What Does Beth Kanter Mean by “Free Agent?”

I spent last Friday at Nonprofit 2.0 Unconference in DC and had an amazing time.  There, I got to spend some time with Beth Kanter. She just co-authored a book called The Networked Nonprofit: Connecting with Social Media to Drive Change with Allison Fine.  Well, since Beth Kanter needs to be translated, I asked Martin Oetting what “free agents” meant, really, and why that term is any different than influencers and influentials (I have not yet read the book).  Well, Martin wrote me an amazing explanation that I will share here in full, with Martin’s permission:

Okay, my take on this is that here, the focus is not so much on the degree of influence that a person has. This whole debate is organizational. It introduces hierarchical old-school organizations to the idea that individuals can also make things happen because they are highly networked. It’s a way of framing things to teach old school organisations that they now need to reckon with individuals who can become powerful because they know how to wield the social web.

These organizations often still think that they are the only way to effect change in society, by being hierarchical and huge, and that they do not need to pay much attention to the networked way of organizing, simply because they are powerful. Explaining the free agent means explaining that networks created by individuals — in a short time! — are also becoming powerful models of a more decentralized type of organization. Power is moving away from being dependent on size, towards being dependent on a capability to network.

I think such a free agent is influential in both “available ways”. As far as I can see, opinion leadership / being influential can depend on two qualities – the quality of knowledge, or the quality of connectedness/networking ability. Some people are influential because they know an awful lot about a certain subject, and people trust them for it. These are the traditional opinion leaders — trusted sources with regard to a particular subject. The computer geek who gives advice on PCs, the car enthusiast who always tells people which car to buy. Online, they exist in all shapes and sizes, in forums, on blogs, etc. The other type of influence is not based on what you know, but on whom you know. These are what Emanuel Rosen calls hubs (Gladwell calls them connectors), i.e. people who are all about making connections with people, introducing, linking, etc. The influence comes from the “social side”, not so much from the “content side”.

Now of course, you can combine the two. And you can add the Social Web to someone who knows about stuff AND who knows how to network with people, and that person can become very influential. Scoble, etc.

But the term “free agents” suggests to me, again, that this is not so much about influence, but rather about the power of the individual. It’s a way of saying “social web” without using the term. A free agent is just one person. By calling that person free agent, they are making a statement that says “This one person can act and effect change, and you better reckon with them,” without saying yet what type of influential the person is. Most likely, it’s someone who knows both a subject and who can connect people.

What do you think?  In response to this amazing, I replied:

I think The Networked Nonprofit IS a new version of nonprofit Cluetrain… “Why don’t I do it myself, why do I need your organizational oomph when I don’t believe you spend enough money on helping and too much money on admin,” right?

And Martin replied, “Exactly! That’s totally it.”

See Beth, Martin Oetting was Moses to your burning bush that is not consumed!  Did we get it right?

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