I’ve been thinking a lot recently about the strength of connections, rather than the number of them.

I’ve also been interested for a long time in psychology and how the brain and mind work. One of the things that neurologists have told us is that as we learn skills and acquire knowledge, we form new connections between the neurons in the brain. The more we use those neural pathways, the stronger the connections become. Conversely, if we don’t sue them, they wither and die. So it is with what we might call the Neural web!

Social Media software is great for making connections; most network sites allow you to create huge networks but don’t give you the tools to then manage those networks proactively. This has got to happen if networking is to be taken to the next level and I believe it is something that will be developed in the next couple for years. Otherwise, we may lose the important conmnections and the link will wither away like the neural pathway.

Imagine a network of 10,000 connections. It’s difficult to identify within that list, the like-minded people with whom you want to stay in close contact. Then imagine if you could create several lists, by keywords and could then communicate with them around shared interests. Like the brain creating new neural networks as a new subject is learned, those connections will be nourished with reapeated contact and giving. It is important to have breadth of contacts – we also need to find ways to create depth and strength.

In that way, armed with the knowledge of the group’s skills, knowledge and strengths, you can keep their names close at mind. Then when someone mentions that they are looking for an individual with a particular skill- or knowledge set, you can make the appropriate referral.

This is what nourishing the ‘we’ in web means to me, is consistent with the concept of the neural web and is something for which I’m trying to find solutions. How do you do it, particlarly if you have one or more large networks you are managing?