Networking; past present and future; and the importance of personality

Hello 2000…..………2002…………..2004……………..2006……..…..2007…… 2008.. I am a professional network and community advisor and multi-domain ‘facilitator’. In other words, I help groups of people do the things that they want and/or need to do.

Here’s the plan
Networking: why, what
Quick timeline: past, present
Present: humans: social everything?
Quick diversion via KnowledgeBoard: did and learnt
The four Ps
Humans and personalities
Not so implicit messages in technology
Quick timeline: future
Tools to make it better
Future

Why do we network?
Learn something new
Learn more about something they know
Share stuff about what they know
Give something back to the organisation
Build their status in a community
Meet like-minded people
Help to make positive change
Organise things:
e.g. global teams
Local groups
Event teams
From work with VSO, Feb 2008

So networks need to…
Offer us learning opportunities
Help us give something back
Respect our time
Provide us with interesting people to meet
Help us make the connections we want to make
Link us to the rights organisations effectively
Respect our personalities
Provide the managers with a suitable space
to do all the above

What do we think networking is? And a definition from the facilitator Expanding one's social network or sphere of influence by initiating mutually advantageous new relationships with people. One’s ability to make contact with others in obtaining research, information, and services about career fields, organizations, or job industries in order to enhance career goals. (Tamara Gittelson) From a network networking event, London Voluntary Services Council, Cascade meeting, 14/02/08

A quick timeline Past Present Future

A quick timeline: past Primary networks: Organisations: producers of stuff and networking
Networking:
Style: Closed
Behaviour: Possessive
Value: Hidden
Technology: Book, Phone
Conferences
Past

A quick timeline: present Primary networks: Organisations: producers of stuff and networking
Networking:
Style: Closed
Value: Hidden
Conferences
Primary networks: Emergence of external networks: Consultants with big org experience Consultants with no big org experience Social enterprises with open networks Communities/Crowdsourcing
Networking:
Style: Wide open
Behaviour: Flaunting it
Value: Prominent
Technology: Social networking
UnConferences and blended
facilitation
Past Present Future

Networking:
Style: Wide open
Value: Prominent
UnConferences and blended
facilitation
Participatory Collaborative Co-creation Knowledge networking Engagement Open Space Social this that and the other… Un-everything From Media Sandbox community launch, Bristol, 2007

Present: humans: social everything? What happened to just doing a good job?

Present: humans: social everything? Participatory Collaborative Co-creation Knowledge networking Speed networking Open Space Social this that and the other… Un-everything Network experts Know everyone …

Present: humans: social everything? Emotional Particular Peculiar Different Spiritual Individual Shy Temperamental Happy Sad Contextual … ? “… We judge ourselves by what we think we can do. Others judge us by what we have done… (Australian Trucker mag my friend Tim found for me)

What did we do on KnowledgeBoard? Facilities to attract: Published content Commenting Q & A Conversations Facilitated environment Publishing articles and encouraging discussion Hosting interest groups and encouraging discussion Sending newsletters and encouraging discussion Measuring … the discussion Social structures to build trust: Co-creation of shared space Events (physical and virtual) Realise-able results from input … Touch points along the relationship Workshops at conferences and our own conferences 3 x Community books Research partnerships and papers

One thing learnt from KnowledgeBoard Good lord we’re all different… Not everyone wants to discuss stuff publicly.. What does that mean? For whom? How can we plan for that in the future? How can we measure that?

The four Ps Public Personal Private Political

Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a personality questionnaire designed to identify certain psychological differences according to the typological theories of Carl Gustav Jung as published in his 1921 book Psychological Types… While many academic psychologists have criticized the indicator in research literature, claiming that it "lacks convincing validity data… proponents and sellers of the test cite unblinded anecdotal predictions of individual behavior… In a similar way to left- or right-handedness, the principle is that individuals also find certain ways of thinking and acting easier than others. The MBTI endeavours to sort some of these psychological opposites into four opposite pairs, or dichotomies, with a resulting 16 possible combinations. None of these combinations is 'better' or 'worse',… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator Humans and personalities

Humans and personalities: Ed is ENTP
I’m bound to get on someone’s nerves and vice versa
Some networks may be entirely un-suited to me
Couldn’t networks and the tools be suited to us as individuals?
Will we see the same things in different networks?
What is the balance of people types in networks?
Should I behave in the way you think I should?
But does that mean you have to behave in the way I think you should?

Personalities being sold to In response to the intel ad: “ More Computing Power Means More You” “… Would I really want to have be more me? A glance at my personality spectrum reveals swathes of my selfhood where there’s already quite enough, thank you – and some aspects, such as the egotism, suspicion, self-pity, pointless regret and maundering envy, that might do with toning down. Would anyone else want to have more me? I suspect my wife would declare ‘Enough husband’…” (Enough, John Naish) http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enough-John-Naish/dp/0340935901/

Not so implicit messages in technology… http://thayer18.livejournal.com/10610.html “… Twitter is not a popularity contest. Step away from your ego... Last night I cut down the amount of people I follow. I do this about once a month, after adding people throughout the month. It's something I've always done, and interestingly, every time I do it - it's something that has always caused some grumpiness from a few of those who I stop following… … If I follow over 80, in particular when I get close to 100, I find it very hard to track my real life close friends - you know, the ones I know personally, go drinking with etc. So I chop back a bit…”

And a few recent news items…

A quick timeline: future Primary networks: Organisations: producers of stuff and networking
Networking:
Style: Closed
Value: Hidden
Conferences
Primary networks: Emergence of external networks Consultants with big org experience Consultants with no big org experience Social enterprises with open networks Communities/Crowdsourcing
Networking:
Style: Wide open
Value: Prominent
UnConferences
Past Present Future
Networking:
Style: …
Behaviour:…
Value: …
Technology:…
Primary networks: Rainforest effect: Open Innovation networks Organisations’ recognition Collaboration/competition Formal/informal Internal/external

And a glimpse into the future… http://www.amazon.co.uk/Enough-John-Naish/dp/0340935901/ http://www.wethinkthebook.net/home.aspx

Tools: Organisational recognition http://emekaeme.wordpress.com/2008/02/12/visions-of-km-2-another-draft-of-the-paper/

Tools: Engagement planning Berry, J, from work on The Open Innovation Exchange, 2007 http://www.innovationexchange.net/

Tools: Engagement planning (Wilcox, D, 2006) http://www.annfacil.com

Tools: Socio-technical mapping http://www.personalinfocloud.com/2008/01/the-elements-in.html http://www.nform.ca/publications/social-software-building-block

Organisations and ideas: quote “… Ideas do not live in the minds of individuals but through a constant circulation as gifts. In the century to come well being will come to depend less on what we own and consume and more on what we can share with others and create together, especially as consumption becomes increasingly constrained by environmental concerns that mean we have to live more within collectively binding limits…” http://www.charlesleadbeater.net/cms/xstandard/ChapterOne.pdf

A quick timeline: future Primary networks: Organisations: producers of stuff and networking
Networking:
Style: Closed
Value: Hidden
Conferences
Primary networks: Emergence of external networks Consultants with big org experience Consultants with no big org experience Social enterprises with open networks Communities/Crowdsourcing
Networking:
Style: Wide open
Value: Prominent
UnConferences
Past Present Future
Networking:
Style: Purposeful
Behaviour: more knowledge-y
Value: Even more important!
Technology: specific to us
Constructivist conferences
Primary networks: Rainforest effect: Open Innovation networks Organisations’ recognition Collaboration/competition Formal/informal Internal/external

Future
Design included at birth of networking systems
Systems designed to afford individual vs group balance
Socio-technical systems design to afford individuals’ preferences
Facilitation to understand personalities
Networking becomes more of a tool as part of a purpose
Community construct will return with networking as part of it
Different personalities will have different options to share/connect
Individuals understand more about Public/Private/Personal/Political
Individuals find their boundaries and life-networking balance
Organisations recognise and reward different behaviours
Organisations recognise different types of networks and outcomes
Knowledge networking will drive technical developments (e.g. twine)
Conferencing
From unconferences to constructivist conferences with a mix of more structured opportunities for different personalities to engage
Increasingly refined: personalities as well as knowledge requirements in advance, during and after

Thanks [email_address] 07974 737 254

Links
http://del.icio.us/edmittance/socialnetworks
http ://deli.icio.us/edmittance/socialnetworking
http://deli.icio.us/edmittance/facilitation
http://del.icio.us/edmittance/collaboration
http://del.icio.us/edmittance/engagement
http://www.myersbriggstypeindicator.co.uk/mbti_dichotomies.htm
http ://www.win.net/insightsys/ALPHABET.HTM
http ://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myers-Briggs_Type_Indicator
http://www.interweave-consulting.com/pictures/MBTI-Mousepad.gif
http://www.annfacil.com/
http://www.personalinfocloud.com/2008/01/the-elements-in.html
http://www.nform.ca/publications/social-software-building-block
http://www.innovationexchange.net/
http:// emekaeme.wordpress.com

Networking; past present and future; and the importance of personality

by Ed Mitchell

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