When most people think of Networking, they think of awkward cocktail party banter, reaching out to power players to ask a favor, and contending with shameless self-promoters.
The good news is that it doesn’t have to be any of those things!
Let’s reframe and take the negative association from a natural human inclination to build genuine, mutually beneficial long-term relationships.
This is by no means an exhaustive list,
In my previous blog, Networking to Enhance a Diverse, Equitable, and Inclusive Business Environment, we spoke about how it has become widely accepted that companies committed to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion benefit from a “diversity dividend” for a whole range of reasons, including gaining access to diverse markets and tap into different and often innovative perspectives.
At this point, it had become widely accepted that companies committed to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion benefit from a “diversity dividend” for a whole range of reasons, including gaining access to diverse markets and tap into different and often innovative perspectives.
So, how does that relate to your career? The answer is if you can harness your networking skills to connect and engage with people of all ages, cultures, backgrounds,
Our lives these days can seem to consist of a sequence of virtual meetings, with interpersonal encounters as hard to pin down as the electrons that are zooming around the Internet. The isolation of the virtual world can be frustrating, but there are things you can do to ensure that it’s Zoombaya rather than Zoombyebye. As it happens, each and every virtual meeting provides the same opportunity to create meaningful relationships as in-person encounters.
One of the maxims I live by is, never take your network for granted. Building a long-term, collaborative network is a daily activity that requires you to both consciously cultivate and nurture your existing relationships and develop new ones. In fact, the best time for you to work on maintaining the contacts you have and developing new resources is when you already have a job and are in a good place emotionally.
If I were your guest and you were having a party, hopefully you would welcome me and then introduce me to your other visitors, right?
You would do your very best to make me feel comfortable and welcome.
The ability to do this even when you are not at your own home and it is not your party is a superb skill — and one that can enhance your personal and professional life.
We all live in dread of “dead air” – those awkward moments when you find yourself face-to-face with the need to have a conversation with someone you have just met. What follows are some tried and true conversation tips to keep in mind:
“Everyone you meet knows something you don’t”
Approach every conversation with the wonderful sense of having something to learn. As Bill Nye, the science guy says,
I recently had the wonderful opportunity to speak at TEDxEmory. The overall theme was What Makes Your Heart Beat? My topic was Owning Your Confidence: How to Overcome Nervousness and Exude Confidence in High-Stakes Situations. I discussed several practical techniques to help you excel in even the most stressful of situations. They are practices I’ve developed over many years of being on television and speaking professionally.
The first technique is learning to build a Positive Emotional Memory Database ™
