A special version of
these ties is formed between technologists making inventions and managers
launching new products. They need each other, and each knows they are competing
with others in the organization who are trying to use other innovations to
launch other products. Out of mutual interest in their careers (and to be
helpful to their employer), they may partner up, exchange information, and then
– importantly – try to influence others to get their innovative product
approved for launch. In a recent paper in Administrative Science Quarterly, AnneTer Wal, Paola Criscuolo, Bill McEvily, and Ammon Salter document what may be
an especially good way for these partners to influence others for the sake of launching
innovative products.
The authors discovered
that a special structure – the woven network shown in the figure here – is best
for these technologist/manager partners to pursue. In the figure, a manager and
a technologist who are collaborating to advance an innovation are both
connected to peers and seniors in the organization, and they are both connected
to other managers and technologists. In other words, each of them is connected
to people who occupy different roles at different levels. This allows them to
create buzz for the innovation and to influence their bosses. What’s new about
that? Here’s the key: the technologist networks with people in various role
sets, and the manager networks with different
people in those same role sets. The results of this specific type of
influencing create a particularly strong advantage.
Technicians and
managers have different knowledge, different goals, and different
interpretations of an innovation. A manager always sounds more credible talking
about its commercial features and less credible talking about its technological
features. For the technician, it’s the other way around. By tapping into this
particular kind of networking, the team helps both kinds of information reach people
in different functions and at different levels of the organization. The team’s
joint influence over different people within a given role/level gets reinforced
when those people then talk to each other about the innovation’s potential.
How big are the
effects of such interwoven networks? A modest change in the degree of this type
of networking increases the likelihood of innovation launch by about 8 percent.
In management studies, and especially anything that has to do with innovation,
that is a big effect. It is interesting that the effect is so big and the
behavior needed to get it is contrary to what many people do. A geeky
technician will mostly speak to peer technicians. An instrumental technician
will mostly speak to senior managers. Each of them will be missing influence
with important roles in the organization, and they will have a better chance to
succeed if they are paired with a manager who networks with people in a variety
of roles and encourages the technician to do the same. In networking, as in so
many other aspects of bringing a new product to life, teamwork is key to
producing the best possible result. So let’s start talking—and not just to the people
who already know what we know and think how we think.
Ter Wal ALJ, Criscuolo P, McEvily B, Salter A. 2020. Dual Networking: How Collaborators Network in Their Quest for Innovation. Administrative Science Quarterly, forthcoming