19 Nov, 2016

Organizational Network Analysis

EMBA

SAMPLE FINAL EXAM

This sample exam shows you the kinds of questions that will be on the final exam, but not necessarily the quantity. You can expect the exam to have about 2.5 hours to complete the exam. Part 1 – Concepts 1. Answer the following questions about Bonacich’s beta centrality 1. a. Explain the basic idea of the measure. b. In the figure below [only in the real exam], which node would you expect to have a higher centrality score, A or B? 2. Suppose you would like to get a sense for who is an opinion leader in a given organizational unit, and you have the luxury of conducting a survey-based social network analysis. a. What would be an appropriate kind of tie to ask to measure? Why? b. What network measures would you use to assess the potential influence of each person? Why? [even if not asked explicitly, always include the why] 3. What is a network explanation for the often-noticed phenomenon of the experience curve? 4. Discuss Uzzi’s view of embeddedness. What are the arguments he makes against overembeddedness. Part 2 – Interpretation 1. Take a look at the two networks shown below. The networks show the pattern of collaboration among scientists at two different pharmaceutical companies. Which one do you think would more conducive to radical innovation? 2. The network below shows socializing relationships among members of a voluntary association. A few months after the data were collected, the group had some conflicts, and ended up dividing into two groups. Who do you think went with which group? Part 3 – Analysis 1. Attached is an Excel file with two tabs. The tab named “network” contains the adjacency matrix of network. a. Import the data into UCINET and use the display function to print out the matrix b. Draw a diagram of the network using Netdraw. 2. Another tab in the file is called “attributes” and contains data about each node in the network. a. Import the data into UCINET, and use the display function to print out the matrix b. Pull the data into Netdraw i. Size the nodes by rank ii. Color the nodes by department.

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This sample exam uses concepts that we did not focus on in class.

19 Nov, 2016

Organizational Network Analysis

EMBA

c. Based on the diagram, would you say that both rank and department affect who is connected to whom? Part 4 – Big Picture 1. Describe a non-trivial organizational challenge that you think could be addressed by a network analysis. Design a research design to collect the appropriate data, and then describe the analyses you would conduct. Explain in detail how the analyses would address the question. 2. [to be answered by individually – not a team exercise] Think about your own network of professional contacts in the context of what you see yourself doing in five years. What changes do you need to make in your network in order to facilitate reaching your goals?