In this blog, first I will define social networks and communities of practice separately then I will describe how they are different from each other and then I will give an example from my organization to prove my theory on them.
Social Networks:
Social Networks:
Social Networks has great significance in knowledge management and plays an important role in sharing the knowledge [1]. The word social stands for society (human, people) and it is the association of people with each other [3] and word networks mean connecting one or more then one things together to share the characteristics of interconnected things.
The word “Network” means one source of interconnecting but when we use “Networks” it means different sources or ways of interconnecting something.
So my definition of Social Networks will be “interconnecting people (from one or different societies) by different ways to share their knowledge, ideas or interests (regardless of common or uncommon interests) calls social networks.”
According to my definition of social networks it’s not necessary that the people should be from the same society, they may belong to different societies. For example in my organization (hotel) people come to stay in there from all over the world (they belongs to different societies as their geographical location is different) and in the evening most of them get together in the bar and share their ideas or interests.
There are always more then one ways to do something similarly there is more than one source to interconnect people for example internet, intranet, telephone, getting together face to face etc.
It’s also not necessary for people to have common interests in social network they may have different interests.
Social network diagram
A: Society1; B: Society2; C: Society3; D: Society4
In social network diagram, the individuals with A representing Society1 so we can see that there are three individuals from the same society who are interconnected with each other and at the same time an individual from Society1 also interconnected with an individual from Society3.
In social networks people interact with other from the same society who have the same interests and also with those who do not have the common interests or anything common in them.
Communities of Practice:
According to the World Wide Web the definition of community is “A group of people having common interests: the scientific community; the international business community.”[2]
The meaning of practice is to do something on continuous basis to achieve something.
My definition will be “A group of people who practice their common interests to share their knowledge or experiences to achieve their common goal calls communities of practice.”
In an organisation employees form formal or informal networks of relationship based on work requirements and personal interactions etc, which helps them to carry out their daily task quickly and more effectively.
These networks can be formal or informal. There may be a scenario where an organisation asks their employees from a certain department to get together on regular basis to share their ideas to enhance to quality of their work which is a form of formal network. This type of formal networks dependent on the management of an organisation that how do they enforce their employees to get together.
The other form of network is informal which is very common in organisations. In this type of network, employees get together (without management enforcement) from same field, department, interests and personal attractions etc. to achieve a common goal.
Employees can be from different departments in informal networks but they always have something common in them which bring them together.
For example, in my organisation (hotel) we have a formal and informal community of practice. Our management arrange a meeting once in every month in which all of the employees get together from different departments (house keeping, front desk & restaurant) to share their ideas, this meeting is form of a formal network.
Hotel employees also get together informally to share their knowledge in-between them. For example, restaurant people have nothing to do with front desk people but in a case if some of the guest makes any trouble in the restaurant, the restaurant staff comes to front desk if they think they have something common with that particular person who is present at reception by that time and share their problem about that particular guest. This kind of informal interactions in between two employees from different departments helps a lot to prevent any problem occurring at front desk.
Example:
The word “Network” means one source of interconnecting but when we use “Networks” it means different sources or ways of interconnecting something.
So my definition of Social Networks will be “interconnecting people (from one or different societies) by different ways to share their knowledge, ideas or interests (regardless of common or uncommon interests) calls social networks.”
According to my definition of social networks it’s not necessary that the people should be from the same society, they may belong to different societies. For example in my organization (hotel) people come to stay in there from all over the world (they belongs to different societies as their geographical location is different) and in the evening most of them get together in the bar and share their ideas or interests.
There are always more then one ways to do something similarly there is more than one source to interconnect people for example internet, intranet, telephone, getting together face to face etc.
It’s also not necessary for people to have common interests in social network they may have different interests.
Social network diagram
A: Society1; B: Society2; C: Society3; D: Society4
In social network diagram, the individuals with A representing Society1 so we can see that there are three individuals from the same society who are interconnected with each other and at the same time an individual from Society1 also interconnected with an individual from Society3.
In social networks people interact with other from the same society who have the same interests and also with those who do not have the common interests or anything common in them.
Communities of Practice:
According to the World Wide Web the definition of community is “A group of people having common interests: the scientific community; the international business community.”[2]
The meaning of practice is to do something on continuous basis to achieve something.
My definition will be “A group of people who practice their common interests to share their knowledge or experiences to achieve their common goal calls communities of practice.”
In an organisation employees form formal or informal networks of relationship based on work requirements and personal interactions etc, which helps them to carry out their daily task quickly and more effectively.
These networks can be formal or informal. There may be a scenario where an organisation asks their employees from a certain department to get together on regular basis to share their ideas to enhance to quality of their work which is a form of formal network. This type of formal networks dependent on the management of an organisation that how do they enforce their employees to get together.
The other form of network is informal which is very common in organisations. In this type of network, employees get together (without management enforcement) from same field, department, interests and personal attractions etc. to achieve a common goal.
Employees can be from different departments in informal networks but they always have something common in them which bring them together.
For example, in my organisation (hotel) we have a formal and informal community of practice. Our management arrange a meeting once in every month in which all of the employees get together from different departments (house keeping, front desk & restaurant) to share their ideas, this meeting is form of a formal network.
Hotel employees also get together informally to share their knowledge in-between them. For example, restaurant people have nothing to do with front desk people but in a case if some of the guest makes any trouble in the restaurant, the restaurant staff comes to front desk if they think they have something common with that particular person who is present at reception by that time and share their problem about that particular guest. This kind of informal interactions in between two employees from different departments helps a lot to prevent any problem occurring at front desk.
Example:
Following diagram is an example of communities of practice in a hotel type industry. There are different departments in my hotel and each department has a community of practice in which employees share their ideas and common problems to improve business. Employees in a department interact with each other to improve the services and they also interact with employees who are in other departments to share the over all knowledge about hotel.
In hotel type organisation there are different communities of practices in which employees interact with in their own department community of practice and also across the department community.
Communities of practice diagram (Hotel industry)
Social Network Vs Communities of Practice:
From the above definitions of social networks and communities of practices it’s clear that both involve the human interaction but this interaction is differ in both of them.
The term social network use in broader concept where people interact with each other with out having a common task or goal and there is no limitation of no. of people getting involved in this kind of knowledge network.
This is an IT era where technology boosted over the couple of years time period and the term social network is becoming popular day by day (face book, orkut, hi5 etc) with the use of IT as people coming across from all over the world onto these networks.
On the other hand the communities of practice works in kind of a bound environment where only those people get together who have something in common in them and the no. of people is also limited to a certain extent. Usually employees in an organisation develop this kind of environment to facilitate themselves and the size depends on how big the organisation is and how many employees participating in that practice.
Communities of practices can be very tight (employees from one organisation can interact with each other and no one is allowed from outside) and weak as well (in this type of practice people from other organisations who have something common in them are also allowed to participate).
Example:
In my organisation we have a forum which is on intranet where we discuss our work related problems and also share our ideas about a daily life routine.
It’s been advised to all the employees to seek a help from that forum in case of any work related problem if someone is not available near to you. For that purpose we have to make a new forum name with the problem we are facing and then employees from other branches who have an experience leave their answer which is an example of communities of practices.
The main forum on intranet is open to all of the employees to discuss anything so employees go to the forum in their free times (especially night staff) and find any interesting topic and starts discussing about it. For example one night I logged into the forum and there was about more then 50 topics and some of them seemed to me very interested so I participated in there which is kind of a Social network.
Though the forum is not open to everyone apart from the hotel employees but they can discuss anything social in there.
In my conclusion I would say the social networks terms is used in a much broader and open environment where people from any back ground are welcomed and some time people develop a community of practice inside the social networks and communities of practices is usually operates on a small level which usually works inside the boundaries of an organisation.
References:
In hotel type organisation there are different communities of practices in which employees interact with in their own department community of practice and also across the department community.
Communities of practice diagram (Hotel industry)
Social Network Vs Communities of Practice:
From the above definitions of social networks and communities of practices it’s clear that both involve the human interaction but this interaction is differ in both of them.
The term social network use in broader concept where people interact with each other with out having a common task or goal and there is no limitation of no. of people getting involved in this kind of knowledge network.
This is an IT era where technology boosted over the couple of years time period and the term social network is becoming popular day by day (face book, orkut, hi5 etc) with the use of IT as people coming across from all over the world onto these networks.
On the other hand the communities of practice works in kind of a bound environment where only those people get together who have something in common in them and the no. of people is also limited to a certain extent. Usually employees in an organisation develop this kind of environment to facilitate themselves and the size depends on how big the organisation is and how many employees participating in that practice.
Communities of practices can be very tight (employees from one organisation can interact with each other and no one is allowed from outside) and weak as well (in this type of practice people from other organisations who have something common in them are also allowed to participate).
Example:
In my organisation we have a forum which is on intranet where we discuss our work related problems and also share our ideas about a daily life routine.
It’s been advised to all the employees to seek a help from that forum in case of any work related problem if someone is not available near to you. For that purpose we have to make a new forum name with the problem we are facing and then employees from other branches who have an experience leave their answer which is an example of communities of practices.
The main forum on intranet is open to all of the employees to discuss anything so employees go to the forum in their free times (especially night staff) and find any interesting topic and starts discussing about it. For example one night I logged into the forum and there was about more then 50 topics and some of them seemed to me very interested so I participated in there which is kind of a Social network.
Though the forum is not open to everyone apart from the hotel employees but they can discuss anything social in there.
In my conclusion I would say the social networks terms is used in a much broader and open environment where people from any back ground are welcomed and some time people develop a community of practice inside the social networks and communities of practices is usually operates on a small level which usually works inside the boundaries of an organisation.
References:
[1] Rob Cross, Andrew Parker, Laurence Prusak, Stephen P. Borgatti, November 2001, Knowing What We Know: Supporting Knowledge Creation and Sharing in Social Networks, Retrieved March 01, 2008 from http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=MImg&_imagekey=B6W6S-451DFP2-2-K&_cdi=6606&_user=6703465&_orig=search&_coverDate=11%2F30%2F2001&_sk=999699997&view=c&wchp=dGLbVlb-zSkzk&md5=c0d7ee0e70b8a6768c5d653d7b5c3558&ie=/sdarticle.pdf
[2] Online Dictionary: Die.net, Retrieved March 01, 2008 from http://dictionary.die.net/society
[3] Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://www.answers.com/community?cat=technology
Bibliography:
1. Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://www.tfriend.com/cop-lit.htm
2. Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://www.answers.com/
3. Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://www.anecdote.com.au/archives/2006/07/the_difference.html
4. Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_network
5. Retrieved February 25, 2008, from http://www.elearningpost.com/articles/archives/communities_of_practice_at_the_core/
2 comments:
The reasoning behind your definitions are useful to see, but the meaning of a bit of jargon is often more than sum of its parts. 'Social networking' and 'Communities of Practice' each mean more than what you get if you put the words together. Your explanation of the first is fine, although the membership of a society by individuals in a social network is probably irrelevant to the principles of how a social network works (or doesn't). The essence of the idea is that from conversations and connections in a network of human beings, interesting stuff happens. It does not have to be engineered to happen; it just happens because of the way people interact.
A 'community of practice' is not really about a community putting things into practice together, but about people who do things coming together in a social network to share how their practices in doingig whatever they do.
Because of my position on the differences (and overlaps) I don't agree with the idea of an "informal" community of practice. You describe these in your organisation, but I see matters differently. I see informally arranged (e.g. spontaneous) social networking, for example, a party after a successully hosted event in a hotel. The conversations and connections between people after such a party can form a social network, which will decline as memory of the party fades. I can imagine formally arranged social networking, in which the employers organise a sports club that members of the organisation can join. The social network formed around the club will allow all kinds of conversations to take place and their nature will vary a lot over time because different people interested in the sport will join in from different part of the organisation; their common interests will be wholly unpredictable, and so the tacit knowledge they have and may be able to share will be unpredictable too.
A community of practice is made up from people who share some skills and knowledge that is of use to one or more organisation. The members of a community of practice join (or are maybe selected to join) only if they have shared skills and knowledge. Their conversations may serve their own organisation's knowledge needs or may help another organisation. For example a CoP of corposrate IT managers may include all those with skills in the area withing your hotel organisation, but it could be set up by competing hotel groups so they all can make use of the knowledge shared by that CoP. Or, it may include IT managers from hospitals (because the knowledge and skills are shared to some extent). I see such CoPs as being formally consitututed, mostly by their members, but possibly by one or more organisations.
One difference between a social network and a CoP is that the former is not purposeful, it is not organisational goal-oriented. A CoP has the development of knowledge in its area of expertise as its goal. To that extent it is purposeful.
The points you make about the way IT is now involved in social networks are valid. The forum you describe may be supporting a social network because it is not wholly purposeful. However, if an IT-based forum has a definite purpose, and if departments equate to CoPs within an organisation (there's a discussion to be had about that idea too) then maybe the forum cannot be seen as a tool for supporting social networks. The debate will continue...
Hi there,
I'm joining this conversation as it is one of my favourite topic, academically (when doing my PhD) and professionally (at Headshift).
Communities of practice is a new name for an old reality in organisations. Before systematic and scientific management gained momentum, most organisations where organic, ie organised by professions. Carpenters, Masons, etc... in a construction company. Communities are based on a purpose and are authoritarian. The authority is based in an old-fashion way: not the hierarchy but the expertise.
What we see with the emergence of CoP is the re-emergence of this form of socialisation in the workplace. This combines with the mechanistic model set by systematic management gurus (Taylor, Fayol, Sloan and many more) and gives birth to a mixed / matrix model where communities are confused with practices.
Now for the networks. They are here to help make things work. The silos organisations have built over the years cannot encompass the reality of the operational work. One needs the support of some colleagues to achieve its own work and sometimes these persons are beyond the mapped co-ordination processes. So far, we had no tools to correctly and systematically representat real-life interactions in complex organisations (in and out). A reason why we have organisation charts (that incidentally only represent authority related interactions).
Social Networks Analysis help us now to do so. But if we go down that road, I am pretty sure social networks will not match CoPs.
What we really need there are actually tools that maps social interactions on the go. We need to embed SNA withing daily work. Otherwise, SNA will be costly and not used (therefore even more costly). A lesson we have learned with Knowledge Management ten years ago.
One solution may be to use personal pages and social net to build intranets. In a knowledge economy, information is vital. Agregation of information, such as personal pages, helps monitor personal sources of info (keywords, blogs and other media and ... people). It seems like Personall follows this path.
No matter how you call it, you have to materialise it to manage it. Social Networks, Communities, whatever ... the name is not so important. What is important is our ability to monitor this to make it work better and have happier employees and more profitable corps.
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