As Community Liaison for Steemit Inc., part of my job (probably the most important part) is liaising with community members as well as people who could become valuable community members to create more organized and powerful networks within the community, hence the title.

Disclaimer: These are my personal opinions and views. They do not represent the official positions of Steemit Inc. or any employees thereof

Steem Park is one example of this. Mike (@hansikhouse) and Kirk (@voronoi) networked with one another to create a great idea, then they networked with me to take it to the next level, and finally, through the grant process they became networked with Steemit Inc. which enabled them to execute their project. None of us could have done any of this without any other member of the network, and of course none of it would have happened without the help of the broader Steem community. That being said, sometimes deals go south...

When you're trying to create a network, or "organization," it is necessarily the case that you don't know how it's going to turn out with any high degree of certainty. Of course you try to maximize your odds, but you have to get to know the people, understand their talents, their personality, their strengths and weaknesses. It's simply not possible to know everything about all of these issues at the beginning of a deal.

When Things Fall Apart

In fact, the deal making process (the organization/network/group building process) is the process of learning all of this information and determining the ideal structure for the organization, if there is one. That includes figuring out the vision, the product or service, the organizational structure, and a lot of other stuff. Unfortunately, due to this reality, a certain percentage of the time you're going to find out that the network design you are developing is unsustainable.

One of the strengths of Steem (and any application built on it like Steemit.com) is that it provides a dynamic, sustainable, and scaleable resource allocation mechanism. That makes the protocol as well as the apps built on it extremely anti-fragile. That means that once you get an organization up and running it is very likely to keep existing and growing. I can see that as a member of the Steemit Team. We're a great machine (certainly not perfect) within which everyone serves a function that works together synergistically to maintain our products (Steemit.com, the Steem Blockchain, etc.) and build out new features. Steemit Inc. is a good, strong, well-designed network. But my job is to leverage my resources, and the resources of Steemit Inc. to nurture new organizations and networks.

The problem is going from a new organization to where Steemit Inc. is at now: a stable, sustainable, scaleable, and productive enterprise. Unfortunately, there's no technology yet which can guarantee that a group which generates an idea has the necessary ingredients to take their effort to the next level. Leveraging Steemit.com can be a very good resource because it enables people to meet one another, get to know each other on a deep level, as well as gather feedback from their customers (the crowd of Steem users), but it can't guarantee every project will come together.

This Isn't Going to Work

The best way to deal with this reality is, of course, to be working on lots of deals and never committing too many resources (here I'm not talking about money as much as other forms of capital like time and energy) to any one project until it reaches some kind of goal post which signals that the network has demonstrated sufficient strength and potential to justify more of an investment. It's very much like progressing to another level in a game (in fact it's exactly like that). But you're still going to come to a point where you realize that one of the efforts just isn't going to work. There is a weakness in the network that is likely to make it unsustainable or an otherwise poor investment of your resources.

Are YOU The Problem?

And to be quite frank, you simply can never rule out the possibility that the weakness is you. When you can't see the organization working it's either because you're right, or because you're the problem, and so the only possible course of action is to remove yourself from the equation. It's actually the best path forward for maximizing the odds that the organization will succeed.

Something Isn't Right

The reality of these weaknesses is that they make themselves apparent to the network eventually. Sometimes they manifest in an individual, sometimes they manifest at the group level with everyone realizing it at once. It may even be the case that it always manifests itself to the group in one way or the other, it's just not always conscious.

Pay Attention to Negative Emotion

One important lesson I think I've learned recently is to not ignore possible red flags including negative emotions in yourself or other people. After reading the work of people like Jonathan Haidt (The Righteous Mind) and Jordan B. Peterson (Maps of Meaning) I've come to understand that evolution has equipped us with extraordinarily powerful tools. Being social provided humans with incredible benefits which caused natural selection to form us into what Haidt calls "ultra-social" organisms like bees. Our ability to network with one another provided a serious evolutionary benefit, which means that we evolved mechanisms which make us better at being social.

Evolution: Follow Your Instincts

The term "listen to your gut" has taken on an even deeper meaning now that we understand the importance of the microbiome not just in maintaining our gut health but in maintaining our mental health. That's because your "mind" is not solely located in your head, but distributed throughout your body. When you see a snake or touch a fire, your brain is not used at all. Your body reacts before the brain is able to even understand what's going on. Neurons located outside of your brain are activated by an external stimulus and motivate practically instantaneous action. That's because these kinds of things were so common to our ancestors, and the need to react fast so important, that natural selection bred us to incorporate these behaviors into our unconscious mind: into our bodies. Not into our brains.

Evolved Social Instincts

If human beings evolved to be ultra-social that means that very common, and very important social phenomena should be "hard coded" into our bodies. I think that's where "instinct" and "gut" comes in. I'm 35 now, and I can tell you, there's still an infinite amount of information I need to learn about doing business and being involved in organizations. Just because a network doesn't come together, doesn't mean it wasn't my fault. I think it's vital for my job to always consider what I did wrong and how I can avoid repeating that mistake. Either I pursued the wrong deal or I somehow broke it. Either way it's my fault. As individuals we are intensely ignorant. Even as groups we still have just a tiny amount of the information available to us.

Darwin to the Rescue

Ignorance isn't good from an evolutionary perspective. A gazelle that can't recognize a lion running straight toward it isn't going to last. So it would make sense that as an evolved social creature that natural selection would at least make sure that we can recognize the social equivalent of a predator. Some of the more measurable ways of doing that are our ability to recognize hostile or angry faces. But as conscious, big-brained, ultra-social beings, our interactions are far more complex than the problems most animals face. Therefore it only makes sense that we would have evolved some mechanisms that help us deal with this complexity. What I've found is that this is where instincts come in. They don't necessarily signal that danger is imminent as much as begin to raise red flags which draw your attention to issues that have been commonly linked to catastrophic events throughout human history. That allows you to act fast and cut off problems before they become catastrophes.

Don't Over React

Part of the reason it's important to recognize these signals early is because, assuming you are not dealing with a psychopath (which you are likely not), then the issue is not that you are dealing with "bad people." You're just developing a bad network and your body is trying to warn you. Then you can use your big brain to analyze the signals you are receiving and do the required investigation.

What I'm Grateful For

As part of a rapidly growing sector, an amazing team that never ceases to amaze me with their innovation and brilliance, and a great community of Steemians, the potential for new deals, organizations, and networks seem practically infinite. There is so much opportunity out there it's just a waste of everyone's time to be involved in projects that aren't perfect. I'm working on many such projects which I can't wait to share with you all. It takes time building good, strong networks, and not all of them succeed, but in the very near future you will start seeing the fruits of the most productive ones. I want to thank everyone in the Steem ecosystem for giving me the privilege of developing these efforts and getting to be a part of making awesome things. :)

Thank you for reading!