Learning Network Management

Social networks are regarded as powerful resources that have
available novel solutions, innovative ideas and can create new
pathways. Networks exist as informal webs of affiliation between
individuals and also as ties between organisations in the form of
professional networks. These different forms of networks have in
common that there is a social structure that connects particular
agents with each other and enables the flow of information and
knowledge between them. Thus, in creating new ties and connecting
already existing networks/individuals/organisations, a richer
structure is created and with it access options to novel knowledge.
The exchange and combination of knowledge is a means for creating
innovations. The national initiative “Learning Regions – Providing
Support for Networks” (2001-2008) fostered this macro-structural
change process in Germany on a regional level, so that a new
learning culture and with it innovative products and ideas could
emerge. An underlying concept for this programme is the theory on
‘learning organisations’ (Senge et al. 2007) which is referred to
concerning the interpretation of the data. Moreover, in order also
to focus on the associated change processes, the guiding
theoretical elaborations of Scharmer’s “Theory U” are applied to
the findings. In this thesis the data gathered during the
evaluation of this initiative are re-analysed with the research
focus on particular social role inhabitants in networks: network
managers. Based on a combination of survey and network data as well
as expert interviews, the structural position and the resulting
perspectives, perceptions and role learning processes are explored.
By means of interpreting the findings, the thesis illustrates a
developmental role-taking process for network managers with five
stages along a U-curve. Thus, it becomes evident that the above
described structural changes of interaction and knowledge flows are
accompanied by deep change and the acquisition of certain skills.
These skills are identified for example as a high tolerance for
complexity and uncertainty, a “bridging capacity”, an awareness of
tie structures, a high level of personal mastery and the capacity
to act skilfully in interdependent structures and perceive himself
or herself as part of a larger system. Network management is
recognized as a service function that needs to be filled in
professional educational networks. In the networks of the learning
regions, network managers are inclined to act as societal change
agents and social entrepreneurs who try to induce a process of
conscious co-evolution within a defined region.