Qualities of an effective network

According to the authors of Influencer,

From a personal career standpoint, the need to build social capital by connecting with others has never been greater... Since you can't know everything, it's essential that you find people who can make up for your blind spots. A whole host of recent studies reveals that today's most successful employees have networks of people they can go to for expertise, as well as networks of people they can trust with sensitive requests...they carefully reduce their personal vulnerability by ensuring that they're valued members of hyperconnected networks.

Changing, complex, turbulent, and risky times require multiple heads to come up with creative solutions that no one person could ever invent.

Noel Tichy and Warren Bennis of Judgment write, "Making choices about who we surround ourselves with and from whom we take counsel is perhaps the biggest judgment that any leader can make. Building a social network that keeps developing knowledge creation capacity is central to the success of a leader."

Some of the assets that Tichy and Bennis recommend one seek in your network include the following:

• Domain expertise: Deep understanding of a technical area such as a functional specialty or technology.
• Industry knowledge: The ability to diagnose industry trends or help place changes in historical context that is predictive of possible future outcomes.
• Organizational knowledge: Understanding of the organization’s competencies, talent, networks, processes, and culture that suggests execution capability or receptivity to change.
• Constituent knowledge: Up-to-date information and relationships about one or more key constituents such as regulatory agencies, key customers, or suppliers that predict how these actors will respond to your organization’s moves.
• Access to information: Personal networks, relationships, and know-how that enable the person to get reliable answers to questions even if they do not have the answers themselves.
• External experience: A different perspective based on experiences outside the company or industry that helps to identify best practices or alternate approaches.
• Unconventional problem solving: A differentiated thought style that can generate creative solutions not likely to come from standard analyses or the industry's conventional wisdom.