Customer Reviews

Driving Results Through Social Networks: How Top Organizations Leverage Networks for Performance and Growth (J-B US non-Franchise Leadership)

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

First, this book is *not* to be confused with social networking as used typically in the context of linkedin or facebook etc. I think a better title would have been 'Organizational Networks'

This is about the combination of explicit and implicit organizational networks and how organizations should consider evaluating, re-defining these organizational networks to maximize organizational performance.

It will help you understand how *your* organization is actually functioning, the drawbacks that hinder your personal performance because of organizational network bottlenecks, and suggests models for improved organizational performance.

Organizational performance is related to getting the level of collaboration just right. You may be surprised to learn that the problem might not be too little collaboration but too much of inefficient collaboration.

The book is very good. The only reason I am not giving it a 5-star is because I think the book takes considerable effort to read.

Great read, the authors do an excellent job of staying out of the fray of the various tools and technologies that are available for social networks, and we all know many of them. Some of the reviewers for this book seem to be looking for a cookbook of how to leverage these technologies. However, that is not the challenge we face in organizations. This book focuses on how the people and the processes around social networking can be analyzed and understood, then an organization can leverage the appropriate technologies to effectively support these networks. Definitely worth a read, only if you are not looking for a cookbook of how to deploy social networking technology!

If you have ever been tasked to build a network as part of your work responsibility -- and I have -- this book will be very instructive as to how you can begin to go about doing this and importantly, how you measure and document, and visualize the network.

For people in law enforcement, the type of network analysis described in the book can also help you to understand and make sense of the gazillion gang member cards and e-documentation you may be gathering, put that informatin together in an easy-to-understand visual framework, and identify critical nodes in the criminal network that you wouldn't otherwise know were people critical to maintaining the criminal network. Arrest / remove those nodes and you'll be on your way to measurably deconstructing criminal networks - and being able to succinctly report the MEASURABLE results of your work to your Police Chief.

Cross and Thomas have given us a good introduction to the appplication of social network analysis inside organizations. It focuses on how this technique can discover and solve problems. Rather than explain 'how to' analyze networks, it concentrates on the 'why'.