Don’t Network in Tiny Boxes
Josh Hinds over at Business Networking Advice invited me to answer a few questions about business networking. I was happy to oblige, and I hope you’ll check out my quick interview with him.
His first question was, “How do you define Business Networking and why do you feel it is important?”
I mulled this over for a few days. The way I’ve been currently thinking, and the way blogging has opened up so many doors, I didn’t want to answer narrowly.
And then I started thinking about tiny boxes. Josh’s question said, “business networking” but all I could think about in that context was getting into a room and trying to generate leads. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but it’s clear there’s so much more to networking than that.
Networking in a tiny box means:
- Focusing on accomplishing only 1 thing.
- Keeping in a tight circle, be it with the same people, within the same industry, or same groups.
- Not being open minded.
- Not looking for opportunities that you didn’t know existed.
It’s really the word “business” that got me thinking. You shouldn’t network in a “business box” - you should just network.
This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t attend industry events, try and generate leads and sales and focus on business goals while networking.
But limiting yourself by networking in a box means you’ll eventually hit all four walls and that’s the end of that. Your ability to improve yourself, your business and opportunities for others just came to a screeching halt.
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I agree wholeheartedly Ben. And once again you’ve touched on something very timely and relevant for me. Just this week I swallowed my pride and dropped out of the BNI “box” I had created for myself. I love the people I was networking with, but the structure had created a “tight circle” as you put it and severely limited other opportunities.
Also, great interview and I look forward to learning more about your gifter.org project!
Denise - glad you found the post worthwhile and timely! Breaking away from the boxes we create around ourselves is tough…I struggle with it all the time. Usually it works out for the better!
And I hope you will check out Gifter.org and help us promote it!
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Good interview and a timely topic! I look at networking as a kind of connect-the-dots kind of activity. Being fairly new to the blogging scene, I’ve been surprised at how quickly some of my dots are connecting.
In the real world I think I have more of a maze of connections, than that tight circle you mention. Meaning, I know a lot of people who don’t know each other, so it’s harder to connect the dots. They’re all in different circles(or boxes)spread far and wide.
Francie - thanks for stopping by. Having a maze of connections can be a good thing. It might take longer to connect the dots, but as you do that, you’ll be way more successful than people who network in the same box all the time.
And you’ll see how it goes with blogging … connecting the dots is easy!
[…] I was reading Ben’s post: Don’t Network in Tiny Boxes, and working out how that will apply to what I’m doing. […]
Brilliant insight, thanks!
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