Journal of Economic Geography 6 (2006) pp. 251–271 doi:10.1093/jeg/lbi014 Advance Access published on 4 October 2005 Bad company? The ambiguity of personal knowledge networks Gernot Grabher* and Oliver Ibert Abstract Recent debates on learning have shifted the analytical focus from formal organizational arrangements to informal personal ties. Personal knowledge networks, though, mostly are perceived as homogenous, cohesive, and local personal ties. Moreover, a functionalist tone seems to prevail in accounts in which personal knowledge networks are seen to compensate the shortcomings of the formal organization. This paper sets out to expand the dominant construal of networks, which is largely molded by the notion of embeddedness. Against the background of in-depth empirical analysis of the project ecologies of the Hamburg advertising and the Munich software business, the paper will first venture into the neglected sphere of thin, ephemeral, and global personal knowledge networks by differentiating between connectivity, sociality, and communality networks. Second, the paper not only elucidates the supportive functions of these ties but also explores the tensions between personal interests, project goals, and the firm’s aims that are induced by these personal knowledge networks. Keywords: networks, knowledge transfer, communities of practice, project ecologies, software, advertising JEL classifications: D85, Z13, D83, L82, L86 Date submitted: 17 Feburary 2005 Date accepted: 8 September 2005 1. Networks in economic geography: the implicit assumptions Networking has become a key imperative of contemporary capitalism. The Rolodex has turned into a critical asset, the ‘know-whom’ it seems indeed is valued almost as much as the ‘know how’ (Gann and Salter, 2000). Along similar lines, the social capital embodied in trust-full ties is celebrated as a key source of collective prosperity (Putnam, 2000). In general, a ‘spirit of optimism has been linked to discussions of economic networks. They have been viewed as innovative, adaptive, resilient, open, and regenerative economic forms and [...] often seem to be connected with a sense of fairness or economic democracy’ (Leitner et al., 2002, pp. 278–9). Moreover, rather than merely as a transitory phenomenon, networks have come to be seen as defining a new area of capitalist development (see Castells, 1996). In conceptual terms, this emphasis on economic networks drew the attention to social relations that appeared to operate between neo-classical notions of individual firms on the one hand, and Marxist class, amalgamated capital, and ‘structural’ analysis, on the * Socio-Economics of Space, Meckenheimer Allee 166, University of Bonn, Germany. email <grabher@giub.uni-bonn.de> # The Author (2005). Published by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org