{"id":21414,"date":"2019-02-05T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-02-05T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/global2020prd.wpengine.com\/insights\/how-do-our-networks-need-to-change-with-time\/"},"modified":"2020-05-11T09:13:29","modified_gmt":"2020-05-11T09:13:29","slug":"how-do-our-networks-need-to-change-with-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.global-integration.com\/insights\/how-do-our-networks-need-to-change-with-time\/","title":{"rendered":"How do our networks need to change with time?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Extensive studies of communications traffic, and who actually talks to who, have identified unexpected practical information about what makes an effective network, and how this changes with time.<\/p>\n

Father of the field of \u2018organizational network analysis\u2019 (ONA), Prof Rob Cross\u2019s decade of research has revealed that it usually takes 3 to 5 years for a newcomer to build an established network.\u00a0 However his team noted that some managed it much sooner.\u00a0 These people also harnessed their network to make them more productive AND stayed at the new organization past the 2 to 4-year point (when people are most likely to leave).<\/p>\n

What was different about the approach of these positive outliers?<\/a><\/p>\n

Firstly, the researchers found more was less.\u00a0 Purely aiming to create a large network and build your brand broadly across the organization correlated with people leaving in the danger zone of 2 \u2013 4 years of tenure.<\/p>\n

The second surprise was that newcomers did not do better with a formal mentor or an initial strong connection to a leader.<\/p>\n

Instead those that built an effective network quickly, and stayed the distance, were both more selective and more genuine in who and how they reached out to people.\u00a0 They still took the initiative to set up a lot of exploratory meetings, but focused on:<\/p>\n