At higher risk of having good ideas

by Patti Anklam

August 24, 2009 at 2:59 pm · Filed under KM, Web 2.0, innovation, social networks

There has been something lately that the more channels we have for information flow (Twitter, Facebook, blogs, etc.) the more we might really be isolating ourselves within a social network of people who are using the same tools that we use, reading the same blogs, and following the same Tweeters all the while we think that the volume of information equates to diversity of information.

Two articles crept to my attention in the first week of August:

Serendipity, Lost in the Digital Deluge (Damon Darlin in the New York Times)
Cosy social networks ‘are stifling innovation’ (New Scientist, Technology News Section) A better discussion is in the posts Too Much Networking? by J.C. Cavalcanti; and the original article ($$) is linked below.

The first article suggests that we are losing the ability to learn new things serendipitously as our social networks tend to grow along the lines of people who are like us and we rely on these networks for links to new ideas. (I am reminded of a conversation on Chris Matthew’s program weekend August 22-23 about reading newspapers. The thing about reading a newspaper is that you never know what you might find when you turn the page.)

The second article newsbit points to a Science Magazine article by Viktor Mayer-Schönberger of the Kennedy School, “Can We Reinvent the Internet?” Mayer-Schönberger addresses the issue primarily from the viewpoint of the open software movement that is currently driving changes to the Internet. He posits that this community is so connected that fresh ideas are assimilated so quickly they do not have time to develop. Cavalcanti quotes the article:

“An overabundance of connections over which information can travel too cheaply can reduce diversity, foster groupthink, and keep radical ideas from taking hold.”

I’ve long been talking about the importance of diversity in networks in my workshops and training, in both contexts of organizational networks and personal networks.

The most compelling research examples in the importance of diversity in networks comes from Ronald Burt, whose books Structural Holes and Brokerage and Closure look at the structure of networks and the positions of individuals in the network. A structural hole represents a person or group who enjoys a singular position between two or more other groups. This person can have competitive advantage by being able to broker information between the two groups. (For a nice explanation of these concepts, see “Where to Get a Good Idea: Steal it Outside Your Group”, NYT article by Michael Erard.)

The point is very simple when you think about it (and this is how I explain it, as simply as possible). If you have a “closed” network, where everyone pretty much knows or knows about each other. A good aspect of this connectivity is that the network can serve as a filter — multiple tweets or retweets about a topic link usually means it’s worth following — and its possible to generate a common language. However, it’s not likely that the richest source of creativity — two unlikely ideas coming together — will occur. You need (or the organization needs) to have connections outside the group. As Burt puts it (using one of my favorite phrases ever, the title of this blog), “People who live in the intersection of social worlds ‘are at higher risk of having good ideas.”

You may not need to steal the ideas, but to take a close look at your networks. Your professional networks may be more closed than you would like, but it’s possible that your many social networks — clubs, hobbies, sports — may put you at risk of meeting people from other fields, with other types of knowledge.

This is equally true and important in organizational networks. The structural holes need to think like brokers and move information around selflessly and intentionally. There need to be weavers (or more appropriately, “mixers”) who provide opportunities for groups to meet and hear what each other is thinking or doing. And there needs to be a good outside listener who can find speakers and experts from outside the domain of the organization’s knowledge, bring them in, and let people find connections and generate new ideas as they will.

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Patty: Thanks for this ‘canary’. I’ve wondered about the same in the back of my mind, but as you noted there’s a critical caveat: having a breadth of input and variety.

That said, there’s also a need to focus in ways we’ve never been able to focus before. Finding people who think like us allow us to delve deeper into things we can’t work out on our own. Read a book you like? You can readily strike up a conversation with the author (well, depending on the author : )

And in the end, it’s sad when people can’t agree to disagree. It’s only in the differences that we can push the edges of our learning/understanding.

Patti –
The risk of a closed network leading to recursion networks is real and common, but, as you suggest, can be obviated by including a few restless types in one’s network. Personally, for example, I can recall your mention of a new bookstore, called Amazon.com, in 1995 or 1996 and, a few years later, a new search engine, Google, was getting much better than our then-favorite, AltaVista.
Not only does it require restless types in our network, but also we need to have a willingness to have our good plans disrupted by something new and better. Call it creative destruction or somesuch, it’s a reminder that good new ideas change us, often profoundly, but that change requires our active participation.
I’ve had several conversations of late with people in the print publishing business. These folks worry, with cause, how electronic archives will be preserved for historians. The rapid cycling of new and generally incompatible formats scares the yogurt out of them. Preservation, I remind them, is an active process, irrespective of the medium. Just as we need to copy forward the contents of old media, we also need to make sure that paper is properly preserved. I’ve scanned a lot of old and fading photographs, 35mm slides, and my first-grade drawings because the old media are decaying.
So, we need to be able to incorporate change into our lives not only to make things better, but also, in many ways, to ensure that our traditional values, ideas, and knowledge stores can be preserved.

[...] At higher risk of having good ideas If you have a “closed” network, where everyone pretty much knows or knows about each other. A good aspect of this connectivity is that the network can serve as a filter — multiple tweets or retweets about a topic link usually means it’s worth following — and its possible to generate a common language. However, it’s not likely that the richest source of creativity — two unlikely ideas coming together — will occur. You need (or the organization needs) to have connections outside the group. As Burt puts it (using one of my favorite phrases ever, the title of this blog), “People who live in the intersection of social worlds ‘are at higher risk of having good ideas. via theappgap.com [...]

RT @theappgap New Post “At higher risk of having good ideas” http://bit.ly/3BDCeZ

RT @BillIves: At higher risk of having good ideas good read from @panklam http://bit.ly/ClpVH

At higher risk of having good ideas good read from @panklam http://bit.ly/ClpVH Via @juneholley @BillIves Structural Holes & Serendipidty

Cosy social networks ‘are stifling innovation’ ? http://bit.ly/ClpVH via @sagenet

@panklam Nice article on ideas: http://bit.ly/KXAQW Guess who brokered the ties [closed the triangles] in NYT article you reference?

On how closed networks stifle innovation. [At higher risk of having good ideas]
http://bit.ly/Gkwua

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