An analysis of the relationships between psychological needs and social network building behavior and its effects on early career success.

Social network building, a form of proactive behavior, is known to bring about exponential benefits in the context of a workplace as it increases the amount of information, resources and sponsorship that employees have access to. This study focuses on psychological needs as the basis to explain why individuals engage in social network building behavior. Four dimensions of psychological needs were investigated in this study, namely the needs for relationships, autonomy, security and prestige. Analyses show that there is no significant relationship between psychological needs (as a set) and social network building behavior. However, when psychological needs were analyzed individually, the need for autonomy had a significantly positive relationship with social network building behavior. This study also seeks to understand the relationship between social network building behavior and early career success. It focuses on the subjective aspect of early career success of recent graduates who have just entered the workforce. Early career success was further broken down into four dimensions, namely role clarity, social integration, job self-efficacy and job satisfaction. Significantly positive relationships between social network building behavior and each of the four early career success dimensions were observed, illustrating the importance of social network building behavior in one’s pursuit of career success.BUSINES