What's in a link? - or - Who are you?

The theory

A commenter on the post about feelings talked about leading by example. This takes me back to networks and the question that some people asked when I sent the first mail-out telling them about this blog: "Who are you?"

Whenever somebody asks me "Who are you?" I can't help but being surprised at how people can say Zen koans without thinking anything about it. "Who are you?" is fundamentally impossible to answer. My instinctive response to that is always to shrug, palms up, as if to say: "Well, here I am."

Of course, when somebody asks: "Who are you?" they don't mean it at all. You can tell because they are quite happy if you reply to their question by telling them who they are. What they are asking, actually, is: "What is the link between you and me?"

In networks, links are more important than nodes. In a social network, the type of link you have with somebody will determine all sorts of things, including whether they will take your example. In a food web, the type of link means the difference between eating and being eaten!

Usually, a link will mean one or several of these three things:

• Time dedicated to the relationship: It's easy to fall in the trap of thinking that if I spend this much time with you, you spend the same time with me. This is often true, but not always. For example, a person may spend a long time writing and composing a letter that another person only skims through. A hunting animal may spend a long time waiting for and watching the prey, but for the prey it's just a very fast moment of fleeing away. As a general rule, the link is always more important for the side that dedicates the most time to it.
• Material flows: All sorts of things may pass from one node to another: gifts, food, raw materials, money, etc. As a general rule, the link is more important for the receiving side, though often a link will represent an exchange of one thing for another. In that case, the link is more important for the side that needs most what they are receiving.
• Information flows: We often think that information usually flows in both directions, but that isn't true. If you listen to the radio, the information only goes from the radio station to the listener (unless they're taking calls from the audience). If you carefully watch a cabbage, you may learn a number of things about the cabbage, but the cabbage won't be any the wiser. When information is the most important element in a link, the link will be more important for the side that receives the most information.

Also, in social networks, a link may mean an emotional attitude, that can be positive or negative. The link will be more important for the person who feels the strongest emotions about it.

Put it all together, and it's clear that a link is often more or less important to you than it is to the other side. And the more important the link is for others, the more likely they are to follow your example.

If you want to look at it another way, being the important side of a link means more or less the same as being rich, talented and/or famous. I don't think I'm telling you anything you didn't know, when I say that those people are the most important and followed. But it doesn't happen because there is some grave cosmic injustice against the poor, the unskilled or the boring - it's just that when some people have a lot more to give to others, whether it's in the shape of money, gifts, knowledge, or happiness, the others will put a lot of value on their relationship with them.

The practice

Experiment 1

You can do this in a garden or an area of wildlife you can access easily. Pick two animals, or an animal and a plant, that have what you would consider a close link. One of them could need the other as food, as a refuge, as a pollenizer, as a symbiont, as a parent, or any other link you are interested in.

Try to figure out for which one of them the link is more important by observing the three elements described above: time, materials and information. Consider also emotion if it seems relevant (it is if you are looking at a predator and a prey!). If the link is much more important for one than for the other, you would expect to see that the one that doesn't need the other is often on its own, even trying to get rid of the other. If that doesn't seem to be the case, you have missed some important aspect of the relationship. What is it?

Experiment 2

In the experiment suggested on the post on networks I described three possible kinds of links between organizations, "red", "black" and "green". A red link means that there is at least one person working in both groups. A black link means that the two groups work closely: there is a meeting between members of both groups at least once a week. A green link means that the two groups collaborate in some way, but not closely. This is a classification based on time dedicated to the relation.

Make a list of links between an organization you work for and other organizations, and classify the links looking at all four elements: time, material, information, and emotion. Usually the four go together: the more time dedicated, the more material and information exchanged, and the more positive emotions. Are there exceptions to this rule? Can you see why this case is exceptional? Are you happy that this case is different, or would you like to change it?

Also, try to estimate which organization finds the link more important on each case. If there is a big difference, there will be a power imbalance between the two organizations. Is there anything you can do to reduce it?