1 Connecting People: How to Foster and Harness Your Organisation’s Connectors 1 Stewart Forsyth and Shawn Callahan While passers-by see the granite and glass of high-rise buildings, well-connected people think of the organisations within as collections of interesting people they want to meet. Mention a business and these ‘connectors’ will spill out the names of key informants and decision-makers. Connectors know lots of people. One of us worked once with a business developer who, no matter what south- east Asian city he was in, always had names and contact details of locals in his PDA. According to legend, he was once arrested and thrown into a cell for not having the appropriate visa, but he was out within hours—he wangled a call to a mate who had the right connections. Connectors have the happy knack of getting things done, often making it look so easy in the process. Connectors such as these are the human circuit-makers through which ideas, opportunities and resources flow. They ensure that the products proposed by R&D teams can be made economically and will sell. They help their organisation to spot competitor activity and environmental shifts that present threats and opportunities to be managed. They pick up even a weak signal. In our view, the informal connections made by your people are more important than the formal channels in getting the job done. The benefits to your business are increased responsiveness and adaptability. Our emphasis is not only on how these people work. We want to help you mobilise their capabilities, and so your organisation’s capability. Specifically, how do you identify and develop people with connector potential? Looking at the level of team performance, there is good evidence 1 that teams with effective connectors are more productive. Just schmoozing and collecting information is not where it’s at. In fact broad environmental scanning can be counter-productive. Two purposeful sorts of connecting make a difference— promoting the team and securing resources, and reinforcing linkages with other groups in the work flow. It is just impossible for the team to know everything, so it is critical that they can find the person who has the requisite knowledge or skills. Assuming that you want to build the effectiveness of your up-and-coming connectors, to keep your teams and your business plugged into break-through thinking and emerging opportunities, what would you look for? The behaviours of those who manage to develop networks across and beyond the organisation seem to include 2 : 1 Originally published in The Business, 15 May 2006