Driving results through social networks

Driving Results Through Social Networks: How Top Organizaiotns Leverage Networks for Performance and Growth by Rob Cross and Robert J. Thomas

This sequel to Rob Cross’s The Hidden Power of Social Networks is chock full of practical advice on leveraging networks for innovation and increased performance. If you’ve been scratching your head, wondering how all this social media stuff is going to increase the bottom line, this book has some answers for you. You could do a search-and-replace, putting “informal learning” where they write “collaboration,” and you’d end up with a practice guide to socially mediated learning. Rather than put their already pithy prose into my own words, I’m going to quote a few of the passages that grabbed me:

Most leaders readily acknowledge the improtance and power of informal networks for getting work done in their organizations. Yet they generally spend little if any time assessing and managing these networks — a mistake with substantial implications for innovation and performance. Network analysis provides a powerful means for leaders to understand and drive value through this seemingly invisible aspect of organzations.

Not all value-based networks are the same. Customized response networks are good for solving ambiguous problems such as those faced in R&D or strategy consulting firms. Routine response networks are better for tackling established problems; think call centers and claims processors. This matters, because managers must choose the optimal networks for their situation:

Work and innovation are inherently collaborative endeavors, but as the need for collaboration increases, the demands on people’s time skyrocket. The answer is not more and more layers of a matrix structure or yet another collaborative technology. Rather, what’s required is a more nuanced and strategic view of collaboration on the part of leaders as designers of their organization.

We are living in a time rife with opposites. Organizations are expected to exist globally and act locally, to be efficient and innovative, and to remain profitable in both the short and long term. In this environment of increasing complexity, a one-dimensional focus is fatal.

Organizational network analysis (ONA) is about connecting people. Six Sigma and similar methodologies discount the importance of emotional ties. One thing I applaud in Cross’s work is his measurements of positive energy, toxic blackhole people, the importance of introductions, and other people factors.

The book is particularly strong at isolating causes of insufficient innovation. The root causes of failure are fragmentation (often border disputes), domination (not heading all the voices), and insularity (because most of the bright people are working for somebody else.) As they say, “the major barriers of innovation result not from failures or individual genius but from failures of collaboration–the inability to exploit existing capabilities in revolutionary ways.” Time after time, the authors use a graphic of a dense network to reinforce their points. Most of these are meaningless blobs for me; perhaps I could interpret them if they used color, but in black and white, the network diagrams look like huge smudges on the page.

Regarding teams, organizations should divert their energy from forming teams to setting up the conditions for teams to prosper.

The authors favor a programmed approach to onboarding because it accelerates development. Consider…

On average, the time for new hires to achieve an acceptable level of productivity ranges from eight weeks for clerical jobs to twenty weeks for professionals to more than twenty-six weeks for executives. In today’s fast-paced, competitive economy, organizations obviously cannot afford this kind of productivity lag.

Amen.