"Informal Networks and Organizational Exit: "Unhealthy" Support Networks as Influencers on Decisions to Leave"

My research interests involve social networks and the informal organization of a firm as well as individual career mobility, turnover, and career patterns. In particular, I am motivated to understand how the informal relationships individuals develop at work instigate subsequent career choices to stay or leave a firm. In addition, I am interested in gender variances in career patterns and earnings and how relational aspects may help explain the differential outcomes that persist among professional managers.

In my dissertation, I present a set of research that connects two lines of study - social networks and careers - to explore how informal work relationships motivate individual career decisions to stay or leave a firm. I propose a novel approach for studying how informal relationships influence turnover using four studies across three different research settings of professional managers in the early stages of their careers. Investigating the networks around employees who cite interpersonal conflict at work, I uncover "unhealthy" support structures, where employees about to leave a firm activate cohesive support networks of employees most susceptible to exit influence. My research informs social network and career literature by highlighting an important influencer of organizational exit currently absent from the literature that is more attune with the modern professional career. The findings also produce practical knowledge useful for improved retention decisions by enabling firms to more pro-actively manage and prevent the loss of potentially valuable employees.

For more information on my research interests, please read my Research Statement

My teaching experience consists of my ten years of managerial and consulting experience prior to the doctoral program as well as teaching assistantships that I have held in the last five years at the University of Chicago. In the former, I worked in a variety of industry environments - from manufacturing and distribution to insurance and real estate - to design and implement business solutions for all levels of an organization (from staff employees to chief executives). As a teaching assistant, I have complimented these skills by designing materials and leading discussions with full-time, part-time, and executive MBA-students across three campuses - Singapore, London, and Chicago - in courses on Strategy and Structure, Organizational Design, and Strategic Leadership. As a professor, I look forward to teaching MBA graduate students in courses I have assisted with and am also excited about the prospect of designing new course material related to my research, namely the importance of social networks in managing one's career.


For more information on my teaching interests, please read my Teaching Statement