Adina Sterling

I investigate how social networks affect processes and outcomes in markets, with special attention to labor markets. To this end, I treat social networks as 1) tools that can be used by organizations, managers and job-seekers to contend with uncertainty, and 2) objects of study regarding how they develop in the workplace due to the external (labor) markets in which organizations are situated. Second, I study organizational practices related to social networks (e.g. network-based hiring) and “alternatives-to-networks” practices (e.g. tryouts), and the near and more distant consequences of these practices on employees and organizations. Within this second research stream, a primary line of inquiry is the effects of these practices on the social and economic outcomes of members of different sociodemographic groups.