Networking

Posted: February 6th, 2006 | Author: Michael R. Murphy | Filed under: Career | No Comments »

Raise your hand if you’ve never had to look for a job….That’s what I thought.

You’re probably all too familiar with the saying,“It’s not what you know,it’s who you know”. Conversely,it’s also been said,“It’s not who you know,it’s who knows you”. I think successful networking is a little bit of both.

Since I’ve stumbled across two great articles about networking lately,I wanted to link to them and throw in some comments of my own. Since my job at the pizza shop way back in high school is the only job I’ve ever gotten without being referred by somebody,I know how important networking can be.

Guy Kawasaki’s “The Art of Schmoozing” discusses the ground rules for effective networking. I am consistently wowed by Guy’s writing and this post is no different. As an ex-Apple exec turned venture capitalist,Guy knows what it’s like to be schmoozed. Read his tips and you’ll be a better networker for it.

See the section on Face Time at Christopher Hawkin’s web site for details on how he used networking to start and grow a business in a town where he knew no one. All it took is a little legwork and some careful listening.

Back in July,I wrote about LinkedIn,a professional networking site,after I read about it in the career section of the local paper. The gist of the newspaper article is that more and more companies are turning to referrals in order to get quality candidates rather than online job sites such as Monster,HotJobs,etc. You know the drill,you find a posting online and you’re one button click away from exiling your resume to the abyss along with 100,000 other applicants using the site. LinkedIn allows users to cultivate a network of trusted colleagues who,ideally,they would have no problems referring to other users. I’ve made tons of great professional contacts in this manner.

Both of the articles above mention something that I think is important enough to be worth mentioning again. Networking is not about what someone can do for you but what you can do for them. Be generous. Favors come back a thousand fold. Becoming a valuable resource for someone is the surest way to open doors to all sorts of opportunities you can’t even imagine now.

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