My colleague Kate Ehrlich alerted our network to upcoming articles in Business Week (online and print editions) about social network analysis: The Office Chart that Really Counts. It’s a great article, with quotes from Kate and many of the folks who are working with Rob Cross at the Network Roundtable. (You may need to register, but the free registration option will get you to it.) It’s been my privilege to work with some of these people. (On the right of this page, under “Recent Publications,” see a link to a detailed case on the MGH project. The BusinessWeek writer, got a much better quote than I did.)

It is so good to see network analysis breaking through into the mainstream business media, even if it is not making the distinction between organizational network analysis (ONA) and social network analysis. For the purposes of publicity, it doesn’t matter, but for the purposes of being clear about the focus of using network analysis (see, I even eschew both adjectives) in my consulting work, I like to use ONA. It’s about providing a diagnosis of the connectivity of the personal networks inside and across enterprises to improve business performance through enhanced understanding of the current state.

Meanwhile, much is in the news about “social networking” as defined almost exclusively by the likes of MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, and others. So can we anticipate that come people will equate social network analysis as an analysis of these web sites? (See recent MSNBC, BusinessWeek, and — my favorite- The Daily Show.])

Linguists, I hear from an NPR article, are very excited about the evolution of the language as IM shorthand (LOL, TTYL, BFN, et al) creeps into spoken English “TTYLGF” is my favorite (talk to you later, girl friend). Spoken or written, the language does evolve. This week it appears like SNA, 3 and ONA, 0. But the language of networking is coming into the language, and that is what is important.