Social Networking-Book Comment

The research on social networking illustrates the another effective way of the corporate management. Although, recognizing the social networking by informal mean has its cost, it definitely has managerial implications.

The book introduced four different types of people who have big role in the informal communications, and one of them was a bottleneck or unsung hero.
This type of manager who is not recognized by the organization but certainly has trusted by others was called "effective managers" in one of the management course that I took. Since, these type of managers are usually not recognized, the research can be really useful, giving them credits for their, otherwise invisible works, and further motivating them. Also, by rewarding effective managers, the company can build a norm to other employees that such a contribution is important for the company. Through these acts, the company can build more effective way of communication, and therefore, eliminate the redundancy between the sectors. Also by rewarding unnoticeable contributors, these managers can gain job satisfactions through rewarding system. This will lower the turnover rate and also the budget of the company.

However, as book states, connectivity has its cost. First of all, too much connectivity may produce too much politicking within the company. What so called effective managers were the unsung heroes because other employees could trust her/him without being noticed. However, if the informal mean of networking becomes the evaluation criteria, the view of these managers may change creating change in climate.

Finally, evaluating the informal communication within the organization can arise the privacy issue. Since, most of our communicating is done by the email, chatting, etc, evaluating the communication between employees can violate the privacy right. How far the company should monitor the employees need be discussed with in the organization and monitoring the informal network may take the privacy issue one step forward to the environment where employees can be monitored anytime from anywhere, since it is technically possible to do so on the internet.