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5.0étoiles sur 5
Book for consultants, Jui 13 2004
There are many network books out there -- this is the only one that focuses on networks inside business organizations. Being a management consultant who has applied Social Network Analysis to organizational issues since 1987 this book mostly fits my experience.This book is an excellent introduction for the internal or external consultant considering their first social network analysis project. Cross & Parker provide many examples, and discuss both network mapping and measuring. They focus on the network methods and metrics that are understandable by common business people -- no PhD required, an MBA will do fine. Coming from a research organization, the authors don't always go into great deatil on how to apply network analysis in solving business problems. A couple of stories of before/after networks are shared. Yet, how they apply interventions and solutions is often glossed over. The last few chapters delve into this with more detail, but it may be too late in the book for some readers. Several of the the network examples could have used more details to provide the reader a better context of what was happening in the organization. The Appendix is great -- how to get started in a social network analysis project. This section alone may be worth the price of the book for many hands-on consultants. As business schools start to teach social network analysis, this book will make an excellent textbook for both undergraduate and MBA students.
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5.0étoiles sur 5
Insightful and practical, Mai 12 2004
The Hidden Power of Social Networks provides the most complete treatment of the subject of applying the understanding of social networks to organizations as you will find. It includes the insights from the many, many cases that the authors facilitated and it provides insight into the methodology itself. As such, it is a good book for both executives who have had inklings that there is something useful for them in all this "social network" hype, and for HR/organizational development specialists and consultants who want to understand the nuts and bolts of the method. In recent years we saw (and I read) half a dozen books on the emerging science of networks (Linked, Six Degrees of Separation; from the management consulting Nexus, Living Networks); the language of The Tipping Point tipped into the vernacular; and social networking sites (LinkedIn™, tribe.net, Spoke, VisualPath) climbed the "hype cycle" by promising value in gaining access to powerful people just three degrees away. The jury is still out on the latter, but the genie is out of the bottle: organizations and individuals are making the shift to an understanding that social networks shape our lives and our work, and that we can learn how to identify, assess, and manage these networks. This book is the first fully practical, actionable work on social network analysis in organizations. Cross and Parker are among a handful of professionals who have worked deeply in organizations to analyze existing social networks, position these networks within the context of the strategy, culture, and promise of organizations and recommend specific, positive steps that can alter the dynamics of the networks that exist. For example, one of the themes explored is that of central connectors: people who, by virtue of their relationships with people in different organizations serve as boundary spanners (moving information and context from one group to another) or bottlenecks (impeding the flow of information and context). The authors develop the reader's understanding of this phenomenon by presenting the concepts of social network mapping, how the analysis of a network reveals the central connectors, the impact of these people on an organization, and, finally, the actions a manager can take to either (1) acknowledge and recognize these people or (2) shift the work patterns to alleviate the bottlenecks. All the network maps in the book are from real cases - and they are universal as well. You'll not have a difficult time recognizing your own organization (or those you've worked with) in most of these examples. The "before and after" maps are illuminating and inspiring. The descriptions of the methodology are straightforward and useful. I'll say it again: this book is actionable, for both senior managers who want to understand and support networked organizational dynamics and for consultants (internal and external) who want a practical guidebook that establishes the standard for the practice of social network analysis. Full disclosure: I am a practicing consultant who uses social network analysis in my work. When I first heard Rob Cross talk about social network analysis at an Institute for Knowledge Management workshop in Santa Fe four years ago, I knew that this was work that I needed to do in my organization. I had the good fortune to work with Rob and Andrew Parker on several projects, and to learn the method described in this book from them. I inherited, through their teaching and mentoring, the enthusiasm for bringing stunning insights to managers about their organizations as revealed in an analysis of their networks, and a strong sense of the ethics and responsibility in managing analysis projects. I've been waiting almost a year for this book to come out so that I can share it with my clients.
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5.0étoiles sur 5
How to find, assess, and support strategically important networks in your organization, Mai 6 2008
In recent years, there have been several excellent books published on the important subject of social networks and this is one of the most informative as Rob Cross and Andrew Parker examine various social networks that are dynamic and conditioned by strategy, infrastructure, and the work that is being done at a given time, noting a unique characteristic of them: information does not flow through unchanged through a human network as it does through Internet routers. "People add context, interpretation, and meaning as they receive information and pass it along." The implications are of special interest to me, in light of the rapidly increasing impact of blogging, another indication of "information transparency." Cross and Parker base their observations and recommendations on their involvement with more than 60 strategically important networks in a wide range of well-known organizations. They explain how "managers can use the tools of social network analysis to assess and support those within their own organizations, and it's much better to take this targeted approach rather than leave collaboration to chance."
Specifically, they explain how to
Reveal and leverage "the hidden power" of social networks
Identify and repair critical disconnects
Develop a "sense and respond" organizational capability
Create energy throughout an organization
Understand how individuals affect a network
Initiate, develop, and sustain networks
Align organizational context to support social networks
Identify and then prepare for a network's future challenges
Then in Appendix A, Cross and Parker explain how to conduct and interpret a social network analysis and, in Appendix B, they provide tools for promoting network connectivity.
For me, some of the most valuable material is provided in Chapter 5, "Pinpointing the Problem: Understanding How Individuals Affect a Network," as Cross and Parker identify four types of people and their positions within a network: Central Connectors (e.g. "The Unsung Hero" and "the Bottleneck"), Boundary Spanners (i.e. those who "connect a department with other departments in the organization or with similar departments in other organizations"), Information Brokers (i.e. those who communicate across subgroups of an informal network "so that the group as a whole won't splinter into smaller, less-effective segments"), and Peripheral People (i.e. those who "might either need [vary degrees of] help getting better connected or need space to operate on the fringes"). Cross and Parker duly acknowledge that there are many different ways to assess the composition of a network, and, of individuals who comprise it. Obviously, members who are centrally can have a positive or negative impact on a network's value in terms of what is learned as well as which mindsets and viewpoints are predominant. As for boundary spanners, they can play an important role "when people need to share different kinds of expertise -- for example, in establishing strategic alliances between companies or developing new products. Their involvement will help to facilitate effective communication, cooperation, and collaboration between and among those who might otherwise function in a disconnected number of organizational "silos" and "bunkers." Alas, boundary spanners are rare.
With regard to information brokers, they can help an organization "disseminate certain kinds of information and promote connectivity throughout a network [or matrix of networks]."These brokers tend to be third-parties outside the given organization who have direct access to other organizations; other brokers could be individuals within an organization who also have access through their own personal networks. Some of the latter could also be viewed as "intentionally peripheral" in that they operate on the fringes of a network (perhaps for personal reasons) but who, nonetheless, can add substantial value to a network by helping it to obtain certain access it needs. The most effective, efficient, and productive social networks need lots of "bridges" and people to build and then maintain them.
Credit Cross and Parker with providing two supplementary sources of exceptional actionable value. Appendix A includes a six-step process for "Conducting a Social Network Analysis," followed by a "Case Example" of that process based on an unnamed oil and gas services organization. In Appendix B, they provide and then carefully explain three kinds of assessment tools for promoting network connectivity: "Personal Network Diagnostic" whose exercises help to increase one's understanding one's personal network and how to create an action plan to optimize its effectiveness; "Relationship Building" whose facilitated exercises can help to promote network connectivity through relationship building; and "Organizational Context Diagnostic" that can be included with network surveys to gain a better sense of how aspects of context affect collaboration throughout a network.
It remains for each reader to determine the nature and extent of this book's relevance to her or his own organization's immediate, intermediate, and long-term needs in terms of increasing its effectiveness, productivity, and efficiency by improving communication, cooperation, and collaboration between and among everyone involved throughout the enterprise. For many reasons, the power of social networks is now hidden but that will not continue to be true if their C-level executives read this book with appropriate care, then formulate an appropriate plan, engage their people at all levels and in all levels when implementing that plan, and then rigorously evaluate its progress thereafter, making whatever modifications may be necessary.
Those who share my high regard for this volume are urged to check out Jay Cross's Informal Learning, Gary Hamel's The Future of Management (with Bill Breen), and Ram Charan's Leaders At All Levels as well as Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff's Groundswell: Winning in a World Transformed by Social Technologies, Enterprise Architecture as Strategy: Creating a Foundation for Business Execution co-authored by Jeanne Ross, Peter Weill, and David Robertson, Richard Ogle's Smart World: Breakthrough Creativity and the New Science of Ideas, and Global Brain co-authored by Satish Nambisan and Mohanbir Sawhney.
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