Networking as a job search behaviour: A social network perspective

By Greet van Hoye, E. V. Hooft, Filip Lievens. 2009

219 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Although networking is typically recommended as a job search strategy in the popular press, research on networking as a job search behaviour is scarce. On the basis of social network theory, the present study investigated whether the structure and composition of job seekers' social network determined their networking behaviour and moderated its relationship with job search and employment outcomes. The data were collected in a large, representative sample of 1,177 unemployed Flemish job seekers, using a two-wave longitudinal design. Job seekers with a larger social network and with stronger ties in their network spent more time networking, beyond individual differences in extraversion and conscientiousness. Networking explained incremental variance in job offers beyond job seekers' use of print advertising, the internet, and public employment services, but not in employment outcomes. Some evidence was found indicating that networking might be more effective for job seekers whose social network contains weaker and higher-status ties.

Subfields: Education, Sociology and Political Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2eca7bbc1f7e60eb8f38b67f3c60d1e0978d5611

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Education

1. Saša Batistič
2. A. Tymon
3. Sang Eun Woo
4. Caitlin M. Porter
5. Connie R. Wanberg
6. Denise A Jackson

In Sociology and Political Science

1. A. Tymon
2. Saša Batistič
3. Sang Eun Woo
4. Caitlin M. Porter
5. Connie R. Wanberg

Citations in the corpus

• The individual experience of unemployment. (2012, background): “Individuals with lower extraversion , conscientiousness, and proactivity and those with smaller networks will be most likely to avoid networking during their job search (Lambert et al. 2006, Tziner et al. 2004, Van Hoye et al. 2009, Wanberg et al. 2000).”
• Untangling the Networking Phenomenon (2015, background): “As one might expect, the outcomes of networking in the job search context are similar to the outcomes of job search (Boswell, Zimmerman, & Swider, 2012): more job offers for the job seeker (Van Hoye, van Hooft, & Leivens, 2009), increased likelihood of reemployment (for unemployed job seekers; Wanbe”
• The Relational Organization of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems (2017, unknown): “Both entrepreneurs and workers use their social networks to find good matches, adding to the value of dense social networks within a region (van Hoye et al., 2009).”
• Networking behaviour, graduate employability: a social capital perspective (2017, background): “The wider the social network the higher the potential value, as distant contacts, accessed less frequently, are more likely to have exclusive information (Brown and Konrad, 2001; Van Hoye et al., 2009).”