How can you divide the labor in your organization to optimize for innovation rather than efficiency? ~Dave Gray

Networked workers are a critical asset for today's organizations. But in the end of the day, it does little good to be a networked worker if the organizational context will simply drive you back to ineffective patterns. In order for an organization to benefit of the power of its networked workers, it needs to instill a culture that scales the social and intellectual capital of its employees to a level that meets organization's purposes. And that's where networked teams come into play.

What is a networked team?
A networked team is a social entity that carries out tasks in order to serve the needs of a customer (internal or external) and is embedded in one or several larger social systems . It stands out from regular teams by its network awareness, which mainly manifests itself in the following characteristics:

Why networked teams are winner teams?
Networked teams grant the organization a fluid structuring based on relentlessly changing templates, quick improvisation and ad hoc responses. This can easily be translated into competitive advantage as it allows for innovation through continuous creation of new (combination of) resources. 

Networked teams are network-aware, which means they manage their social and intellectual capital better, they know how to retain and access talent across the organization (thanks to their bridges) and their inherent structuring allows them optimal knowledge diffusion (Fully connected with more or less decentralized power).

Networked teams have been proven to perform better as they empower their members, interface with different other groups and collaborate internally and externally in more effective ways.

And finally, a networked team is not as strong as its weakest tie because it is resilient (small world characteristic). It is as strong as its core structure which is much stronger than a single player.   

Engineering a networked team

As we've said before, if the organizational context does not offer the right ecosystem for networked teams to thrive, any attempt to build one will fail systematically. Indeed, "Culture eats strategy for lunch". So before engaging in the engineering of a networked team, make sure the general context won't hinder its progress.   

1. The map: X-Raying your teams' external and internal ties is the first step. A Social Network Analysis of every team member's relationships with colleagues in and out-side the team's boundaries can help profile the actors and give a general overview of the network's structure.

2. The measures: Cohesion, centralization and clique analysis are three measures to start with. 

The measures addressing network cohesion are the density of the network (number of linkages), its average path length and diameter (longest possible path in the network to which extent linkages effectively connect nodes). 

Centralisation of a network entails the emergence of  ‘hubs’ which are highly-connected nodes. While peripheral structures of nodes with a lower degree of centrality emerge, highly differentiated structures are known to be generally more robust. 

Clique analysis looks into subgroups using the clustering coefficient. It has been proven that the most efficient network architecture is the small world topology, where cohesive subgroups are connected to each other.  

3. The gap: Once the measures are laid on the table, all is left is bridging the gap between the "As-Is" and the "To-Be" networks. It is not an easy task as it grazes organizational and cultural aspects. And there is no silver bullet. Many initiatives can be taken according to the problem at hand and the context of the organization. If we note, for example, many peripheral members that barely link to the subgroups, a  mentoring program can be implemented to shrink their distance from the hubs, giving them access to the majority of team members. If the team looks highly cliquish with no interconnection among subgroups, maybe it's time for some conflict management workshops...

While knowledge workers are the working force of an organization, teams are its backbone. If teams can really be businesses within the business, and of they can leverage the power of networks, then there is no saying to the potential they can unleash.   

I'm no better-never, I don't think technology is ruining our brain, life or whatnot. I truly believe though, that like anything else, it's our use of it that makes it the Good or the Villain. Sometimes it's actually the over-use of it that makes it the latter. As I was revisiting "Connected", I thought about  relearning to be disconnected and how I have failed to consider that sometimes the only way to appreciate something's value is by distancing oneself from it for a while. Relearning to appreciate technology, rethinking its effect on our lives can only be possible by unplugging the matrix and then re-plugging with a new perspective.

Not convinced? Monika Guzmano from geekWire makes a good sell of it on her Ignite talk: Why I unplug. 

It definitely gives you something to think about.

Have a great Sunday!  

"What is the best book you read this year?" A question I asked some of my friends mainly to pry the best recommendations out of them. But it turned out to be a great social experience. Books are an incredible social object, they trigger thought provoking conversations and have an amazing serendipity effect! (I have met very interesting people through book discussions!) So while I'm organizing all the recommendations I got into a decent reading list (that I promised to share later), here are some of the books I read this year and some of the interesting ideas I came across while reading them.

• The thinking here [flatter organizational structure] is that it doesn’t matter where good ideas come from—if you empower all of your employees and all the members of a community with the same information and if members of a department also understand that they’re expected to share all the information that they have with you—then the best solution will evolve.
• Knowledge isn’t static. That old saw that encourages people to “collect pearls of wisdom” is false because, unlike pearls, knowledge changes. Knowledge is a process; it’s something that is made, and consequently, communities and social networks aren’t about and shouldn’t be about collecting facts.
• People tend to get siloed in and are inclined to communicate with others in the same silo rather than reaching across what Burt calls structural holes in a network. People tend not to talk across the gaps between silos and don't discuss ideas with people in other silos.
• The ability to see how something obvious in one field (such as bicycle chains) can be applied to a problem in another field (such as how to transfer power from an engine to a propeller) is often how new knowledge is created. Membership in multiple communities enables that.
• The future, therefore, doesn’t lie in everybody being connected to everybody. I don’t agree with those who see us headed toward a single, flat, monolithic culture where we all share the same values and the same literacies and sense of purpose. 

Social Networking for business : Choosing the right tools and resources to fit your needs

By Rawn Shah

• The basis for high-performing individuals and groups now includes those who demonstrate social intelligence and find the best ways to incorporate the wisdom of crowds
• Blogs and Wikipedia emphasize the role of individuals, their ambitions, preferences, competitive spirit, interactive behavior, personal characteristics, interests, and personal goals. In contrast, most organizations still try to manage themselves through centralized, hierarchical structures, forged in the days of ancient empires. This command-oriented structure emphasizes predictable and standardized processes to manage an operational environment, while deemphasizing individual expression and direction.
• Culture, an integral part of social environments, can exist in obvious or professed levels, or can hide in the unspoken but shared behavior of members. It emerges as a confluence of shared ideology and values, behavior and rituals, imagery, and stories about the social group.
• Researchers were able to demonstrate that the topology of the network has a strong relationship to their work performance...they found that just the size of a consultants network did not translate to increased performance.
• Social computing facilitates new strategies that change how businesses can apply the collective efforts of many individuals to solve problems and contribute to the success of the organization. Understanding the dynamics of how these methods work is both a science and an art.  

• In the 90's, collaboration was primarily about working with colleagues within the corporate firewall. Today, it often means working with people inside and outside the organization (in your value network) who have a wider spectrum of roles and relationships in this ecosystem that develops across and between organizations.  
• Mary OHara Devereaux and Robert Johansen: Historically businesses have viewed diversity as a chronic problem that had to be minimized and managed. The new challenge of globalization represents an opportunity to take a radically different approach: one that embraces diversity in ways that allow business to grow and profit from the many dramatically different cultural qualities that characterize most of our communities and organizations.
• Multiple realities inform each other, fertilize, stimulate, and stir the cauldron of creativity. David La Chapelle
• A trend in the industry is moving toward contextual collaboration, where user access to collaboration features is integrated within the business process or application being used. This can improve rates of adoption, since the use of the collaboration technologies becomes seamlessly melded into the way people work.  
• In order to work in the space effectively, People, Process, and Technology must all be addressed simultaneously

What makes an unusual, bizarre, absurd situation an awesome experience? Sharing. A point thoroughly made by Charlie Todd and his friends at Improv everywhere, who proudly define themselves as a prank collective that causes scenes.

Photo: Improv Everywhere 

I recently stumbled upon Charlie Todd's talk at Ted: The shared experience of absurdity (thanks Salah!). And it just made my day!

Have a great Sunday!

The world in all its complexity and enigma, is a set of networks hidden and interwoven in a vast fabric of humanity. Whether we like it or not, acknowledge it or not, we are embedded in these vast social networks and they ubiquitously shape our lives. 

In a compelling talk, Nicholas Christakis presents evidence of how our networks affect us, our friends affect us and even our friends' friends affect us. 

It seems as though "you are who you hang out with" just got a whole new meaning! It gives one something to really think about.

Have a great Sunday everyone!

Lamia Ben.