Incredible complexity. So many moving parts. Almost impossible to fully understand and depict. These are all descriptions of business ecosystems. Yet people continue to try to understand the big picture—their environment—and how it affects their companies. There’s good reason to do so. If companies can improve their understanding of their ecosystem, they have an edge that can help them find opportunities, assess potential threats, find collaborators, and monitor trends. In this post, we’ll look at a few different ways organizations depict and understand their business ecosystems.

The Corvallis Business Ecosystem

How do you get politicians, business owners, programmers, and staff members on the same page?

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Jazzed about doing your first network analysis? Hold your horses! It’s important to do no harm when conducting a network analysis. Make sure to read these important caveats before you begin.

Identify Your Goal

Determine what you want to learn as a result of conducting a network analysis. Do you want to identify influencers (critical connectors) in order to engage them in change initiatives? Do you want to understand how information flows through the organization? Do you want to create a plan to help new employees build their networks during the on-boarding process? The questions you choose will shape the results you receive, so be clear up front.

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When I was a kid, one of my favorite things to do was to hike with my parents. We would romp through forests, looking at interesting lizards and trees, finding animal tracks, and admiring the sounds of bird calls. We would arrive at our destination, usually the top of some peak. We’d get to look at the entire forest — the trails we followed, the lakes we missed, the cloud formations — and we’d feel awed and satisfied. We had been in that forest, but now we could see it from above.

Today, it’s time for us to spend a little less time looking at the animal tracks in our organizations and a little more time looking at the forest as a whole.

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Excerpt from “Finding Value”: an article just published by OD Practitioner.

Several years ago, I was hired by a software client to help with strategic planning. When the company started fifteen years ago, its product was revolutionary but its uniqueness was not a permanent state. Other companies were offering software that provided similar functions. The channel partner who sold the company’s software was now offering a competitive product. Furthermore, hardware companies were embedding the software’s features into devices like printers, scanners, and faxes. This company needed help figuring out how to move forward amidst these challenges.
Eight years later and 2000 miles away, a diverse group came together to improve the health of adolescents in Austin, TX.

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A fellow blogger, Charlotte Erdmann, recently wrote that the future of work will be more flexible and more networked. She’s right on.

What caught my eye in her article was the word “trust.” Charlotte mentioned it three times. No wonder: In a world in which information flows much more freely and people collaborate more frequently than in the past, trust is essential.

Unfortunately, trust is also elusive. Over the past several years, I’ve worked with a variety of clients on issues such as strategy, change, and leadership. It doesn’t matter what I’m overtly doing with the client. Trust always comes up.

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Several weeks ago, I fell into a network trap. I asked someone for her business card without getting to know her first. We were at a networking event so it wasn’t rude or unexpected. She gave the card to me although I could tell she wasn’t thrilled with me or my request.

People do this all the time. They exchange cards with acquaintances and then go back to the office and file them. Perhaps they add them to their emailing list and then they congratulate themselves: “Wow! I’m up to 1000 people on my email list. I’m hot stuff!”

The problem is that there is a big difference between developing genuine networks and advertising.

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People have been predicting boomer brain drain for years. In 2008, a SHRM / AARP study warned about the impending brain drain. Yet, companies haven’t been too worried, partially because the economy has made it impossible for people to leave.

It might be time for that relaxed attitude to change.

Recently, one of my clients was surprised to learn that 28% of their workforce would be eligible to walk out the door with full benefits within the next two years. That’s a lot of people and a lot of institutional knowledge. With the market in recovery, they decided it was time to act.

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“Small talk can get big results — but only if you know how to use it,” says Robin Madell on Glass Hammer. Unfortunately, too many of us don’t know how to use small talk. We shy away from networking meetings where we’ll need to use it and cringe as we ask someone about the weather. Yet, small talk has a very important purpose. Learn about that purpose in this article, which features Maya Townsend of Partnering Resources and Dr. Robin Bernstein of Harvard University.

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First things first: Project managers rock. You grease the wheels, pacify the resisters, solve impossible problems, and keep things going when everyone else wants to quit. You save our butts every day, and I thank you for it.

Here’s the thing, though. You’re shooting yourselves in the foot with the heroics. Yes, it’s fun to play Superman or Superwoman and fly in at the 11th hour to save the day. You get that adrenaline high, and you feel like the company couldn’t survive without you. Indeed, it can’t.

That is, of course, why it’s time to change.

There is simply too much at risk for companies to let so much depend on the project managers.

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CIOs are having a hard time finding good candidates for open positions. They’re not alone.

According to ManpowerGroup’s annual survey, 52 percent of employers in the US are struggling to fill mission-critical positions. The number of employers experiencing difficulties is at an all-time high, despite a high unemployment rate.

So, what should a CIO do? Keep searching as current employees become more frustrated because they’re overloaded trying to cover extra work? There’s another way.

Get the Kinks Out of the Acquisition Cycle

The first thing to do is to sharpen the acquisition process. Talent acquisition is a notoriously leaky process. Companies lose money through slow screening, ineffective matching, and incorrect selection processes.

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