Networks: A Question of Control
As with so many other aspects of knowledge assets, there are both bottom-up and top-down aspects to networks. There are many who study networks that see them as analogous to self-organizing, living systems that occur in nature. If you believe this, then you believe that organizations can organize themselves. There is a lot of truth to this and it makes sense to dig in, using the approaches we outline above to understand how a network is working organically so that interventions are effective. But it is unrealistic to believe that businesses will become completely self-organizing in our lifetimes, if ever.
On a practical level, organizations often do take a top down approach and try to influence and improve the performance of their networks—or even to create them. Chris Meyer of Monitor Network explains this view in Consulting magazine (April, 2006–not on line) by saying “networks are like computers in that they need applications software or a design of how to use them to be productive, and to do this we begin with the work and not the technology.” In other words, networks need a task, a sense of purpose to be effective. His suggested approach is to first define the work to be done, then identify the talent needed to make it happen, “engineer” the exchanges needed, design the experience, and assemble the technology. In other words, build your networks by thinking about the business purpose first and then the technology and platform.
As explained in a past post, the knowledge factory is an updated version of the Value Chain diagram developed by Michael Porter. When it came time to organize the kind of business depicted in Porter’s graphic, the organization chart fit the bill. There was someone in charge of each of the boxes in the value chain. Sometimes there was a manager overseeing several of those managers—a head of manufacturing, or of an individual plant. Many companies also had Chief Operating Officers. At the top was a CEO and/or a President. Power, funding, and communications all flowed from the top to the bottom along the “chain of command,” a term that invokes a military organization but one that is changing as we speak.
Of course, every organization still has an org chart. And a chain of command. But neither is as monolithic as they used to be. The work of most organizations today cannot get done if employees are forbidden to reach into another silo or chain or command directly as opposed to the old way of “going through channels” that slowed things down and inhibited communication. As you will see in the coming posts, there is a balance to be struck between the org chart and the network map….
Adapted from Intangible Capital: Putting Knowledge to Work in the 21st Century Organization by Mary Adams and Michael Oleksak.
