Understanding Your Workplace Network
Welcome to the Understanding Your Workplace Network exercise.
In this activity, you need to answer a few questions related to important relationships at work. As you prepare to answer each question, think about the people with whom you have close working relationships. Note that you may also include the names of individuals outside your organization.
To begin, please enter the following pieces of confidential information about yourself:
NOTE: All information entered in this activity is confidential and will not be shared with others. Data will be stored locally on the computer and browser that you are currently using and will NOT be accessible from another computer or browser. If this is not the primary computer/browser you will be using for this course, it is advised that you exit this activity now and restart this activity from your primary computer/browser.
You will be required to save the results of this exercise as a PDF. If you know that you are unable to “Print to PDF” please contact the ExecOnline Support Team at support@execonline.com. The iPad is known to have this inability prior to iOS 15 (released September 2021), so do not attempt to complete this exercise on an iPad if you have not updated to iOS 15 or later.
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1.
Task Advice
Over the last six months, were there any work-related contacts from whom you regularly sought information and advice to enhance your effectiveness on the job?
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2.
Buy-in
Suppose you were moving to a new job and wanted to leave behind the best networking advice for the person moving into your current job. Are there any individuals you would name to your replacement whose “buy-in” is essential for initiatives coming out of your office or department?
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Strategic Information
Think back over the last six months. Are there any individuals on whom you have relied as a source for general information about the “goings on” within your organization? Are there people who have given you special insight into the goals and strategies of important individuals, divisions, or perhaps even the firm as a whole?
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4.
Social Support
Over the last six months, is there anyone in your work environment whom you regard as a source of social support? Someone with whom you are comfortable discussing sensitive matters?
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5.
Mentor
Are there any individuals whom you regard as a mentor? Someone who has taken a strong interest in your professional development over the last six months by providing you with opportunities and/or access to facilitate your career advancement?
Now, please enter some additional information about each of the people in your listings.
For <Unique Name> :
Answer the following questions to the best of your ability/knowledge. It is fine to enter your best guess for questions where you are uncertain of the correct response. Click the Previous Person and Next Person buttons at the top of the panel to navigate to the information entry screen for each unique person you listed.
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Does this person know other people that you know?
Check the boxes of all the people this person knows, to the best of your knowledge. The criterion to use is: "If these two people passed on the street, would they recognize and greet each other?"
Here's a visual representation of the network information you have entered. This view may give you a new perspective on the characteristics of your network and relationships of its members.
For better viewing, you can click/hold/drag the cursor on the image to move it, or roll the scroll button on your mouse to zoom in/out.
My Network Summary
Based on the information you have provided, a variety of ‘network characteristics’ have been calculated. These figures shouldn’t necessarily be interpreted as “good” or “bad”, but rather as a set of new perspectives on your network. Review the 
icon next to each figure to learn more about its meaning and how it was calculated, then reflect on if a change in this area could increase your effectiveness as a leader.
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Network Size Index:
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Network "Multiplexity":
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Network Boundary-Spanning:
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Age Diversity:
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Gender Diversity:
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Prevalence of "Weak Ties":
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Global Reach/Diversity:
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Network Density:
As a final step, please reflect on the following two questions, enter your responses in the text fields given below and submit by clicking the Submit button.
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1.
Think of the key people whose buy-in will be critical for the success of the initiative you’ve chosen to focus on in this course. What kind of direct or indirect ties, if any, do you have to these individuals? How will you leverage those ties? How do you propose to manage the situation where you lack a tie to an important player?
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2.
Reflect more broadly on your network as revealed by the mappings and measures displayed on the previous screens. Drawing on materials and concepts from the class lectures, what insights can you draw about potential strengths and limitations of your existing network? Are there any “structural holes” that you bridge (or could bridge) within your organization? Are you capitalizing on the potential advantages associated with being a “bridger”? Are there any segments of the organization where you would benefits from formulating “weak ties”?
You have completed the Understanding Your Workplace Network exercise.
You must now save a summary report of your entries as a PDF document, which you'll later submit as an assignment attachment. PDF creation is accomplished via your computer's Print functionality.
Click the Print button and select the option to "Print to PDF" or "Save as PDF" instead of sending to an actual printer.
(NOTE: The Print button here may take a few seconds to activate.)
You should feel free to go to previous steps to adjust data for accuracy and completeness, if desired.
After you have saved your report as a PDF, you can click the Close Exercise button to close this browser window.
