Power Mapping: How Leaders Can Start Making Connections

Throughout my time as a School Principal, one of the most important things I focused on was establishing and maintaining partnerships with community organizations. These partnerships brought in over $200,000 in additional funding and provided our campus with over 20 student opportunities. “How can I get similar partnerships of my own?” other school leaders would ask me. “ They were pressed for time and had so many competing priorities. They’d share that they didn’t even know where to begin. “It all starts with power mapping,” I’d tell them.

What is Power Mapping?

Power mapping is a strategy used to create a visual representation of your social network. It helps you see who you know, how they are connected, and what resources are available to you. A power map allows you to identify the people who can help you accomplish your goals and enables you to strengthen your connections with them.

Why Go Through Power Mapping?

Power maps are an excellent way of visualizing your network and gaining insight into its structure. When used correctly, they can help you to see where your connections are strongest and where there may be opportunities for growth. It’s also a great tool for getting a better understanding of what other people in your network do and how they work. Power mapping can help you assess how your current network can support your personal or professional goals.

When you’re trying to build relationships with new people or groups, you must first get an overview of the landscape before diving in head-first. If you don’t know who’s who and what’s what, then how will you know who is worth reaching out to or if there are opportunities for collaboration? Power mapping helps us get this information so that we can make informed decisions about who we want to connect with or collaborate with in the future.

How to Start Power Mapping

1. Write down everyone that comes to mind who could be helpful in achieving your goal. That includes everyone who works with you, people in your organization or division, people in other organizations or divisions within the same organization, and anyone else who could help you in some way. (The only caveat is that you have to select the names of people you know. Ex. If you’ve never met Bill Gates and have no connection to him, then you can’t write down his name on your power map.)
2. Next to each name, write down their basic information. At a minimum, include the following:
   1. Role and Organization
   2. Location
   3. Email
   4. Phone
3. Make a note of the strength of your connection with them.
   1. Loose Ties – weak and infrequent relationships
   2. Moderate Ties – stronger and more frequent relationships
   3. Close Ties – strongest and most frequent relationships
4. Write down the areas where those individuals have expertise. 
5. Optional
   1. Rank each individual by level of importance so that when it comes time to contact someone, you know whom to contact first.
   2. Document additional organizations or associations that they have.
   3. Establish links that individuals on your power map have with one another or with people outside your network.

At the end, your power map could look like this:

A Future After Power Mapping

The practice of power mapping isn’t an end in itself. My experiences with the process prove it. I was able to provide my students with incredible opportunities due to my awareness of the connections in my network. 

One of the standout experiences for our students was when we partnered with the Houston Dynamo front office staff. Our students had the opportunity to visit with the staff and learn about off-the-field career opportunities in sports. It was a valuable and exciting experience for them, and it wouldn’t have been possible without our partnership with the Dynamo.

Another successful partnership was with Twitter. A contingent from the company came to our school for an entire day to provide our students with first-hand accounts of what it’s like to work for a social media organization. It was a unique and engaging experience for our students, and it helped to provide them with a better understanding of the different career paths that are available to them.

Closing Thoughts

Overall, I think that power maps are a valuable tool for establishing partnerships. The process of creating it forces you to look at where your social network currently is, and compare it to where it could be. The visual nature of the map helps bring this process into clear focus. Too often, we view our networks as static things when in reality, they are always growing and changing. A power map can help you to see this growth and chart your course to partnership success.

Time to Commit

1. When are you going to start power mapping?
2. Who are the first five people you will include on your power map?