Network Advantage

How can you choose your partners well? How can you balance your network so as to capitalize on it fully? Business success today increasingly requires alliance strategies. But identifying whom to approach isn’t always easy—particularly since the value provided by a network extends far beyond each partner’s contribution. It also resides in the relationship among the various partners, including with the members of their respective partner networks.

The authors of Network Advantage encourage leaders to consider three levels in building their network. Level 1: direct relationships with each partner considered individually. Level 2: relationships maintained between the partners themselves; this level makes it possible to see whether the company is at the core of an integrated network or of a hub-and-spoke network, with major implications for the types of contribution to the company’s innovation capacity in particular. Level 3 assesses how the company can rely on the status of its various partners to reinforce its own reputation. The chapters present not only the theory, but also practical methods to visualize networks, as well as the type of analyses one can use to evaluate them more effectively.

A very pragmatic book, sometimes rather technical, but still accessible.