« Your Career is An Asset: Don’t Let it Depreciate
Why The Economy Isn’t the Boss of You »

Tune Out Noisy New Year’s Networking, Tune In To Yourself

December 21, 2008 | Author: Promise Phelon | Filed under: The Networking Habit

As the holidays and New Year’s approach, we’re hearing a lot of noise about the need to network more.

Rampant job loss, a lack of confidence in our capital markets and surprises like the fed-interest rate cut and the Madoff scandal are throwing curveballs left, right and center. So people start to reach out in a nervous panic, hoping to make use of a slew of social gatherings.

Our take: Don’t be part of the New Year’s networking noise.

Think ahead to January 5: Email inboxes will be packed with requests for breakfast, lunch, dinner, coffee and check-in meetings. Why compete with everyone else for attention? There’s no countdown when it comes to networking.

A recent Wall Street Journal about Ways Job Seekers Can Find Old Contacts highlights the fact that networking should be an ongoing activity, rather than a frantic, job-search-driven one.

“Many laid-off professionals who’ve worked at the same company  — or just a few firms  — over their careers may find that their networks have gone stale. Experts recommend networking be done consistently and be nurtured throughout a career,” writes Dana Mattioli. 

For the simple purpose of keeping current contact information on the people in our networks, it’s important to stay in touch. The same article says that LinkedIn officials have seen a 36-per-cent increase in membership over the past six months “as executives scramble to rebuild their networks.”

Most of our networks are stale: unused, under-leveraged and ineffective. Based on UpMo’s recent study involving 650 professionals, networking activity definitely tends to spike around job transitions.

If I were looking for a job, or concerned about my network’s ability to help me find my next opportunity, here is what I would do over the holidays:

  • Spend time processing my goals: What do I want to see happen in 2009?
  • Send funny, colorful holiday cheer in the form of email, snail mail or FaceBook messages to your extended network. Wish them a happy holiday and check up on them. Try asking them what their goals are for 2009. Engage in a conversation. No one’s getting work done anyway.
  • Instead of buying your niece that Nintendo Wii or your uncle that leather jacket, invest money in buying and reading one of the top 10 business books of the year — one that’s relevant to what you do.
  • Then buy enough to send to 10 people in your network who will help you reach your 2009 career goal. Include a personal note. Include your contact details and why you thought they’d enjoy the book. Let them know what your career goal is for 2009.
  • After the first of the year, follow up on the conversation. Offer some insight to their 2009 goal, and ask for any ideas about yours.

    • You’re looking for something real right now. The economy is in a bad place. We’ve all got to be focused and purposeful. Whether you’re working or not working, your network could be the one thing that saves you.

    Start cultivating now. Start with checking in with yourself, checking in with your network, offering a small and meaningful gift, and then asking for insights in return. Avoid the perception that you’re desperate — even if you are!

    Share/Save/Bookmark

    This entry was posted on Sunday, December 21st, 2008 and is filed under The Networking Habit. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

    xygoxen

    No comments yet.

    feel free to leave a comment

    Comment Guidelines: Basic XHTML is allowed (a href, strong, em, code). All line breaks and paragraphs are automatically generated. Off-topic or inappropriate comments will be edited or deleted. Email addresses will never be published. Keep it PG-13 people!

    XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

    All fields marked with " * " are required.