It is not uncommon for organizations that endure restructuring to experience trust decay amongst the work force. How does responsible restructuring come about? What are the antecedents that drive an organization forward in a responsible manner, also when trust is hampered and uncertainty arises within the boundaries of the firm?
This month, FINDER friend and Member of the Radboud Centre for Organization Restructuring, Jinhan Jiao will defend her dissertation related to this behavioral theme at Radboud University, titled “Dynamics of Interpersonal Trust: A Social Network Perspective”.
The project supervised by Prof. Dr. Allard van Riel of Hasselt University, Dr. Zuzana Sasovova of VU and myself – here at Radboud University – pivots around the interesting behavioral concept of trust repair as a mechanism that may help organizations to stay afloat also as trust get hampered in the course of managerial action. Building on previous research, two issues remain on the research agenda of Jinhan’s dissertation work. One is the dynamics of trust, and the other is the social nature of trust. To address these issues, this thesis investigates interpersonal trust dynamics, including trust formation and trust repair, from a social network perspective. The various projects reported on in this work aim to answer the main research question: How do social networks influence the dynamics of interpersonal trust? Congratulations Dr. Ciao: and an excellent defence it was indeed!