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Networking
Networking is basically a social process of linking people together, thereby creating and developing relationships or coalitions to achieve certain goals. The process opens up channels of communication between people, who usually have similar interests or background. This creates a new bond of interdependence and reciprocity. British Petroleum, as quoted in Hastings’ (1993) book ‘The New Organization: growing the culture of organizational networking’, identify 6 key purposes of international networking, as highlighted in box 1.
- 1. To share common policies
- 2. To share best practice
- 3. To develop new skills
- 4. To create synergies to add value
- 5. To co-ordinate joint projects
- 6. To develop strategies
Box 1: Purposes of international networking (organisations)
Networks may help to develop specific communities of practice, some characteristics of which are given in box 2.
- Community of Practice characteristic
- Description
- Purpose
- Adding value, sharing knowledge, building members’ capabilities
- Membership
- Diverse, self-selecting
- Size
- Can be hundreds
- Scope
- Narrow or wide, across organisations
- Structure
- Self-organising
- Frequency of contact
- Whenever necessary
- Ethos
- Informal, sharing
- Topics covered
- Anything defined as useful by members
- Source of cohesion
- Members’ commitment
- Outputs
- Knowledge sharing and new understanding
- Organisational support
- Funding, interventions to overcome obstacles
- Typical habitat
- Knowledge-driven organisations
- Assessment
- Stories told by members
- Lifespan
- long as members want it
Box 2: Summary characteristics of communities of practice (based on Wenger & Snyder, 2000)
Rosabeth Moss Kanter (1989), a renowned management guru, expressed that a major benefit to organisations of networking was that it also promoted innovation and change, vital attributes for successful organisations. She further emphasised the benefits to the individual in networking. This was built on by writers in the fields of management and careers, including Luthans (1988) who saw networking as the prime vehicle for management promotions, with effective maximisation of socialising and politicking opportunities.
Box 3 below lists some of the benefits to organisations and individuals of successful networking.
- Organisations
-
- Helps to eliminate boundaries
- Encourages reciprocity and information exchange
- Enables flexibility in ways of working
- Promotes innovation
- Creates new services, products and markets
- Widens access to resources
- Engenders trust and support
- Individuals
-
- Develops new skills
- Provides access to resources
- Adds credibility
- Provides access to information
- Represents a valuable ‘currency’ of support and co-operation through high quality relationships
- Helps personal career progression
- Can be useful to speed things up and get things done
Box 3: Benefits of networking for organisations and individuals
Last cached: 2008-05-07 06:58 PM