Streamline Training & Documentation: Help with Organizational Network Analysis

Monday, March 19, 2007

Help with Organizational Network Analysis

Awareness of how work really gets done at your organization is a prerequisite for optimizing performance. For many years, Rob Cross, professor of management at the University of Virginia, has been producing practical guidance on network analysis, a powerful technique for identifying who talks and works with whom. His expertise is captured in the book he and Andrew Parker published in 2004, The Hidden Power of Social Networks: Understanding How Work Really Gets Done in Organizations.

You can also learn a great deal about the ins and outs of network analysis by visiting the website of the Network Roundtable, of which Cross is the research director. For example, you can work through a set of six tutorials (registration required) covering the five steps in the network analysis process:

Pick an appropriate group and design a survey

Create and administer the survey (UVA software is available)

Visually analyze network results

Quantitatively analyze network results

Identify recommendations and assess progress

For brief descriptions of the steps (with slightly different boundaries between them), you can go to Rob Cross's own website.

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Labels: Networking

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