Archive for category Networking
World Class Moderator and mentor
Posted by David C. Buchan in Coaching others, Inspiration and motivation, Networking, Self improvement on June 24th, 2009
Reading time: < 1 minute
Mentors play such an important part in our lives. Today I was blessed to hear that someone who I’ve been working alongside for several years now has been describing me to her friends as her mentor. I trust it is no coincidence I just heard from one of my mentors — Roy Sheppard, World Class Moderator — the very person who showed me there was such a thing as personal development and to whom I ultimately owe the identification of my calling to guide people to the path of self improvement and walk beside them on their journey.
Roy has just launced the World Class Moderator site to showcase his speaking work. Take a moment to have a look. You never know what may come from it.
Go for No!
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking, Self improvement on May 26th, 2009
Reading time: 1 – 2 minutes
It turns out that you can judge a book by its cover. In this case, Go for No! in which the premise of the book is summarised in the title. If you want success, don’t chase the yes — chase the no. It’s only from chasing no that you will get sufficient learning to enable the yes’s to occur.
We can often fall into the trap of failing to ask for something because we’re afraid of a negative response. This bold assessment that we know what the other person will say (how often do you know what you’ll say) stops us from creating the opportunity for them to say either ‘no’ or ‘yes’. How dangerous is it to hold back on a question because we can’t afford to hear no, yet by doing so we don’t allow the very yes we so desperately need.
This book describes why setting a target to achieve a certain number of no responses will automatically generate the required number of yes responses.
The Fine Art of Small Talk
Posted by David C. Buchan in Inspiration and motivation, Networking, Self improvement on May 19th, 2009
Reading time: 2 – 2 minutes
Initiating a conversation with other people can be difficult as most of us are so worried about what the other person will think of us that we decide it’s better to say nothing than to expose our flaws. This topic is just one covered in The Fine Art of Small Talk by Debra Fine. For me this book differs from the many other ‘How to speak to people’ books out there because it entwines real stories with some ideas that go beyond have courage, smile and be pleasant.
Take for example Debra’s ideas on how to approach acquaintances about their work or family life. Instead of asking “How’s work?” and walking into a minefield because they were made redundant last week and didn’t know it, ask “How has your year been?” or “What’s been going on with work since I last saw you?”. This provides both parties a graceful way to explore or avoid the situation. Similarly don’t use “How’s your wife/husband/partner” but instead use “Bring me up to date on your family”.
One of my personal pet-hate questions, though not listed in the book, is “Are you having children?”. This question causes extreme pain to all those couples who are striving to have children but can’t for whatever reason. I know; I’ve been there. It presumes so much.
Another suggestion I’ve picked up on the way is to ask people, “So, do you work locally?” instead of “Where do you work?”. Similar to the suggestions above it allows the other party to gracefully handle the loss of a job, working from home, etc.
Yet I digress. The Fine Art of Small Talk is an easy read on what should be an easy subject. It carries with it useful information and a shot of confidence.
The Brain Blog shows the benefits of mapping relationships
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking, Using technology on May 6th, 2009
Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes
When you start mapping out the people you know and their relationships to you, and one another, interesting things happen. The Brain Blog’s article Everyone Is Connected. It’s Time to See the Links. which describes adding people and mind mapping social networks has several examples of the ways in which you can use PersonalBrain as a tool for mapping. As the article intro says,
If you don’t have your family or colleagues in your Brain you are missing out. Adding people in your Brain whether it’s their name connected to a project or their contact info will help you get the big picture on your relationships. Creating a people centric Brain will improve the quality of your interactions so you can remember key details that might otherwise be forgotten.
I expand the original article with a description of my own practices below.
Further ideas on mapping relationships
Family relationships
In my brain I map family relationships as follows:
- Husband and wife are linked with a join link
- Children are linked as child links from each parent, and with join links to each other as siblings.
I don’t use labels as my real brain can keep track of the relationships when it sees them. I may in the future but so far have found no need to.
In the example below we have Donald Duck, his girlfriend Daisy Duck and sister Della Duck (see the full Duck Family for more info on Donald’s relatives).
And if we show Della Duck you’ll see her three sons, Huey, Dewey and Louie. Each is linked to Della as parent and to each other as a sibling.
Finally we have Huey as son on Della Duck and brother to Louie and Dewey.
Events
In addition to linking people by workplace or family relationship, I also link them to the events (seminars, training sessions, conferences) where I either met them or attended with them. This helps me connect to our history.
Your connectors
An earlier article describes how I used MindManager to identify the connectors in my network. Unfortunately the graphic has gone to Internet heaven and I’ll have to find the original file.
Use the phone to build relationships instead of email
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking, Using technology on February 21st, 2006
Reading time: 1 – 2 minutes
What do you do when email is down or it fails to get your point across? I bet you pick up the phone just like I do. Robert Gerrish of Flying Solo makes a great point about conversation and relationships in his latest newsletter.
Just imagine if email were taken away from you. What would you do? Would you type 20, 30, 40 letters a day? Fold them, pop them in envelopes and trundle up to the letterbox? Not a chance.
I sure as hell wouldn’t. It would be worse if I needed to have a printed label on each envelope. The choice of communication channel is critical in the creation of quality working relationships. Email traverses distance in time differently from a phone or face-to-face conversation. It also changes the nature of the interaction. Only last week I shared with someone the example of an email sent to my cousin which drew the response, “Are you allright?”. I was fine as would have been evident over the phone, yet in the email there was no emotional marker. (have you noticed there are emoticons for a lot of emotions but “ok” is not included). My cousin’s own mood effected how he interpreted mine. How ironic that for most of us email travels over the phone line.
Why updating your LinkedIn email addresses is important
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking, Using technology on October 18th, 2005
Reading time: < 1 minute
Today I wrote a LinkedIn endorsement for a friend’s past position. They are in their new job but their LinkedIn profile only contains their old email address. The endorsement went to the old employer and not to my friend. Thankfully the old emails are being passed on. But to compound things they have lost the password needed to log in and correct the problem. Guess where that get’s sent. The old email address again! That’s why you need to update your LinkedIn emails addresses.
Update your LinkedIn email addresses when they change
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking, Using technology on October 14th, 2005
Reading time: < 1 minute
If you have a LinkedIn account then make sure you have registered all your email addresses. When someone uploads their contact list, LinkedIn matches their contacts against registered email accounts. If a past colleague or friend has an old or a personal address and you’re only using the new one, the little ‘already LinkedIn’ icon won’t appear and you may miss a chance of reconnecting.
As they say, “Extra email addresses are useful if you expect to be invited at more than one address.”
Go to your profile and select add/edit email. Simple as that.
List of selection criteria to invite people into your network
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking on June 16th, 2005
Reading time: 2 – 2 minutes
In his book, Your Personal Survival Guide to the 21st Century, business author Roy Sheppard writes
You can tell a good networker at a party – they attract people like a magnet because they are worth knowing. They are interested in others, and they respect people deeply. They actively put individuals together. When they meet someone new, a poor networker asks the question “How useful is this person to me personally?”. A distinguished network will ask themselves, “How useful is this person to my network?”.
It is good advice, but I’ve been wondering just how do you know the value your new potential network contact brings. Indeed, how do you assess the value of existing network contacts.
Some possible criteria are:
- the duration of contact you’ve had with them
- how frequently you meet
- the impact of workload on their availablitity for conversation
- the ease with which they can be contacted
- locality
- professional speciality (common or scarce)
- the number of referrals made/used
- who they know (their network and position as a centre of influence)
- their exposure to new people
- industry
- the quality of their networking skills
Each of these will have a different weighting and it would be interesting to understand if something more formal could be created from it. That would enable me to focus on the higher leverage people in my network and serve everyone better.
Identifying the Connectors in my Network
Posted by David C. Buchan in Networking on December 15th, 2004
Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes
Malcolm Gladwell gives a great explanation of connectors in his book, “The Tipping Point”. They are the people who get great satisfaction from connecting others. ANd in that, they create great value. He says there are varying degrees of connector. From the person who can only make a few introductions, to the person who can make hundreds of them at will.
I thought, “Who are the connectors in my network? It will be useful for me to know exactly who and how I can best offer assistance to the people they know.” I took it upon myself this morning to map out who introduced me to who. It was a fascinating and rewarding experience—reconnecting me with many memories. Riding my bike along the highway on a hot summer day as my friend and I chased down someone he knew. Sadly that friend has since passed yet the person he introduced me to remains a life-long friend. In another case I can track the roots of an introduction to a friend in Denmark all the way back to a friendship of my Uncle’s youth. If you’re interested it goes like this. Me -> My Mum -> Her brother (my uncle) -> His friend -> His wife -> Her parents -> Their exchange student -> My friend. One work colleague inadvertently put forward the series of introductions (about 5-6 chained) which led me to a career as an ontological coach.
Take a look at the map of my network and notice how many people lead nowhere, whereas others are rich in the people they know.
The original list was created using MindManager and converted for your enjoyment. My rules were:
- Link to the person that introduced me. If I know that somebody else knew you, but we had not met, that connection was ignored. Rather it was the person who actually introduced us.
- Don’t map relationships between people. This is about who introduced me to who. Not who knows who. That’s another task to look at.
- Networking professional bodies are included as people because they are the catalyst for the introductions. Workplaces are treated the same (otherwise you end up linking to the person who interviewed you
- Only link to people I know. If I know you know somebody who I don’t I’ll have to wait for that introduction before adding it.
Then to make it public I shaded all the boxes and text the same colour. You shouldn’t be able to read it.
This was a worthwhile exercise for the 2 hours it took and I plan to keep it up to date. I suggest you do the same. And, if you know Malcolm, perhaps he’d be interested in this. Please let him know.
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Charter for Compassion
