Why We Need To Rekindle Our ‘Weak Ties’

How the pandemic is affecting our social network

During my three years at university, studying Economics. I spent my days and nights in the library, in an around campus, and the student dorms. Although I wouldn’t describe my university friends as close to me; most of them, I barely knew at all. When going around campus, I would exchange pleasantries, a small chat, smiles and a laugh with the other students and professors. This doesn’t seem significant on the face of it, but there was no denying that it made me feel much happier, and positive.

Now with the UK going into another month lockdown — universities closing, and classes taking place online. People won’t get the opportunity to connect with others who they don’t know on a personal basis. They won’t get to see that friendly face around campus or have that short conversation before the lecture. We’re slowly losing touch with our weak ties.

A sociologist and Stanford professor Mark Granovetter wrote a paper titled “The Strength of Weak Ties.” This paper written in 1973 was the first and became the most famous and insightful papers within sociology on this topic. Unearthing the value behind people we don’t know well. Granovetter was fascinated in understanding how networks foster social mobility, how the people in our lives lead to new opportunities.

With many individuals, the social landscape we have are of two categories, close friends, and acquaintances. The former would be those who we would meet on the weekends, be in a two-way conversation with. Perhaps we went to the same school, most likely we share a lot of activities together, and enjoy the same things. These friends are important they will do us favours, like feed our pet when we go away on holiday. We find comfort, solace, companionship within this group. Granovetter named these “strong ties.”

The latter are those individuals whom we talk with infrequently or would have a small chat with them when passing by. This relationship is more tenuous, perhaps we would give them a call once a month or drop them a text. They tend to have different interests to you. Granovetter referred to these as your “weak ties.”

Granovetter carried out a survey in a Boston suburb of which around 282 workers who fit the criteria of moving a job responded. He found it wasn't close friends and family who were the most valuable during the job hunt. Rather, more than 75% of new jobs had come from leads and contacts who were seen only as acquaintances, weak ties. This finding led Granovetter to write his ground-breaking paper. Which showed the value of the quantity in our social network.

As Granovetter said, if you want new information, you should be looking out of your immediate circle. As these friends are in different circles to your circles and are the key to unlocking those people. They are essential as he put it “the windows to your world.”

What makes our ties weak or strong?

It is understood that the strength of a tie increases with the amount of time we spend with someone, and this is directly correlated with the experiences we have shared with each other. We can look at how our strong ties evolve from childhood, beginning with family, going into our teens with our best friends. Then in your 20’s with partners or roommates.

Weak ties are the people we meet but don’t stay in immediate contact with. Coworkers, we speak to briefly, or in my case other students at university. Neighbours who we say hello to when taking out the bins. Individuals we see when going about our day.

Weak ties are becoming harder to come by

The dynamic of the world has been changing due to the recent pandemic, work is being done remotely, classes taking place at home. Offices, lecture halls, coffee shops, fast-food chains are left empty. The settings in which we conversate with our weak ties have now been shut off, or have been made harder to get to. These places gave us the opportunity and the ability for weak tie relationships to form.

In an age of social distancing, gathering restrictions, which seem to be in place for a while. We are missing out on those all-important low-taxing conversations with our weak ties.

The danger of only keeping strong ties

Only surrounding ourselves with individuals we are close with like family and friends. We limit ourselves to people who are closely aligned with our values. They will share the same interests, have the same habits and watch the same TV shows as us. During the recent lockdown, I have only been in contact with a handful of people, not being able to regularly leave the house. Although these people help us live life, providing us with that help in cases of emergency. They don’t help us thrive as weak ties do.

It is the ones who you barely know that will change your lives for the better.

When we surround ourselves with strong ties. We are closing the doors to opportunities, potential challenges that can develop our own character. We’re left happy in our comfort zone, but is always being comfortable good for our development?

Value of weak ties

From Granovetter’s research, we see the benefit in weak ties. That although these weak ties don’t share the same interests as us, and are too far away to be close friends. Within this lies the key for them to actually leave a profound effect on our life.

Due to the fact they are not within your small bubble, they will enable you to be exposed to new ideas, meet new people, understand and be open to different cultures. Going out of your comfort zone. They understand the things which you don’t. Weak ties are like bridges where you can’t see on the other side because you don’t know where they may lead.

It is not just about the opportunities our weak ties bring but also connecting with these ties increases our own ability to communicate. When we talk with our family and close friends we speak with a certain jargon that is familiar to us. Our strong ties will tend to use the same phrases as us, this is called restricted speech. We know the person we’re talking to understands our shorthand way of speaking. We say more with less. Being around our strong ties too much can limit who and what we know, how we talk and how we think.

Weak ties on the other hand force us to communicate from a place of difference, to use elaborated speech. This does not make the assumption that the listener thinks in the same way as us. As a result, we are required to be much more thoughtful in our engagement with weak ties, needing greater organisation, and thoughtful reflection. This develops us in a key way, improving our socialising ability, giving us a well-rounded personality with the ability to live harmoniously at a time where we see increasing globalisation.

The people we know the least turn out to be the most transformative in our life.

Finding new ways to connect with weak ties

Weak ties are too valuable for us to lose. We, therefore, need to try and find new ways to cultivate these relationships. The only way I can see us still being able to communicate with others is through social media. This has proven a useful tool in having conversations with weak ties. Having value which doesn’t require much emotional pressure and is meaningful.

Take this time where the world has seemingly been put on pause to reach out to someone you haven’t spoken to in a while. Make your way across the bridge, and uncover something you didn’t know already.

Keep dreaming big

Please do let me know how you’re keeping in contact with your weak ties during the lockdown?