Who Gets Connected? Network Drivers of Racial Inequality in Tie Formation

• In Event: 30255 - Social Networks and Interorganizational Relations

Abstract

Intraorganizational networks are critical for careers, but Black employees derive fewer benefits from these networks than their White counterparts, primarily due to a lack of connections to White coworkers. Drawing on organizational theories of networks and inequality, we argue that shared contacts---employees who facilitate ties between mutual contacts---produce racial disparities in tie formation when facilitating connections that enable access to career-advancing tasks. Such high-stakes work can amplify shared contacts’ tendencies to make race-based inferences either about an employee's competence or about others’ racial preferences and biases, making them more likely to facilitate connections for their White than Black coworkers. Using a rich longitudinal network dataset, including personnel and staffing records for 2,418 new hires in an elite professional services firm, we estimate the causal effect of shared contacts on tie formation. We find that shared contacts facilitate connections at a rate that is 72% lower for Black than for White new hires, although no such gap in tie formation exists in the absence of a shared contact. Our results show that relying on shared contacts to facilitate staffing decisions serves as the central mechanism driving racial disparities in intraorganizational networks and prevents Black employees from accessing career-advancing work.

Authors

• Mabel Abraham, Columbia University

• Sanaz Mobasseri, University College London

• Elizabeth Linos, Harvard Kennedy School