All right, so let me get the “summary”
part of this out of the way first. 
A recent study by Sorenson and Stuart (2008) presented an elaborate and,
at times, complicated peek into the mechanisms through which venture capital
firms form syndicates with other venture capital firms when investing in
start-up companies.  Based on some
person-level theories of relationship building, the specific aim of the
researchers was to describe how characteristics of the investment situation
(which included variables such as how “fashionable” the targeted industry was
at the time of investment, the maturity of the target company, the size of the
investment syndicate, and the density of relationships among members of the
syndicate) influenced the likelihood of syndicate formation across “social
distance” (defined as the similarity of investment histories between two firms
and previous experience with each other, among other things).  Breaking down the main findings, it was
reported that venture capital firms were more likely to create distant ties
with other firms when:

• the popularity of investing in the target company’s industry or
  geographic region (think Internet boom in Silicon Valley) was high
• the level of risk in investing in the target company was relatively
  low
• the size of the investment syndicate (i.e., the number of players
  involved in the venture capital firms) was large
• at least one member of the syndicate had worked with someone in the
  venture capital firm in a previous investment

But as I slammed my head against this
article trying to maintain interest, I did come to a couple of interesting
realizations which I think might be useful to those of us who are wholly
academic I/O psychologists or still wet-behind-the-ears when it comes to how
business operates in the “real world.” 

1. Appreciating the context in
   which our “population” and variables of interest reside is not a trivial
   task. 
   While some may not want to admit it, I/O psychology is a unique branch
   in that we bound our study of human behavior to specific environments;
   thus even a base understanding of that environment may reveal some
   insights into the nature of a phenomenon you might never have even
   considered.
2. Theories of the individual
   often have great use and appeal at describing theories of the
   organization—if you’re careful.  The foundations for Sorenson and
   Stuart’s article were tied closely to early works on social exchange
   theory and networking, and the authors were quite explicit in explaining
   how similar the functional linkages were at both the individual and
   organizational level. 
   Continuing to apply such thinking has the potential to advance our
   field, but it requires creative thinking, sound methodology and an
   understanding of where inferences might be most applicable.

Moral of the story: take the time to
expand your breadth a bit. 
Granted, there’s the real possibility that you’ll be bored to death,
but, if you’re lucky, you might just learn a thing or two that could come in
handy down the line (especially if you’re ever a multi-millionaire looking to
expand into high risk investments).