One of the most insightful practitioners of social/organizational network analysis is Valdis Krebs, who has until now been blogging exclusively on Network Weaving, with June Holley and Jack Ricchiuto. On Sunday, Valdis announced that he is moving his posts that relate to concepts and thinking about “economies, organizations, communities and groups” to a new blog, TNT – The Network Thinker. This promises to be one of my “must reads” on my Bloglines feed.

As an added bonus, Valdis moved to this blog his posts on Network Weaving over to TNT. So the new blog has a lot of good tidbits, posts I had seen originally but that always bear a re-read. One was his posted reference to an article and podcast by Herminia Ibarra, professor of organizational behavior at INSEAD. The article is a rich and succinct summary of the importance of networking for successful managers.

Ibarra summarizes three distinct types of networks:

• Organizational. This is the set of people we rely on to get work done. Most managers who attend courses at INSEAD have accomplised organizational networks.
• Personal. This is the set of people who are “discretionary” contacts, people that make our networks diverse and let us extend ourselves into new areas of learning and social activity. Personal networking is often “an afterthought” for busy managers.
• Strategic. These networks are the toughest to build and maintain but the most important for managers who what to be business leaders. The people in this network are peers and senior managers outside your company and beyond your industry who can help you learn new approaches in management, keep tabs on new developments, and see the bigger picture.

The article is extracted from a podcast that is definitely worth downloading and listening to (more than once).