Works
- The Strength of Weak Ties, American Journal of Sociology, 1973
- Threshold Models of Collective Behavior, American Journal of Sociology 83(6), 1978
In Tactics of Organizational Politics
Ideas
The strength of weak ties. Close friends tend to know the same people and the same things, while acquaintances connect otherwise separate groups. Weak ties therefore act as bridges that carry new information and spread ideas across a network, more than strong ties do.
Threshold models. Each person has a threshold, the number or share of others who must act before he or she will join. The outcome of collective behavior, such as a strike, a riot, or the spread of an innovation, depends on the distribution of thresholds, so small changes in who goes first can produce very different results.
What it explains
Granovetter explains how information and support actually travel in an organization, through acquaintances who span groups, and why coalitions grow by cascade: each visible recruit lowers the bar for the next. Cutting the bridges between groups, or controlling who moves first, shapes what a whole population ends up doing.
Tactics that draw on Mark Granovetter (39)
- Activating Weak Ties
- Alumni Network Cartel
- Bad Apple Transfer
- Bandwagon Cascade
- Befriending the Rival's Deputy
- Blocking a Dissenter's Moves
- Boiling Frog
- Central Checkpoint Routing
- Client Relationship Capture
- Coalition-Splitting Reorganization
- Constant Loyalty Signaling
- Cross-Silo Brokerage
- Divide and Conquer
- Gatekeeper Neutralization
- Influence Mapping and Arbitrage
- Investor Whisper Campaign
- Learned Helplessness Induction
- Leaving Old Rifts Alone
- Loyalty Networks
- Mentorship Blockade
- Middle Management Squeeze
- No-Hire Pact
- Onboarding Isolation
- Pilot Envy Campaign
- Planted Rumors
- Positive Whisper Campaign
- Power Structure Mapping
- Promoting the Local Hero
- Reorganization as Amnesia
- Retreat and Return
- Reverse Grooming
- Seating Chart Politics
- Seeded Norms
- Silo Reinforcement
- Small-Footprint Change
- Splitting the Critics
- Talent Transplant
- Triangulation
- Weakest-First Rollout
In Thinking Tools
Known for
A Stanford sociologist best known for the strength of weak ties. His threshold model holds that each person joins a collective action once enough others have, so small differences in the spread of thresholds can decide whether a riot, fad, or movement takes off.