Adina D. Sterling investigates the ways organizations attract, manage, and retain high-value human capital in technology and business, the effect this has on the performance of employees and organizations, and the broader impact of these practices on inequality. For example, her work illuminates the ways firms strategically use the networks of employees to address timing issues when recruiting and hiring individuals, and that those hired with a social contact in the firm prior to starting are better integrated into a firm’s network after they join organizations. She currently has a number of projects investigating the tradeoffs between hiring through networks and hiring through trials such as internships, and is finding that the tradeoffs pertain to the performance of individuals, as well as equity-related issues, such as who is hired and what they paid.