Networking within Divisional Secretaries and its Impact on Organizational Performance (Special reference to Divisional Secretaries in Sri Lanka)

Abstract

The networking among organizations and within the organization is very important to achieve vision, mission and the performance of any organization. Although there are studies about networking in a global context, it is hard to find networking related studies in the local context. Therefore, this study of networking within divisional secretaries and its impact on their performance is important. The main objective of this study is to analysis the networking within the divisional secretaries and its impact on the performance of those divisional secretaries. The studies depend upon the answers based on the questionnaire survey. Although the networks fall into two principal categories such as inter-firm networks and inter-personal networks, this study is limited to studying interpersonal network. The network is a vague concept and it consists of a set of actors (“nodes”) and the relations (“ties” or “edges”) between these actors. Relevant literature discussed to build the analytical framework and different theories of networking such as theories of self-interest, social exchange and dependency theory, mutual interest and collective action, a family of cognitive theories and theory of homophily. It reviewed the relevant literature on job performance and networking related performance. It also discussed the divisional administration and divisional secretaries. In this study impact of networking on the performance of divisional secretaries was measured with five independent variables such as instrumental network, expressive network, friendship network, advice network and knowledge network. Primary and secondary data were used to analyze the networking related performance. The survey was done throughout the all divisional secretaries in Sri Lanka via a questionnaire and collected data were analyzed by using Structural equation modelling (SEM). According to the study, the most important and affected networking activity which was highly affected by the performance is the knowledge network. Friendship network and instrumental network are the second and third networks effects on performance that is to follow on respectively. The expressive network has a moderate effect on performance while the advice network shows no positive effect on performance.