Tipping Points: The Gender Segregating and Desegregating Effects of Network Recruitment

Abstract

Current scholarship commonly posits that network recruitment contributes to job sex segregation, and that the segregated nature of personal contact networks explains this effect. A variety of empirical findings inconsistent with this explanation demonstrate its inadequacy. Building upon Kanter's observation that recruitment processes often resemble "homosocial reproduction," we develop a population dynamics model of network recruitment. The resulting formal model builds a parsimonious theory regarding the segregating effects of network recruitment resolving the puzzles and inconsistencies revealed by recent empirical findings.This revised theory also challenges conventional understandings of how network recruitment segregates: in isolation, network recruitment -even with segregated networks -is more likely to desegregate rather than segregate. Network recruitment segregates primarily through its interactions with other supply-side (e.g., gendered self-sorting) or demand-side (e.g., gendered referring rates) biasing mechanisms. Our model reveals whether and to what extent network recruitment segregates or desegregates, and reveals opportunities for organizational intervention. There is an easily-calculable tipping point where demand-side factors such as gender differences in referring can counteract and neutralize other segregating effects from referring.Independent of other personnel practices, organizational policies affecting employees' referring behaviors can tip the balance to determine whether network recruitment serves as a segregating or desegregating force. We ground our model empirically using 3 organizational cases.

Gender and Organization Science: Introduction to a Virtual Special Issue

“…A question arises as to what organizations can do to change some of these gendered outcomes-either through recruiting of employees or evaluations and promotions of employees once they are hired. Rubineau and Fernandez (2015) studied how recruiting outcomes are shaped by practices organizations use to elicit applications. Taking on concerns that "best practice" recruiting techniques using employee referrals might simply reproduce existing job segregation by gender, they build a simulation model to show that this occurs only in certain contexts.…”

Network Recruitment and the Glass Ceiling: Evidence from Two Firms

“…In another example, a big-data study examining the segregating effects of network recruitment in Stockholm finds that increased use of network recruitment was associated with a decrease in the level of gender segregation in the labor market (Collet, Hedström, and Johansson 2014). These and a variety of other empirical findings challenge the idea that network recruitment necessarily perpetuates or exacerbates segregation (see Rubineau and Fernandez 2015).…”

“…Although politically quite sensitive, the data required for this exercise is commonly available at most mid- to large-size organizations. Prior scholarship has documented a method for measuring the segregating effects of network recruitment (Rubineau and Fernandez 2015). Organizations with referral bonuses commonly collect the application, hiring, and referring data needed to use this method.…”

Homophily, Biased Attention, and the Gender Gap in Science

“…Networking and social capital more generally have long entered explanations for why women of similar capability may experience differential returns to these capabilities (Brass, 1985). Evidence suggests that the majority of U.S. jobs are found through networking and that this mechanism is often gendered and particularly important for highly qualified knowledge workers (e.g., Rubineau and Fernandez, 2015). Networks help, for example, in identifying new opportunities and influencing key decision-makers (gatekeepers).…”