SOC 8311 Basic Social Statistics

1
INTRAORGL OCCUPL NETWORKS
Analysts of intraorganizational and occupational
networks examine how interpersonal social
relations affect status attainment dynamics,
careers, and workplace outcomes

• Which positions in socioeconomic stratification
  systems give job-seekers access to information
  about better employment opportunities?
• Interaction with human capital experience
• Relative advantages of weak strong ties

• Paradoxes of how mentoring, networking, workplace
  friendships shape the development of personal
  careers, work team social cohesion, and
  organizational productivity performance
• Better to rely on mentor or disperse ties?
• Are work friends assets and liabilities?
• Teams boost productivity and tyrannize?

2
Status Attainment Its Not What You Know, But
Sociological status attainment models assume that
individual workers who possess human capital
skills are competing for jobs in a single labor
market. Achieved status (education), not family
background, is main factor affecting occupational
income.
Social resources theory explains how people use
their education, initial positions, and personal
networks to tap into social capital embedded in
egos alters. Principle H0 Social
resources exert an important and significant
effect on attained statuses, beyond that
accounted for by personal resources. (Lin 1999)

• Two processes linking networks to status
  attainment
• Access to social capital via ego-centric nets
• Mobilization of contacts resources in job
  searches

3
RESOURCE DEPENDENCE CENTRALITY
Power within and between organizations originates
in economic and social exchanges, under uncertain
conditions, as actors try to acquire vital
resources while avoiding dependence on others who
control the supply those resources (Pfeffer
Salancik 1978)
Central positions in intraorganizational networks
are key to acquiring power to manage ones
resource dependencies.
Network centrality increases an actors
knowledge of a systems power distribution, or
the accuracy of his or her assessment of the
political landscape. Those who understand how a
system really works can get things done or
exercise power within that system
(Herminia Ibarra 1993494).
Organizational power accrues to actors and
subunits better able to cope with other groups
uncertainties, without substitutable
alternatives. Croziers (1964) famous example of
French tobacco factory maintenance workers who
destroyed repair manuals.
4
VARIETIES OF NETWORK CENTRALITY
Persons and groups occupy different types of
central positions in intraorgl communication and
exchange networks, with varied implications for
types of power resources they can wield. A more
central location reflects egos demand from
others (high prestige as a target of popular
choices ) and greater reach (access to
information, economic political resources)
Bureaucratic hierarchies are asymmetric authority
networks (Webers legitimate power) based on
command-obey and report-to relations of superiors
and subordinates. Betweenness centrality
(brokering structural holes) is highly useful for
person desiring to become a Machiavellian
player Workteams are egalitarian networks based
on advice trust ties that build coworker
cohesion/solidarity and boost team performance.
As in dancing and horseshoes, closeness counts
5
Teams Worker Autonomy or Tyranny?
Self-managing teams take joint responsibility for
job tasks, thus erase mind/hand separation of
Marxian worker alienation
Networks of interdependence among the team
members allegedly foster more empowerment,
participation in creative problem-solving, higher
commitment and morale result is greater
production efficiency higher corporate
profits But, are teams merely a management tool
for indirect control, worker coercion
cost-cutting?
Because team members strongly identify with
co-workers and internalize the teams
self-enforcing work norms, everyone is locked
inside an iron cage of peer-pressured authority
and discipline (concertive control). James
Barkers (1993, 1999) ethnography of ISE
Communications restructured teams showed how
members self-monitored their performances
punished violators of team norms e.g., peer
pressures to change persistent tardiness.
6
GETTING BY with a LITTLE HELP from FRIENDS?

• Paradox that friendship can be both asset and
  liability
• Commercial bankers relied on trusted strong-tie
  colleagues for advice and support when trying to
  close uncertain deals with corporate customers.
  However, they were more likely to close
  successful deals by relying on their relatively
  sparser, nonhierarchical approval networks
  (Mizruchi Stearns 2001).

• Low perceived conflict related to out-group
  friendships, but negative relations overwhelm the
  positive effects of having friends in other
  departments (Labianca et al. 1998).
• Friends who verbalize high job dissatisfaction
  can drag down employee morale. McDonalds workers
  grew happier after their disgruntled buddies quit
  (Krackhardt Porter 1985).

7
TIES THAT TORTURE
Occupancy of central positions in multiplex
workplace networks advice/help, authority,
communication, conflict, enmity, friendship,
trust may help to explain individual, group,
and organizational outcomes such as performance,
productivity, employee morale
David Krackhardt analyzed advice and friendship
networks among 36 employees of Silicon Systems
(see spaghetti diagrams 4 5). He identified
roles and role constraints based on ordinary
dyadic ties, especially Simmelian ties to
multiple cliques.
After Krackhardt collected the network data, a
subsequent union drive flip-flopped from pro to
anti. He located this change of heart in
friendship cross-pressures on Chris. Unable to
satisfy the norms of two opposing cliques, Chris
abandoned the union organizing campaign to
supporters with fewer persuasive ties.
8
(I CANT GET NO) SATISFACTION
Simmelian tie dyad of strongly and reciprocally
tied pair with identical ties to one or more
third actors (i.e., a clique)

• When two or more cliques share a node, the common
  actor may be required to satisfy two sets of
  divergent norms. Conflicting normative
  expectations can generate stressful
  cross-pressures
• Husbands wives keep their friendship circles
  separate because the two groups have differing
  interests and values
• Adolescents dress and behave one way when at
  home, and completely different when involved in
  peer group activities
• Did you ever withdraw from a group because ?

Next figure, a blockmodel-MDS reanalysis of
social distances across both Silicon Systems
networks, is consistent with Krackhardts story
about the co-clique cleavages among
pro/anti-union employees.
9
Fig 6.6. Social Distances in Advice and
Friendship Networks of Silicon Systems (based on
Krackhardt 1999) SOURCE Knoke Changing
Organizations (2001227)
10
References
Barker, James R. 1993. Tightening the Iron Cage
Concertive Control in Self-Managing Teams.
Administrative Science Quarterly
38408-37.   Barker, James R. 1999. The
Discipline of Teamwork Participation and
Concertive Control. Thousand Oaks, CA
Sage. Crozier, Michel. 1964. The Bureaucratic
Phenomenon. Chicago University of Chicago
Press. Ibarra, Herminia. 1993. Network
Centrality, Power and Innovation Involvement
Determinants of Technical and Administrative
Roles. Academy of Management Journal
36471-501. Krackhardt, David. 1999. Ties That
Torture Simmelian Tie Analysis inOrganizations.
Research in the Sociology of Organizations
16183-210. Krackhardt, David and Lyman W.
Porter. 1985. When Friends Leave A Structural
Analysis of the Relationship Between Turnover and
Stayers Attitudes. Administrative Science
Quarterly 30242-261. Labianca, Giuseppe, Daniel
J. Brass, and Barbara Gray. 1998. Social
Networks and Perceptions of Intergroup Conflict
The Role of Negative Relationships and Third
Parties. Academy of Management Journal
4155-67. Lin, Nan. 1999. Social Networks and
Status Attainment. Annual Review of Sociology
25467-487. Mizruchi, Mark S. and Linda Brewster
Stearns. 2001. Getting Deals Done The Use of
Social Networks in Bank Decision-Making.
American Sociological Review 66647-671.