Organizational Network Analysis

Within every organization, there is an informal, internal network which has a crucial effect on how the organization functions. This inner system is in fact more diverse and versatile, and has more influence over the efficiency of the organization than one would suppose at first.

The organizational network analysis can reveal this informal system and point out the key people both on individual and group levels. It gives an exact picture of how much influence they have and how these are interconnected.

Moreover, as a result of the monitoring, multi-dimension profiles can be allocated to every colleague and group. This gives an opportunity to form developmental plans and to plan leader-recruitment. This is how network exploration becomes a fundamental diagnostic means of HR strategy.

Important questions of leaders we answer:

• Who should I put on the project team to ensure success?
• How can I help newcomer adjustment so that they don?t leave the company in a year?s time, taking all the knowledge they gained with them?
• Which of my employees should I train?
• Which of my employees should I aim to keep in the team?
• Could the cooperation with other managers be better?
• Are the various teams in my organization making the most out of joint projects?
• Are there any key people in the company that I don?t know about?
• How does gossip spread, and what can be done to counter it?
• Is there hidden knowledge or information somewhere within the organization that I don?t know about, yet it could further advance the company?s position? If so, where do I find it?

Case Studies

1. Network of professional knowledge accessibility ? integration of professional masters

In any company, network loops can be found, separating some of your most valuable colleagues from the others in the informal relational network. Their high-value expertise is not being used to its full potential ? would you care to know who these individuals are, and how to level them with the rest of the organization?

2. Key employees

In every organization there are informal key ?players? who have the greatest effect on the way the company is organized. Knowing how influential members of your team are likely to react to organizational changes is an important insight.

3. Newcomer adjustment

Working with an IT company, we found that the vast majority of new colleagues were isolated from the old ones, and primarily only had relations amongst each other. By highlighting this problem, the company could react to it by initiating a mentor system that supports the integration of newcomers and their access to professional and organizational knowledge.

4. Organizational information flow

In a manufacturing firm, we found that the top two management levels didn?t have any connection with the managers working in the factories. We showed the management who the key information brokers were, and recommended that they should be connected in order to enhance the flow of information, and to prevent gossips spreading through the organization.

5. Competency profile

We make a profile of every employee, which enables you identify training, coaching and other development areas. Compare this with the development plan of an employee, and the areas that need to be worked on become clear; the route towards becoming a professional expert or stepping up to a higher managerial level is marked out.

6. Cooperation between front and back office

Cooperation between colleagues who are working on bringing business to the table, and those who then carry out the actual work is essential to any business. When acting on behalf of an IT-corporation, we found discrepancies between the group of salesmen and the group of developers. As a result of highlighting these insights, company leaders stepped up efforts to enhance the cooperation between the groups, contributing to the success of future projects.

7. Planning leader recruitment

A Hungarian-owned company went through a significant expansion in one year, lots of new colleagues joined the group. Organizational and co-ordination problems started to surface after a while. By the help of organizational network exploration, any given manager?s leadership skills can be measured, and we are also able to assess their acceptance as leaders in any given group.

8. HR Security

By the help of organizational network analysis, we can identify employees who might pose a potential risk to the company; we can also find so-called cohesive groups with strong ties to each other, but weak relationships with other teams or organizational units.

9. Reducing turnover

We find that turnover rates are higher in departments where the group cohesion is smaller. Employees who are on the periphery of the informal network are likely to leave the company on short notice. Who are these colleagues, what can we do to integrate them?

10. Decision network

By analysing the decision network of a company, we can identify key employees: which colleagues do the others turn to for advice in case of a decision? We can analyze the decision making pattern on different managerial levels and find were the blocks are.

11. Project effectiveness analysis

During the analysis of project teams, we are able to show the communication gaps and the missing cooperation links between employees who are meant to be working together on a project intensively.

12. Identifying key organizational values

If you are aware which values effect your organization the most, you have the chance of influencing or reinforcing them

13. Co-operation of managers

When analysing the organizational network of a division of a financial company, we observed that intermediate managers connected to each other well, creating a strong inner core, however, the Head of the Division did not have this kind of connection with those managers. After the feedback of the results, steps were worked out to develop relations.

14. Group metrics

There are several measures which can be used to indicate the level of cooperation in a group (for example cohesion, density, symmetry). Working with an IT department, we found that all but one their work groups were good in cooperating with each other. With a few interventions the head of the department could remedy this situation.

15. Identifying potential project team members

Using organizational network methodology we can identify colleagues who are most likely to cooperate well with each other and produce great results together.

16. Innovation diffusion in the organization

Unfortunately, in some corporations, the best ideas don?t reach the people who have the power to make them work. Through examining the way innovation spreads through the organization, we can show where and why these fresh notions get blocked.

17. Participant recommendations

Through organizational network analysis, we identified a group of employees that had the largest influence on the organisational and professional information flow of a company. The company?s management invited these informal opinion leaders to discuss planned changes. This way the information flow was streamlined, and the spread of gossip based on incomplete information could be prevented.