Introduction to Organizational Network Analysis
Over the past decade or so significant restructuring efforts have resulted in organizations
with fewer hierarchical levels and more permeable functional and organizational boundaries.
While hopefully promoting efficiency and flexibility, a byproduct of these restructuring efforts
is that coordination and work increasingly occur through informal networks of relationships
rather than through formal reporting structures or prescribed work processes. These
seemingly invisible webs have become central to performance and strategy execution.
Research shows that appropriate connectivity in networks within organizations can have a
substantial impact on performance, learning, and innovation, and benefits also accrue from
well-connected networks between organizations.
Organizational network analysis (ONA) can provide an x-ray into the inner workings of an
organization --- a powerful means of making invisible patterns of information flow and
collaboration in strategically important groups visible. For example, we conducted an ONA of
executives in the exploration and production division of a large petroleum organization. This
group was in the midst of implementing a technology to help transfer knowledge across
drilling initiatives and was also interested in assessing their ability as a group to create and
share knowledge. As can be seen below, the network analysis revealed a striking contrast
between the group's formal and informal structure.
Three important points quickly emerged from the ONA:
First, the ONA identified mid-level managers that were critical in terms of information flow
within the group. A particular surprise came from the very central role that Cole played in
terms of both overall information flow within the group and being the only point of contact
between members of the production division and the rest of the network. If he were hired
away, the efficiency of this group as a whole would be significantly impacted as people in the
informal network re-established important informational relationships. Simply categorizing
various informational requests that Cole received and then allocating ownership of these
informational or decision domains to other executives served to both unburden Cole and
make the overall network more responsive and robust.
Second, the ONA helped to identify highly peripheral people that essentially represented
untapped expertise and underutilized resources for the group. In particular, it became
apparent that many of the senior people had become too removed from the day-to-day
operations of this group. For example, the most senior person (Jones) was one of the most
peripheral in the informal network. This is a common finding. As people move higher within
an organization their work begins to entail more administrative tasks that makes them both
less accessible and less knowledgeable about the day-to-day work of their subordinates.
However, in this case our debrief session indicated that Jones had become too removed and
his lack of responsiveness frequently held the entire network back when important decisions
needed to be made.
Third, the ONA also demonstrated the extent to which the production division (the sub-group
on the top of the diagram) had become separated from the overall network. Several months
prior to this analysis these people had been physically moved to a different floor in the
building. Upon reviewing the network diagram, many of the executives realized that this
physical separation had resulted in loss of a lot of the serendipitous meetings that occurred
when they were co-located. Structured meetings were set up to help avoid operational
problems the group had been experiencing due to this loss of communication between
production and the rest of the network.
This simple vignette provides a quick overview regarding how ONA can be applied to
important departments or functions within organizations. However, many strategically
important networks do not reside on the formal organization chart. The following web pages
illustrate use of ONA to address various organizational issues:
Conducting an Organizational Network Analysis
1. Identify a strategically important group.
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The first step is to identify a group within the organization where investments made
to improve collaboration have the potential to yield a significant payback either
strategically or operationally. We typically look for groups crossing functional,
physical, hierarchical and organizational lines because networks often fragment at
these junctures.
2. Assess meaningful and actionable relationships.
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The second step is to identify relationships that will meaningfully reveal a group's
effectiveness as well as be actionable for managers once results are disclosed. Most
companies are keenly interested in work-related collaboration. As a result, we almost
always map information flow. We can also look at relationships that reveal the
information sharing potential of a network, decision-making or power relations, or
those that reveal well-being and supportiveness in a network such as friendship or
trust networks.
Organizational network information can be obtained in a variety of ways, from
tracking e-mails to observing people over time. Often the most efficient means is to
administer a 10-20 minute survey designed to assess relationships within and outside
of a group.
3. Visually and quantitatively analyze results.
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Once the data have been collected, it can be analyzed using a network software
package. There are a variety of different packages available, some of which combine
drawing functionality with quantitative analysis and some of which specialize in one or
the other. For more information on visual assessment see the interpreting a network
diagram section.
4. Create meaningful feedback sessions.
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We typically conduct feedback sessions in two phases. In the first half of the
workshop, we present an overview of network analysis to orient the participants, and
then provide a summary presentation highlighting important points from the analysis
of the specific group. The second half of the workshop consists of breakout sessions
with smaller groups that brainstorm ways to promote appropriate connectivity and
ensure that organizational design, culture and leadership will not push the network
back to ineffective patterns. These subgroups then debrief the larger group, and ideas
are catalogued for action planning. In this process, it is always important to focus on
what can be done to improve the effectiveness of the group. Rather than questioning
why someone or some department is peripheral or central, it is more constructive to
focus on how the organization can overcome unproductive patterns.
5. Assess progress and effectiveness.
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Conducting an organizational analysis of a group indicates the level of connectivity
only at a specific point in time. Repeating this process after six to nine months can
reveal whether appropriate change has occurred in the network. It is also a good idea
to track objective measures of performance over time.
Interpreting a Network Diagram
Information collected from social network surveys can be used to create network diagrams
that illustrate the relationships between members of a group. The network below reveals
information flow within a dispersed new product development team. In this case each
member of the team was asked 'Whom do you turn to for information to get your work
done?' The network has been color-coded to differentiate between team members that are in
manufacturing, finance and marketing.
Lines and Arrows. The diagram above shows the flow of information within a new-product
development team. Each line indicates an information link between two people; arrows
represent the direction of the relationship (incoming arrows show that the person is a source
of information; outgoing arrows show that the team member seeks information from the
linked parties).
Central People. Network diagrams make clear who the most prominent people within a
group are. On this team, nine people rely on Paul for information. His colleagues in finance
come to him, but so do people in marketing and manufacturing. Paul himself does not reach
out to people outside of finance. The diagram alone can't tell us if Paul's impact is positive or
negative. If the group is overly dependent on him, he may be a bottleneck, slowing the flow
of information and holding up decisions. On the other hand, people like Paul often play a
very positive role, providing valuable information and holding a group together.
Peripheral People. Some people are only loosely connected to a network; a few may be
completely isolated --- members in theory but not in practice. In this network, no one goes
to Carl for information, and Kevin is out of the loop entirely. As is true with central people,
the diagram alone doesn't say anything about the value of peripheral people. Sometimes
such outsiders turn out to be underutilized resources, and integrating them can be critical to
a network's effectiveness and efficiency. Sometimes people are peripheral for good reason;
perhaps they are trying to manage work-family balance or are specialists such as research
scientists, who need to maintain strong ties to academia. And on occasion people are
peripheral because they lack skills, social and otherwise, for the job.
Subgroups. Groups within a network often arise as a product of location, function,
hierarchy, tenure, age, or gender. In this case, the team is split by function; very little
information is being shared among the three groups. Moreover, connections in marketing
and finance are sparse, while the manufacturing subgroup is tightly knit. That can be good or
bad. It may be that the manufacturing people have developed communication practices that
the team as a whole could use to its benefit. It's also possible that those people rely on one
another so heavily that they are preventing integration. Again, only follow-up interviews can
reveal which scenario is true.
1. Supporting Partnerships and Alliances
Executives increasingly employ cross-organizational initiatives such as alliances or other
forms of strategic partnerships to leverage their organizations' unique capabilities. However,
leaders in one organization usually have minimal insight into their counterpart's organization,
and collaboration can be heavily conditioned by legal restrictions, cultural and leadership
differences as well as differences in each company's level of expertise. ONA can tell
executives whether appropriate points of connectivity exist across organizations and whether
governance is restricting collaboration.
Challenge: Consider the network below of an alliance between two well-known
organizations that came together to bring a product to market. One organization held a
patent and understood the science behind the product. The other had manufacturing and
distribution expertise. It was presumed that the product could be introduced much more
effectively and efficiently if the two organizations worked together. Of course this required
effective collaboration, which our ONA showed to be less than desirable.
Key Findings: The network diagram reveals that the healthcare distribution company was
very much dominating the alliance with most members of the pharmaceutical company
peripheral to the network. There were a couple of exceptions to this, in particular TC and PT,
who were playing boundary-spanning roles between the two organizations. In general
though the analysis revealed a very hierarchical network that was not enabling collaboration
at the appropriate points across the organizations. Further, while we did find effective
collaboration between the organizations' sales and technical groups, minimal connections
existed between people in the two marketing groups, who desperately needed to collaborate
to attain the alliance's billion-dollar sales goal.
Changes: A variety of actions helped promote better collaboration. First, decision-rights
were re-allocated within the group and the governance agreements restructured to promote
network flexibility. Second, tasks were re-allocated from several senior members who had
become over-loaded and, through no fault of their own, bottlenecks. Third, face-to-face
meetings and virtual forums were put in place to develop connectivity at key network
juncture (e.g., across marketing groups in each company). These and other relatively simple
changes had a substantial impact on the speed with which the alliance delivered the product
to market as well as innovations identified for future collaborative endeavors.
2. Ensuring Strategy Execution
Core competencies or capabilities in knowledge-intensive work are usually a product of
collaboration across functional or divisional boundaries. ONA allows executives to determine
if the appropriate cross-functional or departmental collaborations are occurring to support
strategic objectives.
Challenge: We conducted an organizational network analysis of a large health services
organization. This was an organization that had grown by acquisition over several years with
the intent that acquired companies combine their expertise in developing and taking to
market new products and services. The CEO of this organization had become acutely aware
of the need to create a leadership network that was able to recognize opportunities in one
sphere of the network and know enough of what others in the conglomerate knew to
combine appropriate resources and expertise. As there was some evidence that this was not
happening, we were invited to conduct an organizational network analysis of the
conglomerate's top two layers of leadership (114 executives).
Key Findings: The table above is an alternative to the diagram format. Each cell indicates
the percentage of connections that exist out of a possible 100% if all people within a given
cell were connected. This simple summary of collaborative activity within and between
divisions provided a great deal of insight into the inner-workings of the organization. The
company had acquired various organizations with the intent that they collaborate in bringing
their offerings to market. However, the organizational network analysis showed that there
was only limited collaborative activity in pockets of the organization. For example, a quick
review of the table shows that divisions 3 and 4 had reasonable levels of collaboration,
whereas divisions 1 and 7 did not.
Changes: Various reasons existed for this. In some settings members of the executive team
were not sure what a given division did and so did not know how to even think about
involving them in their projects. In others, cultural norms or incentives kept people from
seeking information outside of their own division. And in some the complementarity of
product offerings that was presumed when an acquisition was made did not exist. As a
result, different interventions were applied as appropriate throughout the network; however,
it was the view of collaborative activity afforded by the organizational network analysis that
allowed the organization to intervene appropriately at each of these strategic junctures.
This kind of cross-boundary view is powerful for identifying points where collaborative
activity is not occurring and providing a targeted approach to interventions. It is often not
the case that you want high collaborative activity among all departments within an
organization. People have a finite amount of time to put into developing and maintaining
relationships. ONA provides a portfolio approach to considering the constellation of
relationships worth investing time and energy to develop and maintain. For example, it was
not critical that Division 1 be tightly connected to all other divisions to help the organization
meet strategic objectives. To provide strategic value to the organization, Division 1 really
only needed to be well connected to Divisions 3, 5 and 6. Rather than engage in a companywide initiative to improve collaboration, more targeted and ultimately more successful
interventions were employed to facilitate collaboration at specific junctures.
3. Collaboration and Decision Making in Top Leadership Networks
A core function of top executive teams is to acquire information, make sound decisions, and
convey those decisions effectively to the broader organization. ONA, when done with both
the top leadership team and the next layer down, can provide valuable diagnostic
information to leadership. Not only can it help assess connections within a top leadership
team, but also it can reveal how information is entering and leaving this group.
Challenge: The professional services division of a global technology organization had grown
rapidly and succeeded in accelerating the technology organization's introduction of highvalue services. However, after a year and a half of frenetic growth, the top executives of this
division had become concerned that their organization was not working the way they had
hoped. We were asked to examine the extent to which this group was effectively
collaborating as a decision-making body. The executives were responsible for ensuring that
all sales opportunities included substantial service components. Their direct reports managed
the resources and clients: these were the people who sold and delivered solutions to
customers. Thus, collaboration both across practice areas and hierarchical levels was critical
to the effective functioning of the division as a whole.
Key Findings: The network map on the left shows information flow in the extended
leadership team. Each practice is coded in a different color, with large nodes representing
the top executives and smaller ones their direct reports. The network map on the right
shows the same network with the top nine executives removed. In this case, despite good
intentions and engaged executive leadership, the equivalent of functional silos had emerged
underneath each of the executives. Of course this was a problem because people lower in
the hierarchy needed to connect across divisions to provide competitive solutions for
customers.
Changes: As a result of the analysis, the executives identified seven problematic junctures
and took actions to bridge these gaps. For example, one of the key gaps lay between
business consulting and the managed services practice. Business consulting provided an
exceptional opportunity to sell services, yet the level of collaboration between these two
practices was limited to three weak connections. Another important disconnect existed
between the enterprise customer group and the business consulting practice. Two weeks
following the presentation of the network analysis results, the managers of these two groups
agreed to create a position for a senior manager who would work specifically on developing
and implementing a sales plan and managing resulting business opportunities. In addition to
focusing on the problem points between the practices, managers without exception took an
active interest in applying the network analysis results to their own groups. Specific
presentations were done for employees in each of the practices to allow them to assess both
their internal connectivity as well as opportunities for integrating across business lines. These
half-day workshops helped managers understand the importance of networks and of creating
grass-roots initiatives throughout the various practices to promote network connectivity.
4. Integrating Networks Across Core Processes or Expertise
Informal networks across core processes are often fragmented by functional boundaries.
Both cognitive and organizational barriers often keep groups from effectively integrating
unique expertise, which can damage quality, efficiency, and innovation. As the process map
did for re-engineering, ONA provides a diagnostic assessment of information and knowledge
flow both within and across functions critical to a core process.
Challenge: In one global consulting organization we worked with a highly skilled group
commissioned to provide thought leadership and specialized support to the organization's
knowledge management consultants. This group was composed of people with either
advanced degrees or extensive industry experience in strategy and organizational design or
technical fields such as data warehousing or information architecture. By integrating these
highly specialized skill sets, leadership of the consultancy felt the firm could provide a holistic
knowledge management solution that would differentiate it from competitors focusing on
solely technical or organizational solutions. However, the partner leading this group felt
intuitively that the team was not leveraging its abilities as effectively as possible and asked
us to conduct an organizational network analysis of information flow within the group.
Key Findings: It is obvious from the picture on the left that the consulting practice is broken
into two different sub-groups with one person acting as a boundary spanner. Interestingly
enough the practice was divided on precisely the dimension it needed to be connected, their
unique skill sets. The group on the left side of the network was skilled in the 'softer' issues of
strategy or organizational design, whereas the group on the right was composed of people
skilled in 'harder' technical aspects of knowledge management such as information
architecture, modeling and data warehousing.
Changes: A lengthy facilitated session with this group allowed them to assess and discuss
the relative isolation of the two specialties. As a result of this discussion various changes
were made to the group's operations. First, a variety of internal projects - ranging from
white papers to development of a project-tracking database - were jointly staffed with one
person from each group. Second, the partner implemented mixed revenue sales goals so
that each of the managers were accountable for selling projects that included both a
technical and organizational component. Finally, several new communication forums were
created --- including weekly status calls, a short update e-mail done weekly and a projecttracking database. The result of these interventions was significant. Over the course of the
next several months, the group began to sell more work that integrated technical and
organizational skills and a network analysis conducted nine months later revealed a wellintegrated group that was sharing information much more effectively
5. Promoting Innovation
Most innovation of importance today is a collaborative endeavor. Whether concerned with
new-product development, process improvement or R&D departments, ONA can be
particularly insightful in both assessing how a group is integrating its expertise and the
effectiveness with which it is drawing on the expertise of others within and outside of an
organization.
Challenge: The following group had been formed from highly skilled subject-matter experts
drawn from across the organization to develop and disseminate leading-edge manufacturing
processes and technologies. In the old structure, these experts were dispersed in myriad
functions and business units. In the new, they were brought under one leader to ensure
focus and consistency in manufacturing processes and technologies. The network analysis
was conducted to find out the extent to which collaboration and innovation was occurring
across the new group.
Key Findings: The ONA provided a great deal of insight to the incoming executive. For
example, he was surprised by the central role some employees were playing and concerned
with the extent to which some of the leading experts were peripheral members of the group.
And while he was pleased to learn of practices in some countries that promoted effective
collaboration, he was very concerned with clustering in the network, which indicated that the
division was not yet well integrated. The employees were still mostly collaborating only with
others in their own country. In fact, the only connections across countries were those of the
leadership team and a few relationships formed during past projects.
Changes: In this case, an offsite meeting of the division's leaders resulted in some
recommendations. First, a meeting of all employees was held that consisted of a series of
workshops focused on projects under way in various countries. In these joint problemsolving sessions, people not only found solutions and shared recent successes but also
learned about one another's expertise. And to make sure that this was not a one-off event,
monthly conference calls were initiated to follow up on the projects discussed during the
workshops. Just as important, the firm's leaders began to adopt policies and procedures that
encouraged collaboration throughout the network. First, in hiring they began to target
collaborative behaviors in interviews rather than focusing too heavily on individual
accomplishment. Second, they changed project management and evaluation practices to
ensure that people reached out to relevant colleagues for advice at the start of a research
program. Third, the leaders centralized staffing to facilitate cross-group collaboration and to
ensure that the best expertise was placed on each research project (rather than staffing
locally from each country). Finally, they redesigned individual performance metrics to focus
less on individual productivity and more on collaborative behaviors.
6. Ensuring Integration Post-Merger or Large Scale Change
Particularly in knowledge-intensive settings, large-scale change is fundamentally an issue of
network integration. ONA, done before a change initiative, can help inform the change
process as well as central people within the network that a sponsor might want to engage in
design because of their ability to convey information to others. ONA can also be done as a
follow-up 6 to 9 months after implementation. Quite often these assessments reveal
significant issues that leaders need to address for the initiative to be successful.
Challenge: A consulting firm we worked with had invested substantially in changing its
structure from one in which profit and loss responsibility lay with offices in each major city to
one that consolidated these offices into four regions throughout the United States. The firm's
leaders initiated the reorganization to increase the depth and breadth of expertise that could
be brought to client projects and competitive sales situations. Eighteen months after the
restructuring, we were asked to conduct a series of organizationa network analyses to assess
collaboration in the newly formed regions.
Key Findings: We mapped several practices in different regions and found that the firm was
enjoying mixed success. For example, the network map of one practice clearly showed a
fragmentation into three subgroups reflecting the major cities in that region (above left). In
another region, we mapped a group with almost identical characteristics in terms of size,
work, and geographic dispersion. As seen in network picture on the right, here we found a
very different pattern of collaboration across the three primary cities in this region.
Changes: To better understand why one practice had become integrated and the other
hadn't we conducted numerous interviews with people in the different practices. We found
differences in management that were having a strong influence on network integration and
the comparative performance of the practices. For example, except for the partners, who had
periodic face-to-face meetings, the group in the more fragmented region had no forum to
come together, meet each other, and learn about colleagues' skills and expertise. In the
cohesive network, employees indicated that other people in the region became viable
sources of information only after they had met face-to-face and had an opportunity to
understand one another's strengths. Just as important, staffing practices were different in
the two groups. Rather than focusing exclusively on efficiency and billable hours, the more
cohesive group recognized that effective relationships developed during projects. As a result,
staffing decisions were often made with an eye to integrating people from different locations,
a decision that flies in the face of conventional wisdom. Finally the two groups employed
different human resource practices despite a common, firm wide HR policy and procedure
manual. For example, although both groups used a critical incident interviewing technique,
the cohesive group looked for evidence of collaborative behavior in job candidates whereas
the fragmented group was much more focused on past individual achievement such as sales
ability or technical skills.
7. Developing Communities of Practice
Communities of practice are usually not formally recognized within an organization but can
be critical to an organization's ability to leverage expertise distributed by virtue of physical
location or organizational design. ONA can be used both to uncover the key members of the
community as well as assess overall health in terms of connectivity.
Challenge: We conducted a network analysis of a customer-facing service community of
practice in a large oil and gas company. The community consisted of employees spread
across seven countries. Senior managers wanted to understand the network of connections
among the different countries. They believed that promoting collaboration across sites would
reduce re-work as well as improve the quality and innovativeness of work done on projects.
Key Findings: The network maps revealed very little information sharing across countries.
In many cases there are only four or five connections between each country and in some
cases no connections at all. On a more positive note, we did find a high level of collaboration
within each country. This was especially the case in the country that had successfully
reduced losses due to poor quality. A close look at this country indicated that there was a
high level of collaboration between the different functional groups. It is also very clear from
the network map that three people were playing prominent boundary-spanning roles
between several of the countries. Our initial belief was that these boundary spanners were
acting as vital conduits of information between the countries. To our surprise, after
interviewing several key people in the community, we found that the boundary spanners,
known as global advisors, were more information bottlenecks than connection facilitators.
Changes: As a result of the network analysis and a feedback session with many of the
network members several changes were made. First, the organization developed a businessdriven communication plan, which provided a clear charter to tackle tangible initiatives.
Second, the company developed a self-service portal that included expert locator
functionality. Third, several community of practice events were conducted. This has helped
community members meet and know each other-enhancing trust and therefore facilitating
sharing and the breaking down of silos. Fourth, to address the role of the three people who
had become bottlenecks, there was a move away from the centralized organization design
model to one that was more dispersed and participatory with an emphasis on distributed
decision-making. Specific people in each of the countries were assigned the role of local
knowledge champions.
8. Personal Networks and Leadership Development.
A powerful way to improve executive effectiveness or promote connectivity in an
organization is to work through each employee's personal network. Research has shown that
people in more diverse, entrepreneurial networks tend to be more successful. Providing
executives and employees with a means of planning their personal network development is
an effective way to promote connectivity. Such feedback can help employees identify biases
in their networks and understand why they might want to invest more in some relationships
and less in others. For example, are people getting information only from a certain
hierarchical level? Alternatively, are they leveraging only those colleagues who are physically
close or in the same functional unit, or are they actively reaching out to different people to
benefit from diverse perspectives?
There are many ways to assess the composition of your network and its impact on
performance, learning and innovation. For example, sociologists commonly look at the effect
of certain similarities between people-such as age, race, education, and gender-on clustering
in networks. But these demographics do not always illustrate the subtle means by which
one's contacts affect learning. In many coaching sessions with managers at all levels in
organizations, we have found at least six dimensions of personal networks to be consistently
important.
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Relative Hierarchical Position. Networks can be biased by an over-reliance on
people who occupy certain hierarchical positions. Managing relationships with those
higher than, at the same level, and lower than you is a hallmark of a well-rounded
organizational network. In general, balance is important, and people's networks seem
to fall out of balance when they don't maintain enough relationships overall, when
they focus too heavily on those higher in the organization, or when they miss the
technical expertise that can often be gained from those at lower levels.
Relative Organizational Position. People tend to pay attention to, interact with,
and learn from those in their home department. However, as one moves up in the
hierarchy, bridging relationships (to other departments and organizations) become
increasingly important to ensure effective learning and decision-making.
Unfortunately, when people need bridging relationships the most, they often have the
least time to spend building them.
Physical Proximity. The likelihood of collaborating with someone decreases the
farther you are from that person. Distances of only a few feet, let alone floors in a
building or even buildings themselves, often prove to be critical fragmentation points
in networks. With executives, this problem often results in their not understanding
the needs of those in different locations, such as field sites.
Structured Interactions. Look at almost any manager's Day-Timer: It is common to
see back-to-back meetings from 7 A.M. to 7 P.M., day after day. The critical question
from a learning perspective is whether the people you are seeking as your primary
information conduits are the best sources for the task-relevant information you need,
or whether they are simply built into your schedule.
Time Invested in Maintaining Relationships. Do you invest enough time in
maintaining relationships that are important to you? People often spend the most
time and effort maintaining relationships that need little investment or that are
antagonistic and offer little benefit. People have finite time and energy to put into
relationships. Managing these investments wisely can yield substantial performance
and learning benefits.
Length of Time Known. Is there diversity in your network in terms of the length of
time that you have known people? If you have known too many people for too long,
you are probably hearing things you already know or, more insidious, knowingly or
unknowingly using other people to get your own opinions confirmed. It is good to see
new people cycling into (and out of) a person's network as his or her job changes. At
the same time, if you have too many new people in your network, it may indicate a
lack of sounding boards or confidants with whom you can discuss personal or
inflammatory issues.
Combining these dimensions to assess your personal network can give you insight about
where to focus your relationship building. For example, consider an executive whom listed
fifteen people in his personal network. Having recently been promoted to this position, he
found that most of the people he relied on at this point were new to him. Although he was
pleased with this network from an informational perspective, he was little less comfortable
with the extent to which he could trust these people to discuss and brainstorm tough
organizational issues. One implication of this assessment was a need to rekindle relationships
with two past mentors who could be distant advisers.
Additional biases existed. For example, he was concerned about his excessive reliance on
people lower in the hierarchy and on those in his own group. He had set out to build
relationships with his employees in order to be an effective leader, but it was clear to him
that he had not established sufficient relationships with those higher in the organization. As a
result, he often missed opportunities to leverage resources or knowledge that existed
elsewhere in the organization, and he was less able to gain buy-in on initiatives he wanted to
pursue. He was also surprised to note his heavy reliance on those physically near him. The
network analysis showed him that two practices-relying too heavily on spontaneity and
failing to systematically reach out to those in different locations-were biasing the information
he had to work from. To fix this imbalance, he began to structure time into his calendar for
people he might not necessarily bump into in the halls or cafeteria.