Role of Organizational Networks in Making Leadership Decisions

Quite often, it is assumed that if you have the right People Capital in your organization and they are all placed in the right roles, it will boost productivity and operational efficiency. For this reason, there has been a widespread adoption of 9-box and other models to analyze employee performance and evaluate how their potential can be moved in the right vectors. 

However, there is another important aspect that is often missed by employees as well as organizations. And that important aspect is that the Organizational Networks are far more powerful to bring the best out of the organization than individual performances.  

In today’s organization, if the employees are abreast with the art of building one’s organizational network, and know how to derive maximum value from it, then they have the opportunity to impact and amplify both personal and organizational growth. But before we go into the specifics of how one can benefit from Organizational Networks (ONs), it’s important to understand a few related terminologies: 

• Pivotal Node: An employee who is well-networked and connected with several of her / his peers and colleagues within or outside of their function. 
• Knowledge Brokers: These are the members of the team who introduce one network to the other. Their role is critical - if they leave the organization, it will breakdown the knowledge network eventually breaching the information and resource flow within the organization.
• Peripheral Node: These employees are at the opposite end of the spectrum, when compared to the pivotal node. They are connected to fewer people and could be potentially looking out. If they are highly skilled at their job, then their exit will jeopardize the function they are performing. 
• Organizational Network Analysis (ONA): This is a tool which enables leaders to visualize and analyze formal and informal relationships that exist in the organization, which could help in improved decision-making 

ONs influence how communication, information, decisions, and resources flow informally within the organization. Unlike a typical organizational hierarchy chart where the leaders are responsible for driving change, in an ON structure, it’s the people in the pivotal and peripheral nodes that take on this mantle. This role comes with great responsibility and influence - in terms of driving and effecting change. 

I believe ONs can either be ‘Open’ or ‘Closed’. Let’s take a brief look at the pros and cons of both.
 
 In closed ONs, the employees in the pivotal node are connected to members within the team. Whereas in Open ONs, the pivotal node employee is connected to members outside her/his own across function. The knowledge brokers are responsible for connecting two or more closed ONs. 

In a closed network everyone knows everybody within the team. Open networks on the other hand, are more diverse in nature - where there’s cross-functional dialogue and collaboration. Because the group is large, not everybody knows everyone, hence a knowledge broker plays a crucial role in introducing and connecting the members and doing crucial negotiations and knowledge brokering.

Often the closed ONs have very strong collaboration, shared values, and culture. However, in open ONs there’s more diversity and different perspectives, which can potentially be breeding grounds for innovation.

Organizational Network Analysis (ONA) will allow you to explore the ONs in a very analytical way and identify the pivotal nodes, who the knowledge brokers are, and who are the peripheral members. ONA is now increasingly being used to analyze the relationships developed within teams, and to maximize the organic exchange of information with the organization,

In the pandemic era, where organizations are moving from a Work from Home (WFH) to a Work from Anywhere (WFA) model, effective use of ONA can help leaders to map the people, interconnects, dependencies and related process, policies, and systems. By leveraging network visualization, leaders can also identify patterns, and take swift action/decision where necessary. In summary, it is highly likely that ONs and ONAs will revolutionize the way in which organizations are run.

(The article has been attributed to Surinder Bhagat, Senior Director-Regional HR, Sabre India; solely written for BW People Publication.)