How the Other Half Works

Employment Management Work: A Case Study and Theoretical Framework

“…The referral was powerful, supporting Waldinger and Lichter's (2003) argument about the value that employers of lowwage workers place on employee referrals. When employers employed workers of a distinct demographic group and were satisfied with their job performance-a type of reasoning referred to as statistical discrimination in the literature (Waldinger & Lichter, 2003)-the former favored hiring more of the latter for job openings. The referral-which could swiftly produce new workers-was the lynchpin of the just-in-time employment system in the secondary labor market.…”

“…Barley and Kunda point out professionals ''work on their networks'' (2004, p. 277) while Osnowitz and Henson's (2016) project workers and Gershon's (2017) professional workers talk of ''investing'' in their networks, as if a network is an account in which one occasionally makes deposits. In contrast, these low workers lived deeply and every moment in their networks, comprising extended families, current and former employers, and friends of all those groups, a feature that has been well documented in the literature on migration, ethnic enclaves, and migration and work (Dominguez, 2013;Hagan et al, 2015;Hondagneu-Sotelo, 2001;Massey et al, 1990;Waldinger & Lichter, 2003). Their ties were direct and strong, and attending a networking event was a foreign idea.…”

“…We predict that women and men, gay, lesbian, and transgendered people would come to the employment management project with gendered aspirations and toolkits for realizing their employment goals. Along these lines, many people of color view their employment options well aware of the racialized biases that employers hold about who is suitable to do what kind of work (Waldinger & Lichter, 2003; Williams, 2006). We predict that these job seekers would engage in EMW accordingly.…”

“…Social scientists who study low-wage immigrant workers' networks find somewhat more enabling dimensions to networking. Low-wage immigrants cultivate and exploit networks to gain referrals, information about job openings, and positive recommendations (Bloch & McKay 2015;Dominguez, 2013;Hagan et al, 2015;Hondagneu-Sotelo, 2001;Massey, Alarcon, Durand, & Gonza´lez, 1990;Waldinger & Lichter, 2003). Nevertheless, these networks are believed to suffer because they are built on strong, rather than weak ties.…”

“…All the while, the rudimentary economistic time or money matrix to ''get the hours'' was often leavened with qualitative considerations. Even though these workers evaluated their jobs with a dual frame of reference (making constant comparisons between the host and the home country; Piore, 1979;Waldinger & Lichter, 2003) and were aware of their limited mobility in the U.S. labor market, they approached their job prospects with an eye toward social and economic mobility. Interviewees held a spectrum of values about good and bad jobs: about employers who were abusive and those who treated workers with dignity (Hodson, 2001); jobs in which they could learn new skills versus jobs in which they performed routinized tasks over and over.…”