘Always on trauma machine’: Social media managers grapple with burnout, leaving the industry

By Kimeko McCoy

Marc Phillips was exhausted from being extremely online. The former social media manager worked for award-winning global brands. But by 2017, he had had enough.

Political tensions were high, Twitter bots were multiplying and school shootings were happening more frequently, Phillips said.

What was once his dream job quickly became draining. So he left, pursuing a job as a director-level staff member at a Fortune 50 B2B tech company, which he declined to name.

“I had a moment one evening while commuting home on the subway when I thought to myself, ‘Is this all my life will be — just building social media calendars in Excel and shoe-horning brands into online conversations all day?’,” Phillips said in an email.

He’s not alone. More social media managers are exiting their roles because of the long hours, low pay and endless scrolling through hateful comments. And today’s starkly polarized political climate is only adding fuel to the fire, according to social media managers.

One by one, social media platforms have banned or restricted President Trump in light of the recent chaos in Washington D.C. The changes have ignited conversations across social media about the power platforms hold. At the helm of it all are social media managers, many of whom are left questioning the industry and their role in it.

Typically, when catastrophe strikes, advertisers and social media managers hit pause on their content. Days go by and then it’s back to business. But last week was a wakeup call for strategist Amy Brown, who said the last decade of her career has been a “front row seat to the rise of the alt-right and QAnon” and like “watching a car crash in slow motion.”

“There’s only so much trauma one single human brain can process, and Twitter is like an always-on trauma machine,” Brown said in an email. “It takes a huge mental toll to consume this content, day in and day out.”

Brown has worked in social media since 2012, including for a major fast food brand and a political candidate, before ultimately landing at tech company Figma. She has stories, including running point guard for a politician’s social channels during the time of the “MAGA Bomber,” a 2018 incident in which a Florida man sent pipe bombs to Trump critics. She recalls contacting Facebook (which did not immediately respond to Digiday’s request for comment) at the time to let them know the team routinely received death threats in comments and private messages, but said she never got the support she needed.

In light of recent events and ahead of Inauguration Day, Twitter and Facebook each released statements outlining steps they say they’re taking to ensure safety on their platforms for creators.

While the platforms have taken measures to curtail the rise of disinformation and extremism by adding warning labels to content and blocking violative words, it’s not enough to support the teams operating accounts on those sites, said Brown. Digital ads dollars rule the decision making process, social media teams are stretched thin and minimal support …read more

Source:: Digiday