Real Networking doesn’t necessarily SHOUT
I had a whale of a time working with some seriously creative people who formed part of a business-to-business advertising agency back in the 90s. The guiding light of the company was the CEO, a delightfully ‘mad’ Finn who turned out to be one of the most frustrating, annoying, stretching and empowering employers I’ve ever come across in my entire life.
Over the years I got to know his wife and youngsters and that balanced out the picture of the guy in the workplace who would think nothing of calling me on a Sunday evening on my mobile phone rather than waiting till we were in the office the next day. This behaviour was unheard of in those days – okay, he didn’t drink alcohol but some of us like a jar or two every now and again without the prospect of talking to the boss out of the blue…
Let’s back up a bit
Before I even set foot in the door of the agency, the introduction came through the MD of a fledgling Institute I’d gone to do a couple of weeks work for two years previously – and was still there. By now it was obvious that, with the major push on membership recruitment over and the systems and processes I’d had free reign to implement to underpin the telemarketing of their courses, I’d finally worked my way out of a role that someone with a lot less experience (and for less money) could adequately fulfil.
They were a really nice bunch at the Institute but business is business and they were always struggling to find enough money to push through the activities that would start to realise the MD’s vision. So I was moving on.
I called the CEO of the agency who was a speaker on one of their courses. As the MD of the Institute wasn’t known for doling out praise, the fact that he’d suggested the contact probably helped more than I realised and started the ball rolling for the CEO and I to invest six months creating a role for me in his company.
I had to eat and contribute to bill-paying whilst all this planning was going on so I got a temporary job in one of those managed offices, officially telephone selling a low value, high volume product – which I’m actually useless at. I was only kept on as the boss would use me to brainstorm the bigger picture stuff. That place was the closest I’ve been to working in a hellhole: No windows except a skylight that trapped the overhead sun for at least a couple of hours each day and this was one of the hottest summers London had experienced in years. You’d come out of there at the end of the day literally dripping. But it served its purpose and kept me going for those months till I finally presented to the agency Board and suddenly…
I was ensconced in my own office, sharing the time of the CEO’s Management Assistant, in a swish building in London’s stylish Bloomsbury, dead opposite the British Museum, with cafes all around and Oxford Street’s shops a hop, skip and a jump away!
Within a couple of years my role as Head of Business Intelligence (get me!) expanded to include the Bristol and Basingstoke offices. Along with the research projects that I created and ran for clients that justified my existence fee-wise on a day-to-day basis, I was part of many new business pitches and always a seminar speaker. I travelled a reasonable amount in Europe, courtesy of our clients there. And I’d renegotiated my salary to reflect all that 
.
What’s the point of this story?
It’s in the post Title, really.
Looking back I realise that even the Institute job came about from a phone call to a guy I hadn’t spoken to for a couple of years. I rang him on the off chance he might know of something going. Turned out he was a speaker on one of the Institute’s courses and thought they were looking for some temporary help. His name got me a hearing there.
As for the agency job: I can’t for the life of me think of how that could ever have come about via ‘normal’ channels – and I had six more or less glorious years there.
I hadn’t heard the term ‘networking’ back then, certainly not as it’s bandied nowadays. Yet that series of events came about purely by people who knew me connecting me with someone they thought might, just might be able to help me out.
They were died-in-the-wool business people yet they didn’t do it for any return …
About Linda MattacksDoing what you love, your bit for humankind and the planet (if that turns you on) and making a decent, let alone great living don't necessarily come in the same package! With a background of sales training, marketing and market/marketing research spanning decades, for individuals and companies across the world from micros to corporations, Linda's finally found her niche... and some truly fabulous collaborators. Female employer, employee or entrepreneur, if you're not seeing the fruits of your potential value in the marketplace why not talk to Linda? Call +44(0)7879 628 367
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8 Responses to Real Networking doesn’t necessarily SHOUT
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Linda, I just LOVE this post – it’s so, so true and rings many bells for me.
With so many organisations and individuals braying on about social and business networking these days and claiming to have invented it, it comes as quite a shock to some people to learn that it ain’t new.
As you rightly say it wasn’t called networking in earlier decades – it was called “the grapevine,” contacts, schmoozing, various other terms. And goodness me, how on earth did we manage to do anything other than hunt for our food and rub sticks together for fire without the use of the WWW?
Before the internet revolutionised (well, renamed) the way we pass on business and social information we used to get off our butts and go to socialise with other people. That has now been renamed “offline networking,” or even “F2F” (face to face) networking which conjures up an image of networkers stacked together vertically like sardines, staring up each other’s noses.
Also, we had a crude and cumbersome device known as the telephone. OK, ancient telephones of, say, the 1970s were hardwired to the wall and didn’t play your favourite tunes, take pictures, or cook your breakfast, but they allowed you to speak to people who weren’t staring up your nose and even might have been some distance away.
And as you rightly say, it all worked.
How does it go? Plus ça change, plus c’est la mème chose.
I think your term “Real Networking” could be the start of a highly fashionable new low-tech, retro-chic form of activity. Quick, patent that before Thomas Power gets to hear about it….:-)
Twitter: SuzeStMWrites
Low tech networking, patented – lol
Didn’t take you long, did it, Boss
?
Twitter: Linda_Mattacks
Hi Suze – thank you and I think your idea may well ‘have legs
!
Two good friends of mine are ace at introducing people that might be helpful to each other and staying in touch. One of them is in the entertainment industry and says that just about EVERYTHING comes about via recommendation, reputation and ‘who you know’.
Yet neither of these two has been to a ‘networking’ event, where the sole purpose for many seems to be to shove business cards under as many noses as possible in the shortest possible time, in her life and neither is a member of any online networking platform.
Then you have the likes of Andy Lopata who is a great networker in the true spirit of the term and makes a very good living from it.
And the Boss and I originally ‘met’ on an online networking platform… and here we all are!
It’s a funny old world
Twitter: Linda_Mattacks
Linda, I just LOVE this post – it’s so, so true and rings many bells for me.
With so many organisations and individuals braying on about social and business networking these days and claiming to have invented it, it comes as quite a shock to some people to learn that it ain’t new.
As you rightly say it wasn’t called networking in earlier decades – it was called “the grapevine,” contacts, schmoozing, various other terms. And goodness me, how on earth did we manage to do anything other than hunt for our food and rub sticks together for fire without the use of the WWW?
Before the internet revolutionised (well, renamed) the way we pass on business and social information we used to get off our butts and go to socialise with other people. That has now been renamed “offline networking,” or even “F2F” (face to face) networking which conjures up an image of networkers stacked together vertically like sardines, staring up each other’s noses.
Also, we had a crude and cumbersome device known as the telephone. OK, ancient telephones of, say, the 1970s were hardwired to the wall and didn’t play your favourite tunes, take pictures, or cook your breakfast, but they allowed you to speak to people who weren’t staring up your nose and even might have been some distance away.
And as you rightly say, it all worked.
How does it go? Plus ça change, plus c’est la mème chose.
I think your term “Real Networking” could be the start of a highly fashionable new low-tech, retro-chic form of activity. Quick, patent that before Thomas Power gets to hear about it….:-)
Twitter: SuzeStMWrites
Low tech networking, patented – lol
Didn’t take you long, did it, Boss
?
Twitter: Linda_Mattacks
Hi Suze – thank you and I think your idea may well ‘have legs
!
Two good friends of mine are ace at introducing people that might be helpful to each other and staying in touch. One of them is in the entertainment industry and says that just about EVERYTHING comes about via recommendation, reputation and ‘who you know’.
Yet neither of these two has been to a ‘networking’ event, where the sole purpose for many seems to be to shove business cards under as many noses as possible in the shortest possible time, in her life and neither is a member of any online networking platform.
Then you have the likes of Andy Lopata who is a great networker in the true spirit of the term and makes a very good living from it.
And the Boss and I originally ‘met’ on an online networking platform… and here we all are!
It’s a funny old world
Twitter: Linda_Mattacks