Summary
The idea that is getting a job is all about connections means that people tend to find a job due to their relationship with someone in the workplace and not due to their qualifications. This phenomenon can be understood with the concept of the strength of weak ties. Weak ties are formed with people whom a particular person does not know very well. Their strength is that they can be beneficial in certain social contexts, like finding a job. Individuals with a large network of weak ties are more likely to get a job because they have access to job offerings not available to those outside the network. Moreover, due to their relationships with someone in the workplace, they are more likely to get hired than people with appropriate qualifications but without personal relationships with someone in the workplace. Nepotism fits into this discussion because it also involves hiring based on relationships rather than qualifications. For example, if two candidates have the same qualifications, but one of them is the company’s director’s son, the hiring decision is more likely to be made in favor of the director’s son.
Polls and Elections
Asch’s work on conformity shows that people can make correct individual choices. However, when they have to make a choice in the group, they tend to follow the majority view, even if it is evident that the majority is wrong. The reason for such behavior is that individuals do not want to be ridiculed, or they believe that other people are better informed. Given these findings, the undecided voter is likely to conform to the majority view and vote for the candidate that is reported to be more popular, even if the voter’s own inclinations are the opposite. In my opinion, the media should not release polls shortly before the election. Although sharing information with the public seems to be beneficial, it can result in biased election results. The publishing of poll results places a more popular candidate in a more advantageous position because, according to Asch’s work, people will be more likely to choose the candidate favored by the majority.