Managerial networking: A systematic literature review and research agenda

Abstract

Scholars and practitioners agree that networking is a necessity in managers’ daily work, particularly in the domain of public and nonprofit management, in which service provision through networks has become the rule rather than the exception. However, the plethora of studies published on this topic has resulted in a highly fragmented body of literature. Such fragmentation calls for a systematic review that consolidates extant insights. This review structures findings from 63 studies on managerial networking published in leading public and nonprofit management journals and thereby provides an overview of constructs and measures used in networking research, as well as an integrated framework of the antecedents and consequences of managerial networking. A proposed research agenda calls, among other things, for the use of more sophisticated networking measures, a focus on the psychological antecedents of networking, as well as examinations of the dark side of networking and replication studies.

Disclosure statement

The authors report there are no competing interests to declare.

Funding

The authors report that this research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes

1 The full list of journals included in this review is available in Appendix B.

2 We extracted the following study characteristics: author(s), title, journal, publication year, abstract, theoretical basis, hypothesized relations, country of origin, study setting, respondents, methodological paradigm, analytic procedure, sample size, managerial networking conceptualization and operationalization, antecedent, and outcome variables.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lorenz Schönherr

Lorenz Schönherr (MSc) is a PhD candidate and works as a research assistant at the chair of public management at Universität der Bundeswehr München. His research focuses on managerial networking, network management, and cross-sector collaborations.

Julia Thaler

Julia Thaler (PhD) is a professor of public management at Universität der Bundeswehr München. Her research interests concern sustainable governance and organizational management, as well as human resource management in public institutions, nonprofit organizations, and cross-sector collaborations. Her work has appeared in such journals as International Public Management Journal, Public Management Review, International Journal of Public Administration, Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, and Voluntas: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations.