Energy Networks: Using Social Network Analysis to Understand Human Energy in Organizations

Motivation

Research on social networks focuses on social structure: the patterns of roles and relationships in a group, community, or organization. Usually, the types of relationships studied are instrumental, such as task-related communication, money, and advice. Most work focuses on how certain network positions (such as centrality) confer informational advantages or political power.

We suggest that it is time to take a different perspective on network analysis. First, there is a pressing need to pay attention to, and be more creative with, the types of relationships we choose to map. Second, there is a general need to focus on affective aspects of relationships, instead of instrumental ties.

With these ideas in mind, we are currently engaged in research to better understand how “energy” is created, transferred, and destroyed in social networks, as well as its potential effects on outcome variables such as performance and satisfaction. We are taking a mixed method approach to this work, applying social network analytic techniques to assess network patterns and multivariate techniques to analyze the relationships between network variables and important outcome variables. In addition, we are incorporating in-depth, open-ended interviews with our network analysis to gain a richer understanding of the phenomenon.

An Example of a Social Network View of “Energy”

We recently assessed energy from a social network perspective within a major office of a global, blue chip consultancy. In this initiative, we mapped several different types of networks, including interactions that created the perception of energy. Our energy survey question was: “When you typically interact with this person how does it affect your energy level?” Respondents could indicate a value from 1 to 5, where 1 = Strongly De-Energizing and 5 = Strongly Energizing). Even simple descriptive statistics proved interesting. For example, a small number of people tend to account for a disproportionately large amount of energy of the group. Conversely, a small number of people contribute to a disproportionately large amount of the de-energizing relationships in the office.

Even more interesting was the relationship between energy and performance. In the survey of this office, we analyzed information flow in the office’s entire network (bounded network) as well as each person’s network (egocentric networks). In addition, we asked about people’s usage of impersonal information sources such as files, databases and other non-human material. Our general perspective was that those that tapped their informational environment more effectively would be better performers as evidenced by overall ratings from human resource records. While we did find that some traditional information processing variables related to individual performance, what was un-expected was the strong relationship between energy and performance. Standardized beta co-efficients revealed that energizing others turned out to be four times as important a predictor of performance as any other information processing variables.

A Qualitative View of “Energy”

What does it mean to be energized (or de-energized) in interactions with others? Intrigued by the link between energy and performance, we conducted 18 follow-up in-depth interviews with key members of this social network. We are early in the process of interpreting these results, but coding does suggest consistent interpretations of what it means to be energized in interaction with others. Further, there appears to be a fairly consistent pattern involving (1) the interaction, (2) the alter (or other person), (3) the relationship between ego and alter, and (4) the context within which the interaction occurs. We outline some of these dimensions in the following figure.