assistant professor in the School of Labor and Employment Relations
Education: Ph.D. (sociology), M.S. (sociology), B.A. (sociology), B.A. (psychology), North Carolina State University
Course teaching: LER 523, Organizational Fundamentals for Human Resources
“We are very pleased to make Richard Benton one of our five new hires at LER this fall,” said Fritz Drasgow, the dean of the School of Labor and Employment Relations. “He has been well-trained in organizational sociology, completing his education as a postdoctoral research associate at Duke University.
“He has done some very compelling research on stratification and inequality, social networks, organization theory and economic sociology,” Drasgow said. “Although he is early in his career, his research has been well-recognized and acknowledged with awards. In addition to this work, he has already proved to be successful in the classroom, with a very thoughtful and engaging teaching style. We are looking forward to his contributions to our program.”
Research interests: Organization theory, economic sociology, social network analysis, interorganizational networks and social capital
Why Illinois? “I chose to come to the University of Illinois because I was looking for an institution that had world-class research support along with excellent faculty and students,” said Benton. “My research on corporate governance and social networks benefits from the interdisciplinary focus in the School of Labor and Employment Relations and from the many opportunities to meet representatives from top firms who come to campus to recruit from our excellent HR program. As a social network scholar, I was particularly excited about the computational resources available at U. of I. that can help me in developing computational models for social network evolution and organizational change. I felt that these benefits would make Illinois a great place to continue to grow and develop my research program.”