Relational Networking: More Mind, Less Time, More Connections

Another guest post for today, this is from the wonderful Liz Strauss.

I belong to several social networking sites. I follow an active list of 700+ Chicagoans, and I attend a variety of events where networking takes place. Over the past few months one thing has become abundantly.

It’s exhausting to watch people networking.

Many folks pursue networking by the numbers. To them, networking is about the number of people they meet. The premise is that more people means more possibilities for a solid connection that leads to opportunity.

I admire their investment and their energy. They’re always engaged — in conversation or on their way to an event. Life is a constant invitation to meet new people and see where they fit. I don’t know when they find time to read a book or see a movie.

What good is a network if you spend all of your time building and maintaining it? There really is an easier way to create a stronger, more personally powerful network.

Relational Networking

Relational networking isn’t about the numbers. It’s about the “who.” In today’s attention economy, a small, but powerful personal network of genuine friends and influencers is easier to build and much more fulfilling to tend.

Relational networking builds out the edges of relationships that already exist. By focusing where you already are, you use more of your mind, less of your time, and find more meaningful connections. Here’s how to start relational networking.

• Map out a circle of your relationships. You might use the friends graph on Facebook or draw your own. Put the people you know well close to you and those you know least farthest away. Add to it as you remember people over a period of a few days.
• Expand your relationships horizontally. Move out to the edges of your existing circle. Who’s there that you’d like to know better? Who’s there that’s in a industry or a job that involves a circle of people that you find interesting?
• Expand your relationships vertically. List the folks you know who are just a little further up ladder or down the path from you. Look for occasions, conversation, and opportunities to interact authentically with just one person on that list. Choose a person you genuine like and admire. Start a conversation via email or a simple blog comment. Meet that person with a beginner’s mind and without strings.
• Expand your relationships in your neighborhood. If you’re interested in blogging, make a goal to meet one other blogger in your geographic area in the next few weeks. Just having the goal will make you more sensitive to who the people are that you encounter each day.
• Expand your relationships in a circle. List five kinds of people you enjoy spending time with — marketers, writers, financial planners, professors, entrepreneurs. Have a goal to form a relationship with one of each in the next 45 days.

Expect that not every person you contact will have time for another relationship. But each new person who accepts your offer will be someone with whom you already have a distant relationship. It’s the slight distance that’s the value — each of you offers the other a new circle of friends and opportunities.

Networking is more fun and more powerful when we’re not just processing more and more people. The most powerful personal networks grow from existing relationships. Consider the most valuable relationships in your network. What percent were built from the edges of other relationships?

Liz Strauss writes about the business of connecting ideas, relationships, and people at Successful-Blog.