Resolving an Attrition Crisis with Enterprise SNA: A Case Study

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Enterprise Social Network Analysis – A Case Study

Karthikeyan IyerFounder Director, Co-

Crafter,Crafitti Consulting

[email protected]

+91-9740533255

mailto:[email protected]

mailto:[email protected]

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Context

• Predominantly, HR processes have been focused on the individual as the key unit.

• However, increasingly the network (teams) aspects of innovation are playing a critical role in new-age organizations that display learning, collaborative or emergent behavior.

• Organizations are using a lot of tools to facilitate this process – for instance knowledge management systems, collaboration portals and suites etc.

• But these are more focused on artifacts and not so much on how people connect and interact with each other.

• This is an exciting area for HR to play a role in innovation.

April 8, 2023 2© Crafitti Consulting Private Limited

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Crafitti’s Research

• A major area of Crafitti’s research is Enterprise Social Networks and their impact on business. These are formal and informal networks within an enterprise and they are dynamically formed, sustained and destroyed.

• People connect with each other at multiple levels and for multiple purposes. People also connect with others outside their enterprise.

• They act as mavens, connectors or salesmen (Tipping Point Model).

• Concepts like centrality and structural holes (from Social Network Analysis) can be used in organization design.

• The concept of “Wisdom of Crowds” also comes into play (e.g. how promising projects at Google bubble up to the surface).


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The context in which the Enterprise Social Network Survey was conducted

• One of our customers, an SME in the software services space, had been recently acquired.

• With a deepening recession, the company was facing multiple challenges in the post-acquisition context

• Crafitti was engaged to facilitate a post-acquisition strategy for the company

• One of the most difficult challenges was on the employee side – getting leaner by reducing the team size but at the same time control the downward spiral of employee motivation, confidence and morale.

• A first phase of team reduction had not gone well with the employees. Attrition had risen to alarming levels.


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Network Effects in an Enterprise Social Network context

• Multiple types, levels and strengths of relationships between employees– Role based (team leader-team member, peer-peer)– Propinquity (in the same team, same location)– Homophily (similar academic background, shared industry experience)– Relationship (friendship, marital)

• Key influencers or opinion leaders– Employees who are most-approached, based on formal role definitions or based

on perceived value– Employees who are well connected to other employees in the network– Employees who are frequent or strong communicators – impacting the spread of

information in the network


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Three types of people create Idea Tipping Points

Connectors are those with wide social circles. Mavens are knowledgeable people. Salesmen are charismatic people with powerful negotiation skills. They exert "soft" influence rather than forceful power.

The PROCESS of TIPPING POINTS

The Law of the Few: Find out Connectors, Mavens and Salesmen – a few of these is what one idea needs to become an epidemic

Stickiness: Ideas or products found attractive or interesting by others will grow exponentially for some time.

The Power of Context: Human behavior is strongly influenced by external variables of context.


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Competent Jerks and Lovable Fools

Competent Jerks Lovable Star

Incompetent Jerk Lovable Fool

Increasing competence

Increasing LikabilitySource: Casciaro & Lobo, HBR


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Net Promoter Score


Promoter 9-10Passively Satisfied

7-8

Detractor 0-6

How Likely is it that you would

recommend [brand or company X] to a friend or colleague?

Not at all likely Extremely LikelyNeutral

0 105

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The Questionnaire


Who in your work network do you interact with most often?

•Collaboration on regular work activities•Mentorship/ advice•Brainstorming/ Developing an idea•Solving a work problem•Resolving a crisis•To connect you to the right people to get something done•To champion a cause or sell something to customers, top management or to other peer groups

Who in your network do you like/ prefer to work with?

Who are the people with whom you have been frequently communicating?

•Over email , phone, social networks like Facebook, Linkedin etc., Physical interactions (while traveling, during break times, informal meetings after work etc.)

How often do you mention or talk about your company in your networks (formal/ informal/ work/ personal)?

•Very often, Often, Sometimes, Rarely, Never

How likely is it that you would recommend your company to a friend or colleague?

•Choose a number on the scale 0 – 10, where 0 means “not at all likely”, 5 means “neutral” and 10 means “extremely likely”.

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The Network


The survey was answered by close to 80% of the total employee strength. Based on the inputs, the following employee social network emerged

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What the symbols mean


More than 10 years in the company



Less than 10 years in the company

Promoter Passively satisfied Detractor

SHAPE

COLOR

SIZEFrequency of communication about companyNODE

SIZE

LABEL SIZE

In-degree – Number of people reaching a person for work related value

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The Network


Geographic clusters

Testing team

Project cluster

Connectors

Maven

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Some surprises from the analysis of the Enterprise Social Network


Many of the key opinion leaders were net detractors, leading to accelerated decline in the team morale

Some of the youngest employees were net promoters but were invisible to the leadership

Many of the perceived key opinion leaders (role based) were actually not key opinion leaders (as per the network)!

To generate a tipping point for positive employee morale, net detractors had to be first converted to net promoters.

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Emergent Action

• Based on the enterprise social network analysis, the following HR retention and morale improvement action plan was implemented:– Young promoters were given additional responsibilities as cross-functional

connectors between teams– Concerns of key opinion leaders were understood in detailed one-on-one

meetings. Action plans were created to address these concerns. – Interestingly, one of the top recurring concerns of employees was the fact that the

ground realities (as thrown up by the network analysis) of power and importance vested in a person by the network were not being reflected in the hierarchical role definition. Correspondingly, role definitions were reworked.

– Senior promoters were counseled to accept greater network responsibility as mavens, connectors or salesmen.

– The analysis also helped in clearly identifying the employees that need to retained.


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Results

• Prior to this intervention, the company was receiving 10 resignation letters on an average every week! For an organization with just 150 employees this was disastrous, putting immense pressure on recruitment cycles, project delivery and most importantly team morale.– Post intervention based on employee social network analysis, the

attrition was immediately stemmed.

• Earlier, the company was letting go of employees who had a positive impact in the social network, thereby unwittingly accelerating the process of iteration– Post intervention, key opinion leaders and net promoters were

retained with a direct impact on overall employee morale
