We are by nature social animal. This book shows how relationships, networking and collaboration can be leveraged in the right way in achieving success.
The Power of Networking:
Building a strong network is essential for personal and professional growth.
Networking is not just about meeting people; it's about building meaningful relationships based on trust and mutual benefit.
The Importance of Relationships:
Success is not just about what you know, but also about who you know.
Relationships play a crucial role in finding opportunities, receiving support, and gaining valuable insights.
The Art of Connecting:
Genuine connections are made when you show a genuine interest in others and help them succeed.
Look for common interests and shared passions to establish a stronger bond with people.
Developing Social Skills:
Cultivating social skills is essential for effective networking.
Active listening, empathy, and effective communication are vital in building and maintaining relationships.
The Mindset of Generosity:
Giving and being of service to others without expecting anything in return creates a positive network effect.
By helping others achieve their goals, you build trust and goodwill, which often leads to reciprocal support.
Building Your Brand:
Developing a personal brand helps establish your expertise and credibility in your field.
Share your knowledge and insights through writing, speaking engagements, and social media to enhance your reputation.
Leveraging Technology:
Utilize technology and social media platforms to expand your network and stay connected with people.
Maintain an online presence that reflects your personal and professional values.
The Power of Diversity:
Surround yourself with diverse individuals from different backgrounds and industries.
A diverse network offers fresh perspectives, new opportunities, and a broader range of resources.
The Importance of Follow-Up:
Following up after initial meetings is crucial for nurturing relationships.
Regular communication and staying connected demonstrates your commitment and value to the relationship.
Creating a Community:
Build a community of like-minded individuals who support and uplift one another.
Actively participate in industry groups, organizations, and events to expand your network and contribute to the community.
Asking and getting help:
Everyone needs help from others. Feel free to ask and give. There is no other way to go far alone.
Asking and helping your connections will only increase the relation strength. The more you do, the better it becomes.
Rather than asking what others can do for you, ask what you can do for the others.
Never keep score in helping or taking help. Be generous and the world will be generous to you.
Treat yourself as a start-up, as a brand. You need to continuously keep working on it.
Goal setting:
Find your passion
Look inside -> things I want to do + which ones give me pleasure / enjoyment
Look outside
Putting Goals to Paper -> write goals to be reached -> people who can make it happen -> how to reach these people (this is the relationship action plan)
Create a Personal "Board of Advisors"
Warm calling - The 4 rules:
Convey credibility by mentioning a familiar person or institution—in this case, John, Jeff, and WebMD.
State your value proposition: Jeff’s new product would help Serge sell his new products.
Impart urgency and convenience by being prepared to do whatever it takes whenever it takes to meet the other person on his or her own terms.
Be prepared to offer a compromise that secures a definite follow-up at a minimum.
Host a “virtual happy hour” once a month and organize it around a discussion topic. Or set up a weekly accountability group of three to four people who set goals together and share quick personal and professional updates. Have everyone commit to three months, and then rebuild the group as people come and go each quarter. Once a month, ask group members to bring a friend to introduce to the group.
Make a list of the things you’re most passionate about. Use your passions as a guide to which activities and events you should be seeking out. Use them to engage new and old contacts.
Casual events to meet new people:
15 min + coffee meetings
Conference meeting list / business trip meeting list
Workout or hobby event invitation
Lunch / dinner / breakfast invitation
Special event invitation
Home invitation
Charity event
Follow up is the key to success in any field:
Follow up first after 12 - 24 hrs.
Email with one unique aspect of conversation (shared hobby or business interest) - acts as mental reminder of who I am
Linkedin / Fb request dependent on closeness and if they use these medium
Write name + email address + contact details in a list after the first meet
Setup a reminder to follow up after 1 month with another email.
If you know you want to meet again, get their commitment in writing so that following up with it is easier
Always remind how you might be able to help them and not how they can help you
Forwarding relevant articles to people in network is also awesome way of following up
Make follow-up a habit. Make it automatic. When you do, the days of struggling to remember people’s names—and of other people struggling to remember yours—will be a thing of the past.
Always express your gratitude.
Be sure to include an item of interest from your meeting or conversation—a joke or a shared moment of humor.
Reaffirm whatever commitments you both made—going both ways.
Be brief and to the point.
Always address the thank-you note to the person by name.
Use e-mail and snail mail. The combination adds a personalized touch.
After e-mailing, send requests to connect through social media.
Timeliness is key. Send them as soon as possible after the meeting or interview.
Many people wait until the holidays to say thank you or reach out. Why wait? Your follow-ups will be timelier, more appropriate, and certainly better remembered.
Don’t forget to follow up with those who have acted as the go-between for you and someone else. Let the original referrer know how the conversation went, and express your appreciation for their help.
Most people think a conference is a good time to market their wares. They rush from room to room desperately trying to sell themselves. But a commando knows that you have to get people to like you first. The sales come later—in the follow-up discussions you have after the conference. Now is the time to begin to build trust and a relationship.
Be prepared before an event about who you would like to meet, a few critical things they will be interested in (how you can help them), and where they will be in the event.
Research the speakers and catch them before they have spoken and have not become the star (might happen after their speech).
Remember to look sharp. Don’t underestimate the importance of dressing well in places where you’ll be noticed
Always follow-up ASAP. This is very important so that the memory freshens, to get a commitment to continue further.
In other words, it’s not necessarily strong contacts, like family and close friends, that prove the most powerful; to the contrary, often the most important people in our network are those who are acquaintances.
When you help people land a new gig, they’ll be inclined to remember you if they hear of a new position opening. Moreover, if you help, say, a vendor of yours land a new client, they’ll usually be more open to negotiating prices on your next project. Helping others find good employees is a real currency.
9 kinds of super connectors:
Restaurateurs
Headhunters
Lobbyists
Fund-Raisers
Public relations people
Politicians
Journalists
Authors, bloggers, gurus
social media influencers
Cut the umbilical cord to the folks around the office watercooler. Mix it up. Hunt out people who look and act and sound nothing like you do. Seek out ideas from people you don’t ordinarily talk to who inhabit professional worlds you don’t ordinarily travel in. In one word: connect. In four better words: connect with the connectors.
Co-host parties with various other connectors where each host brings a certain section of the crowd. This makes for very interesting events where everyone benefits
Make sure you match the participants that you don't share contacts who wouldn't like to be included
Have equal say in the event or the partnership and be able to take as well as give equally to an event
Only share network or organize event with co-hosts you really trust. You are vouching for them and they are for you
Only co-host events where it is a win-win for all the co-hosts.
About ten years ago, Thomas Harrell, a professor of applied psychology at Stanford University Graduate School of Business, set out to identify the traits of its most successful alumni. Studying a group of MBAs a decade after their graduation, he found that grade point average had no bearing on success. The one trait that was common among the class’s most accomplished graduates was “verbal fluency.” Those who had built businesses and climbed the corporate ladder with amazing speed were those who could confidently make conversation with anyone in any situation. Investors, customers, and bosses posed no more of a threat than colleagues, secretaries, and friends. In front of an audience, at a dinner, or in a cab, these people knew how to talk.
As Harrell’s study confirmed, the more successfully you use language, the faster you can get ahead in life.
How many negotiations would have ended better if both parties involved were simply honest and forthright about their needs? Even when there is disagreement, I’ve found people will respect you more for putting your cards on the table
When we leave a formal, hesitant, and uncomfortable conversation where we’ve held back our true selves, we console ourselves by dismissing the encounter, or more often the person, by thinking, “We had nothing in common anyway.”
Embrace and use the power of vulnerability to break ice and create amazing first impressions and connections. Talk from heart! Accept what you don't know. Don't hide behind somebody who you are not in reality.
Be sincere: The surest way to become special in others’ eyes is to make them feel special. The corollary, of course, is equally true: Make people feel insignificant and your significance to them shall certainly diminish
Have a passion … Any passion. It is not important what you tell but how you tell. The story and enthusiasm creates the connection.
Find ways to create value. Sharing information is a great place to start. Identify the hidden and well-known experts whom your micro network needs to know, and make it your business to connect them. Find the research, the news, and the events that are relevant to this group and be the first to share them. Create content together.
Build the alliance, and hopefully in five or ten years you’ll each be in a better position to help the other. And even if he or she doesn’t become the next Sean Parker, you’ll have another really smart friend in your corner—always an investment with great returns.
Introduce mindfulness in your social media strategy. When you log on, especially during the workday, make sure it’s time that adds up to progress on your goals.
GENEROSITY + VULNERABILITY + ACCOUNTABILITY + CANDOR = TRUST
The better prompt would be this: What’s got your attention?
There’s a subtle utility in that shift, and once you make it, you’ll start seeing your content get shared and commented on. So you’re not posting, “At the movies,” you’re posting, “I saw the new Will Ferrell movie—it was hilarious. Must see!”
When creating content, think how you can be helpful to your audience.
Failures work as well until you provide your insights and how to fix it next time
Try writing LinkedIn profile for the job you want to have and not the job you have already.
Say what no one else will. Candor is very precious. Everybody is trying to be diplomatic and fake so authenticity sells like hot cake.
Do google Q&A session or something for general media where they can ask for help
Share your process. Grope, fail, adapt, repeat—and do it all with the attention and the guidance of those who care enough to follow along.
It’s not what you know; it’s how quickly you’re able to know the new and right things - this is important
Passion drives engagement—choosing to participate in every way you can think of. Acting on an idea—whether it’s as small as writing a blog, or as big as creating a business—sends a shock wave out into the world that flows back even stronger, as others gain interest in your ideas and wish to add their own and participate. Putting something out there—in the form of content on the Web, or a live presentation, a book; your imagination is the only limit—creates a force of attraction, a unique and new community all gathered around you, energized by your shared interest.
If you are low on passion, just do something absolutely new just to change things up (join a sumo wrestling course or start painting or whatever)
Being luck dominant is just "being open to new things and people". Do a new thing every day. Take a left where you usually take a right. Run when you usually walk, talk to somebody new who you never talked with … something every day!
I’ve heard of one start-up CEO who considers manufacturing serendipity—by networking and being generous to the people he meets—to be 30 percent of his job description
Create opportunities for supportive, in-person encounters by attending workshops and conferences where you’ll be surrounded by people who share not just your values but your interests. Surround yourself with genius. Focus less on “to-dos” and more on “to-meets.” And finally, whenever you can, attract and reward mentors not just with gratitude but by demonstrating success.
Be interesting! All that you’ve read thus far doesn’t relieve you of the responsibility of being someone worth talking to and, even better, worth talking about. Virtually everyone new you meet in a situation is asking themselves a variation on one question: “Would I want to spend an hour eating lunch with this person?”
No matter what organization I represented or what professional avenue I pursued in the future, all my efforts had to be powered by a deep passion and a set of beliefs that went well beyond my own personal benefit. To move others, you have to speak beyond yourself. Boldly putting yourself out there was one thing, and a good thing, but that wasn’t enough. There was a difference between getting attention and getting attention for your desire to change the world.
In every job and at every stage in my career, I had some expertise, some content that differentiated me from others and made me unique, made me more valuable in my relationships with others and the company I worked for. It created precious opportunities for me to gain credibility and visibility in my field. Content is a cause, an idea, a trend, or a skill—the unique subject matter on which you are the authority. What will set you apart from everybody else is the relentlessness you bring to learning and presenting and selling your content.
If what you do can be done by anyone, there will always be someone willing to do it for less. Witness all those jobs moving offshore to Bangladesh and Bangalore. The one thing no one has figured out how to outsource is the creation of ideas. You can’t replace people who day in and day out offer the kind of content or unique ways of thinking that promise their company an edge.
10 tips on helping you become an expert:
Know the early adapters, trend spotters, knowledge brokers - read / meet / learn from them
Ask seemingly stupid questions (no question is stupid) all the time - never be embarrassed
Know your weakness and strengths -> don't waste time on weaknesses -> cultivate your strengths so much that weaknesses matter less! Use (80-20 for strength and weakness)
Keep learning like crazy! - books, conferences, courses, experts, networking session. Learn from everything and everyone
Stay mentally and physically healthy! - exercise, meditation, vacations are very important to keep balance no matter how busy you are
Deliberately do new things and have new experiences - new things create serendipity, push you out of comfort zone, open up your mind to opportunities you never knew
Be ok with regular rejections and still never feel discouraged - if you are afraid of rejections, you can't create something big!
Know the new technologies and how they are relevant to your company (hire, befriend or become the expert here)
Develop a niche - see areas where company is underperforming and focus on one of these topics which is least attended to
Follow the money - always understand whatever you do, it should result in more success and more money for the business. No money impact, no value.
Tell compelling stories which everybody can relate to. The better you are at explaining things simply, the more successful you become.
Be the CEO of your own life!
Hammer home the message to yourself that your career is yours and yours alone to manage. Every job I’ve ever had, I’ve made an effort to brand myself as an innovator, a thinker, a salesman, and someone who could get stuff done. When I was just a management trainee at ICI, my first job out of college, I sent a set of recommendations to the CEO. So he never responded. But I never stopped sending those e-mails.
To become a brand, you’ve got to become relentlessly focused on what you do that adds value. And I promise you can add value to whatever job you’re doing now. Can you do what you do faster and more efficiently? If so, why not document what it would take to do so and offer it to your boss as something all employees might do? Do you initiate new projects on your own and in your spare time? Do you search out ways to save or make your company more money?
If you hide your accomplishments, they’ll remain hidden. If you don’t promote yourself, however graciously, no one else will. Like it or not, your success is determined as much by how well others know your work as by the quality of your work
Photos, infographics, animated gifs, slide shares—these are much more likely to catch someone’s eye and get passed on.
Share things which are very high on emotions (positive or negative, it doesn't matter). It is because people like to be aroused.
Share topics which are already being shared like hotcake!
Get in media with whatever work you are doing - PR is important. Do speeches, promote them afterwards. Get every word about you out.
Try small (i.e. local) and then slowly move to the bigger PR brands like Forbes, or NYT etc. first try the local school newsletter, or your company website (try the SAP newsletter)
Be clear, crisp, and brief in every communication … practice it!
All your efforts at publicity, promotion, and branding need to feed into your mission. That means be focused when doing PR etc. You need to find your mission!
Bring big people's name to make your story more famous … you don't have to be connected. But your story needs to tell a connection to the big name somehow. It provides more attraction and credibility
Once you have done an article or a blog, or got published by some magazine … do shameless self-promotion and get more mileage out of it. There is no harm in it.
Try to be part of panel discussions, conference speakers, teach, do workshops, extra projects …. Everything which publicizes your skills or brings you in positive limelight
With influential or famous people, assure them that you are interested in them and their work but not just because of the famous controversies or grapevines they come in.
Just remember that famous and powerful people are first and foremost people: They’re proud, sad, insecure, hopeful, and if you can help them achieve their goals, in whatever capacity, they will be appreciative.
Join sports club, organize sports competitions locally or in your company or at least participate in it!
Create a LinkedIn or fb group - for your cause whatever that is. Help everyone and bring value to everyone who joins the group. Organize in person yearly events and so on. Do monthly google hangouts, coach each other, trade referrals, share information etc.
Building a community of like-minded people around a common cause or interest is, and has always been, a very compelling proposition in its own right. If you can't find one as per your mission or need, create one (it is even better). You will then shape and direct a group of people committed to a cause same (or similar) as yours.
Make rules of club in a way that everyone contributes and is committed to the cause of the club. Like, every member needs to actively contribute etc. etc. (I am thinking about a LinkedIn group or a YouTube group for Germany).
It wasn’t enough to get things done. You had to get things done and make the people around you feel involved, and not just part of the process but part of the leadership. I learned that commitments weren’t commitments unless everyone involved knew what was on the table with absolute clarity. I learned how truly small the world is, especially the world of the rich and powerful.
I learned that arrogance is a disease that can betray you into forgetting your real friends and why they’re so important.
helping employees build relationships for career success reduces turnover and ultimately leads to stronger external relationships for revenue growth as well
The fact is, from my father’s perspective, everyone had something to offer. When he’d go out for his weekly sit-down at a local diner with his friends, he took me along. He wanted me to be comfortable with older, more experienced people and never to fear seeking their help or asking them questions.
your choice of a “reference group,” the people you hang out with, was an important factor in determining your future success or failure. In other words, if you hang out with connected people, you’re connected. If you hang out with successful people, you’re more likely to become successful yourself.
Pat and his team - the partners at Delloitte - taught me some hard lessons about staying focused; that bold ideas weren’t enough if they couldn’t be executed; that the details are as significant as the theories; that you had to put people first, all people, not just those above you.
A successful mentoring relationship needs equal parts utility and emotion. You can’t simply ask somebody to be personally invested in you. There has to be some reciprocity involved—whether it’s hard work or loyalty that you give in return—that gets someone to invest in you in the first place. Then, when the process kicks in, you have to mold your mentor into a coach, someone for whom your success is in some small or big way his success
Some smart companies, recognizing this fact, actually have programs in place that view new hires as mentors to the company. After a month on the job, they’ll ask these new employees to jot down all their impressions with the idea that a fresh pair of eyes can see old problems and make innovative suggestions that others can’t.
Yes, loyalty matters. But not when it means sacrificing your principles.
Of course, when you’re driven by principles, there are always sacrifices involved. But your determination to connect with others should never come at the expense of your values. In fact, your network of colleagues and friends, if chosen wisely, can help you fight for causes you believe in.
I realized that what made you successful in both worlds were other people and the way you related to them. Whether those people were family people, work people, or friend people, real connecting insists that you bring the same values to every relationship. As a result, I no longer needed to make a distinction between my career happiness and my life happiness—they were both pieces of me. My life.
Work life balance: When you’re out of balance, you’ll know because you’ll be rushed, angry, and unfulfilled. When you’re balanced, you’ll be joyful, enthusiastic, and full of gratitude.
People tell us, “If you just get more organized, if you strike a balance between work and home, and limit yourself to the important people in your life, you’ll feel better.” That’s just totally misguided. The need of the hour is finding the job where work is fun and life is also fun. This way irrespective of work or non-work, it is always fun. Either change the work to something you like or make your work more interesting by selecting right jobs, right bosses, right topics and right people to work with.
it’s a sense of belonging that brings us happiness.
We human beings are social beings. We come into the world as the result of others’ actions. We survive here in dependence on others. Whether we like it or not, there is hardly a moment of our lives when we do not benefit from others’ activities. For this reason, it is hardly surprising that most of our happiness arises in the context of our relationships with others.
Learning is best achieved through relationships—having the right conversations with the right people in the right context—and collaborative action.
making your mark as a connector means making a contribution—to your friends and family, to your company, to your community, and most important, to the world—by making the best use of your contacts and talents
“Our souls are not hungry for fame, comfort, wealth, or power. Those rewards create almost as many problems as they solve. Our souls are hungry for meaning, for the sense that we have figured out how to live so that our lives matter, so the world will at least be a little bit different for our having passed through it.”
Love, reciprocity, and knowledge are not like bank accounts that grow smaller as you use them. Creativity begets more creativity, money begets more money, knowledge begets more knowledge, more friends beget more friends, success begets even more success.
Anthropologist Margaret Mead once said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
