Call: "Organizational Networks Effectiveness"

Please consider submitting a paper abstract to the session on Organizational Network Effectiveness at the INSNA Sunbelt Conference 2022, to be held 12-16 July in Cairns, Australia in hybrid format (https://www.sunbelt2022.org/).

Effectiveness of a whole network can be defined as the attainment of positive network-level outcomes that could not normally be achieved by individual participants acting independently. Relatively few scholars have attended to how organizational networks as a whole, consisting of numerous interdependent agents within the bounds of an organization, can be actively managed to reach collective goals. Thus we lack a thorough understanding of how organizations can purposefully create network structures to achieve desired outcomes. Outcomes of interest at the whole-network level are various, including (but not limited to) resilience (e.g. the network is not easily disrupted or can adapt to rapid change and external shocks); performance; efficiency; and the satisfaction of organization members’ needs. Advancing research on organizational network effectiveness at the whole-network level is of value to scholars and practitioners concerned with understanding and managing complex modern organizations. This session will bring together research papers that contribute to our understanding of how organizations can form effective networks to achieve collective goals and promote collective outcomes. Papers may touch upon such questions as:

• What does network effectiveness mean at the whole-network level? What kinds of outcomes are we interested in?
• What are the trade-offs between personal network effectiveness and whole-network effectiveness? How might we manage these trade-offs?
• Does effectiveness imply optimal network configurations that are widely applicable? What about equifinality? What about conflicting goals?
• How can we account for formal organizational structure in theories of informal network effectiveness?
• Can managers design and implement effective networks? What controls do managers have available to change the shapes of the networks they are responsible for?
• What opportunities do new types of data, new social network analysis methods and new data collection methodologies present for testing theories of network effectiveness?

Proposals (title, up to 200 words abstract, keywords, and author details) must be submitted by February 6  via the Sunbelt website https://www.sunbelt2022.org/abstracts