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Networks and Six Degrees of Separation

20-09-2009

A popular net-based game challenges participants to connect various entertainers to the actor Kevin Bacon in the fewest steps possible. It turns out that this is usually possible within a few steps.

Harvard researchers in mathematics took this notion further as described in an SBS program in November 2008. These researchers sent some 12 letters to random individuals in widely spread parts of the globe. The letter asked the recipients to send the letter to someone they knew who might be in some way connected to the researchers. Most of the letters returned in a matter of weeks.

These two stories suggest the existence of powerful connections, although often seemingly indirect, between various parts of humanity. This is the so-called “six degrees of separation”. If person A knows 100 people and each of them knows 100 people, it is only 5 steps until the number of 10 billion is arrived at.

Polish research into the nature of networks, specifically the Internet, revealed that when networks developed randomly (without design), they do not in fact function randomly (all sites with the same number of connections). A large majority of sites have only a small number of connections, but there is a minority with huge numbers of connections. It is this well-connected minority, which often acts as the rapid conduit in these six degrees of separation situations.

Reflection upon our own personal networks reveals that this condition comes up again. We all have very widely connected friends and a range of others all the way to the isolated loner.

If we examine business entities, the equivalent of these well-connected individuals would be somewhere in “middle management”. These individuals have direct connections to those at the coalface and often spend time during their working week in direct connection with them and with the customer. This would apply equally to government bureaucracies. These individuals are also connected “upwards” and are usually privy to “big picture” strategy and company or departmental goals and priorities.

If there were a determined policy to encourage innovation and initiative, would these people not be the ideal agents of change?

People in middle management positions are usually on the way forwards in their careers. If the priorities in business and government were to change to better adapt to change, middle managers would be ideally placed to lead. They were after all “on the ground floor” when new policies and practices were initiated.

Careful appraisal of future leaders should, I believe, include their ability to lead cultural change. These people should be targeted for specific training in this area as something of the highest priority.

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