Building your Networking Strategy

Kathy Harvey

10 June 2014

Questions and Challenges

What makes a good network?

How can you use your networks for competitive advantage?

What kind of relationships matter in networks?

3

Themes

Hierarchy and power

Reciprocity, influence and social capital

Network boundaries and connectors

Open and closed networks

Bottle necks and facilitators

Adapted from French and Raven (1984)

POSITION POWER

PERSONALPOWER

Reward Power

Legitimate Power

Expert Power

Coercive Power

Where does power lie in organisations?

Informational Power

Referent Power

Indirect

Direct

Bases of power bestowed by the organization

The Limits to Formal Power

Reaction of Less Powerful

Power Gap

Diversity

Interdependency

Solutions?

Develop Soft Power

Law of Reciprocity

Networks

Managing Upwards & Sideways

Outsourcing; alliances; matrix structures; working groups; ‘professional’ models of organisations

Most of the time direct power (authority) is not available to managers in their day-to-day interactions

Managing laterally or upwards is more important than managing downwards

Influencing others has become one of the key skills for effective management of organisations

Reciprocity

“Although the obligation to repay constitutes the essence of the reciprocity rule, the obligation to receive makes the rule very easy to exploit”

“The obligation to receive reduces our ability to chose who we wish to be indebted to and puts the power in the hands of others”

(Cialdini, 1993)

Two contrasting views of ‘the organisation’

Organisation as ‘machine’: • Rules• Roles, Responsibilities• Top down flow of authority• Human capital• Rigid

Organisation as sets of inter-related ‘networks’:

•Relationships• Authority is ambiguous &

contested• Negotiation, advocacy, coalitions• Social capital• Fluid

‘Seeing’ networks in everyday work

Information Network with 5 Key Boundary Spanners

Information Network without 5 Key Boundary Spanners

Information Flows Across Countries, Alliances...

Network within an Alliance

Bottlenecks or Facilitators?

New information flows 9 months later….

Strengths of Network Forms

Clique Networks Boundary-Spanning Networks

Advantages

• High Cohesion

• Loyalty and support

• Increased efficiency of decision making

• Leverages diversity

• Capitalises on opportunity

• Greater Innovation

• Earlier Promotions

• Higher Salaries

Disadvantages

• Redundant Communication

• Biased Communication

• Groupthink

• Dispensable Members

• Greater conflict in both task and relationships

• Power Struggles

3 kinds of networks to extend your impact

YOU

Operational

Getting work done efficiently; maintaining the capacities and functions required of the group.

Personal

Enhancing personal & professional development; providing referrals to useful info & contacts.

StrategicFiguring out future priorities and challenges; getting stakeholder support for them -- from A McQuater 2007

Operational Personal Strategic

PurposeGetting work done efficiently; maintaining the capacities and functions required of the group.

Enhancing personal & professional development; providing referrals to useful info & contacts.

Figuring out future priorities and challenges; getting stakeholder support for them.

Location and temporal orientation

Contacts are mostly internal and oriented toward current demands.

Contacts are often external and oriented toward current interests and future potential interests.

Contacts are internal and external and oriented toward the future.

Players and recruitment

Less choice in who - prescribed mostly by the task and organisational structure, so it is very clear who is relevant.

Key contacts are mostly discretionary; it is not always clear who is relevant.

Key contacts follow from strategic context & org environment; specific membership is discretionary; not always clear who is relevant.

Network attributes and key behaviors

Depth: building strong working relationships.

Breadth: reaching out to contacts who can make referrals.

Leverage: creating inside-outside links.

Effective networks for leaders

(Ibarra & Hunter HBR 2007)

Networking, Influence and Effectiveness

Networks are key to personal influence and organisational effectiveness

How effective are your networks at:

‒ helping you achieve your professional objectives?

‒ enabling you to implement goals and influence outcomes?

‒ ensuring your organisation is efficient, effective and innovative?

Do you know what your organisational

& personal networks really look like?

• Rational analysis may not spur or promote action

• Across networks formal authority is often fragile, incomplete, unavailable

• Major decisions involve hearts and minds and “brokers” need to tailor

communication across boundaries to persuade

Influence and persuasion become crucial tools to accomplish outcomes….. because

Influence and persuasion in networks

Using ‘soft’ power (relating, persuasion, informal structures) allows

you to influence at different levels of a hierarchy.

Networks Basics

Ron Burt et al

• Society is a market in which people exchange all sorts of goods and ideas in pursuit of their interests

• Some get higher returns than others for their efforts

• Human capital view says individuals with more ability receive greater rewards.

• Social capital view says individuals who are better connected receive greater rewards.

• Being more connected makes resources accessible (knowledge, expertise, ideas, influence)

• Information tends to circulate within groups more than across groups.

• Structural holes are brokerage opportunities to connect different pools of information and resources (additive not overlapping)

22

Conclusion

• Find ways to invest in building your networks and social capital

• Build goodwill by depositing ‘credits’

• Think more specifically about the different ways in which you use your different networks

• Take account of process (strategy), skills and your own mindset, when seeking to exert influence across the wider organisation

• Consciously develop a range of influencing tactics and skills