Spring: 'Tis the Season to be Networking

How, where and why do you network?  How effective are your networking activities?  Do you gain good returns on your investment of networking time and effort?  

There is widespread endorsement of business networking as a strategy for sourcing new clients and finding new career opportunities.  However, when it comes to how networking is practised, there is a sharp disparity between theory and practice. What works well in business networking, and what doesn’t, is not well understood or openly acknowledged. 

 

Could networking be that easy?  Woody tells us 80% of success is showing up.

 

In a series of articles, we will take a close look at what works well and what is less effective in business networking.  Three factors that can lead to disappointing returns are:

1. Woody Allen famously quipped “Eighty percent of success is showing up.”  He is right but the other twenty percent is having some idea of why you are showing up in the first place.  Often we don’t know why we are showing up at a particular event except that our boss and other members of the team are going and we tag along.  

For business networking to be effective, we need to have the big picture in your head, knowing our purpose and having a direction and a plan.  If we network in a haphazard manner, we will get results that are patchy and poor.  Then we get discouraged and stop networking because we cannot see any worthwhile outcomes. 

So work out the big picture and link your networking efforts to your goals for client acquisition and/or career development, amongst others.

2. Another common trap in networking is lack of consistency in where we network.  Often we rush in here and rush in there!  Instead of choosing a small number of forums, we take a scattergun approach and go to many different functions and events.  Be discriminating and select the forums you will regularly attend in order to become recognised and well known.

3. Perhaps Woody Allen can show up without any prior knowledge or practice of the networking script and protocols.  He is a gifted actor, director and comedian.  But for the rest of us, for our networking to be effective, we need to have (or learn) some basic social skills.  What are you going to say to break the ice?  What is a good group to approach?  How will you get someone talking?  Can you do the small talk?  How do you break away from a group without causing offence?  

At People Results, we look forward to bringing you more articles on the topic of business networking during the month of September.  As well, we are currently preparing a short program on effective business networking which will be launched in October 2012 (dates TBA).   More on this topic soon.