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Pre-existing company contacts and premature termination of apprenticeship training in Germany

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... Empirical studies have revealed the significant influence of strong ties, and parents in particular, during adolescents' transition to their first jobs (Otto 2000;Kramarz and Page 5 of 20 Herrmann and Kühn Empirical Res Voc Ed Train (2024) 16:16 Skans 2014; Roth 2018; Ulrich et al. 2018). However, further training has revealed that recommendations from parents or, more broadly, strong networks show no correlation with the probability of non-completion of training (Flohr and Protsch 2023;Weißmann and Roth 2023). Tümen (2017) transferred aspects of Granovetter's approach to the career choice of young people and utilized a modeling approach to support the assumption that career guidance from strong ties tends to lead to mismatch. ...
... Conversely, advice from weak ties leads to a more secure and stable career path. This correlation is empirically supported by Weißmann and Roth (2023) and confirms that weak contacts with a company that existed before the start of training reduce the risk of premature termination. School-based career preparation activities increase career readiness, including pupils' ability to acquire knowledge and choose a career (Dodd et al. 2022). ...
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Much research in sociology and labor economics studies proxies for productivity; consequently, little is known about the relationship between personal contacts and worker performance. This study addresses, for the first time, the role of referral contacts on workers' performance. Using employees' hiring and performance data in a call center, the author examines the performance implications over time of hiring new workers via employee referrals. When assessing whether referrals are more productive than nonreferrals, the author also considers the relationship between employee productivity and turnover. This study finds that referrals are initially more productive than nonreferrals, but longitudinal analyses emphasize posthire social processes among socially connected employees. This article demonstrates that the effect of referral ties continues beyond the hiring process, having long-term effects on employee attachment to the firm and on performance.
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Der vorliegende Beitrag untersucht Prädiktoren von vorzeitigen Vertragslösungen auf Basis eines Kohortendatensatzes zu Ausbildungsverträgen der Ausbildungsanfänger und -anfängerinnen des dualen Systems. Der Datensatz basiert auf den Daten der Berufsbildungsstatistik der Berichtsjahre 2008 bis 2011 und enthält alle in 2008 von Ausbildungsanfängern begonnenen Ausbildungsverträge (Anfängerkohorte 2008) in 51 Berufen. Ziel ist es, der vorherrschenden Fokussierung auf die Auszubildenden als „die Ausbildungsabbrecher“ eine alternative Perspektive entgegen zu setzen. Wir argumentieren, dass die Wahrscheinlichkeit einer Vertragslösung auch von Ausbildungsbetriebs- und Berufsmerkmalen abhängt und die berufliche Segmentierung eine erhebliche Rolle für die Stabilität von Ausbildungsverhältnissen spielt. Die Ergebnisse von logistischen Mehrebenenmodellen sprechen für die Bedeutung von Ausbildungsmarktsegmenten und für einen systematischen, von den Merkmalen der Auszubildenden unabhängigen Einfluss der betrieblichen Ausbildungsbedingungen, dem Ausbildungsmodell und der Attraktivität des Ausbildungsberufs für die Vertragslösungswahrscheinlichkeit. Initiativen zur Senkung von Vertragslösungen in der dualen Berufsausbildung, die allein an den Auszubildenden selbst ansetzen, reichen demnach nicht aus. Abstract This paper studies influencing factors of premature dissolutions of apprenticeship contracts in the dual vocational education and training (VET) system by analyzing cohort data from the German census on VET from reporting years 2008 to 2011. The data set covers all contracts that firstly started in 2008 in 51 training occupations of the dual system (cohort of beginners). In contrast to the predominant focus on apprentices as “dropouts”, the paper develops an alternative perspective. We argue that the probability of contract dissolution is strongly determined by characteristics of the training firm and the occupation. Furthermore, we expect occupational segmentation to be an important factor for explaining the completion of apprenticeship contracts. Results from multilevel analyses support these assumptions. They reveal that training conditions in the firm, the training strategy and the attractiveness of the training occupation significantly affect contract dissolutions over and above individual characteristics. Initiatives that aim at reducing contract dissolutions in the dual VET system will therefore be insufficient when soley focusing on individual factors.
Article
The literature on employee referral hiring gives little attention to referrers. Synthesizing two theories in the literature (the better match and social enrichment accounts), through the lens of social resources theory, I provide a conceptual and empirical breakdown of the effects of referrer quality (referrer performance at hire and referrer tenure at hire) and post-hire accessibility (referrer employment and referrer-referral hire job congruence) on referral hire performance and likelihood of voluntary turnover. I tested my hypotheses with longitudinal data from 386 referrer-referral hire pairs at the same job level in a U.S. call center over a 2-year period. Across analyses of two performance criteria (calls/hour and quality) and likelihood of leaving, I found a nuanced mix of benefits and liabilities that illuminate potential boundary conditions of the revised theories. Referral hires from high-performing referrers performed better but had higher turnover propensities than those from lower performing referrers. Longer-tenured employees also produced better performing referral hires, up to a point. Referral hires were less likely to leave, provided their referrer remained employed, but they performed less effectively under this condition. Similarly, referral hires performed worse when their job was congruent with their referrer's job. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.
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Previous research indicates that social relationships can influence the probability of successfully finding a first job. This paper contributes to this field of research by empirically analysing the rarely studied question, if social networks can help adolescents find an apprenticeship in the strongly company-based vocational training system of Germany. In contrast to most previous studies, not only the youth's networks, but also their mothers' networks are taken into account. In addition to the social, the ethnic composition of the networks is also considered. Event data analyses of German panel data on natives and migrants from the project ‘Young Immigrants in the German and Israeli Educational System’ show that adolescents' networks have no effect on the success of an apprenticeship search. In contrast, the mothers' networks play a crucial role.
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This article’s aim is to explore the role of personal contacts at the transition from school to work and compare these effects across countries with various levels of market development. Using data from school-leaver surveys for Ukraine and Croatia and applying propensity score matching, we focus on the probability of finding initial employment and the quality of this employment among those youths who adhered to personal contacts compared to those relying on formal methods of job searching. Our results reveal that personal connections yield greater economic benefits for job entry in transformation countries with more developed market structures.
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In 1973 Granovetter formulated the strength-of-weak-ties hypothesis (SWT), which became the foundation of a vast sociological literature on social networks in labor markets. Until now, SWT has never been directly tested but treated instead as a surrogate for the relationship between an actor's network and labor market outcomes such as characteristics of a job obtained. The paper restates SWT as a proposition about the probability of getting a job as a function of within-actor differences in tie strength and tests it with data on hires carried out in one Russian city in 1998. In support of SWT, the results show that a worker is more likely to get a job through one of her weak ties rather than strong ties. The advantages of weak ties lie in their abilities to provide timely access to non-redundant information and to influence employers directly. In contrast, strong ties are associated with indirect influence on employers through well-connected intermediaries. The estimates come from a within-worker fixed-effect conditional logistic regression and thereby provide rare evidence of an association between information and influence transferred through social ties and labor market outcomes, independent of workers' individual characteristics.
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Beneficial effects of social support in the workplace have received only limited attention from sociologists. Workgroup interactions, especially social support received from coworkers, may significantly contribute to job satisfaction. This article assesses the effects of coworker support on job satisfaction, paying particular attention to the nature and influence of instrumental coworker support both relative to and in conjunction with affective coworker support. The authors expect that both affective and instrumental social support will exert significant and independent effects on these outcomes and that instrumental support will buffer the effects of nonrewarding work on job satisfaction. These hypotheses are tested in a series of ordinary least squares regression models. Data are drawn from a nationally representative sample of 2,505 full-time employees. Study findings are consistent with a main effects model of workplace social support. Suggestions for the absence of buffering effects, implications for industrial policy, and future research efforts are offered.
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This article argues that a common organizational practice - the hiring of new workers via employee referrals - provides key insights into the nation of social capital. Employers who use such hiring methods are quintessential "social capitalists," viewing workers' social connections as resources in which they can invest in order to gain economic returns in the form of better hiring outcomes. Identified are three ways through which such returns might be realized: the "richer pool," the "better match," and the "social enrichment" mechanisms. Using unique company data on the dollar costs of screening, hiring, and training, this article finds that the firm's investment in the social capital of its employees yields significant economic returns.
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The context of the present study is the early careers of lawyers. I examine if and how receiving “more” mentoring – in terms both of number of relationships and amount and type of assistance received – affects individuals’ satisfaction at work. Results suggest that the more developmental relationships an individual has and the more developmental assistance he or she receives, the greater will be his or her work satisfaction. Findings also suggest, however, that receiving a high amount of psychosocial assistance from just one person, who is not necessarily of higher status, is associated with high work satisfaction. Practical implications and suggestions for future research that explores the effects of multiple developmental relationships in other contexts are discussed.
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We examine whether data routinely collected in household surveys and surveys of workers can be used to construct a measure of underlying match quality between worker and firm which helps test matching models and predict subsequent labour market outcomes of workers. We use subjective data from employees both on reported levels of job satisfaction with various aspects of the current job and on whether they would like a new job with a new employer to construct a measure of underlying match quality. We then use this to test several implications of matching models relating to wage-tenure profiles, wages, and separations.
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The literature on job networks predicts that employees referred through networks would be better matched and mentored and thus would have lower turnover. However, existing research on this question has neglected the ways in which network effects are contingent upon firm organization. Using the personnel records of a large retail bank, we examine the relationship between network recruitment and turnover among new employees. There was no significant difference between network referrals and non-referrals, but referrals eligible for the employee referral program did have lower turnover. These results are explicable in light of the bank’s organization.
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Examined the effects of similarity, both actual (race and gender) and perceived, and amount of contact between mentor and protégé on the quality of mentor relationships. Ss were 104 16–22 yr old summer intern protégés and their volunteer staff mentors employed at a media organization. Protégés were randomly assigned to 1 of 2 types of mentor pairings, same and different race mentors. Mentor relationship quality was measured by liking, satisfaction, intended retention, and degree of psychosocial and instrumental functions experienced by the protégé. Results indicate that liking, satisfaction, and contact with mentor were higher when protégés perceived themselves to be more similar to their mentors. Actual race pairing was related to protégés' perceptions of the amount of career support and to mentors' liking of protégés. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)