Networking and Manners

Last week I met with a woman who facilitates cultural change within large enterprises.  The discussion was around business development for sole practitioners, plus a small Joomla based website that we were deploying for her to manage some communications issues.  She had realised that her client base was starting to thin out a little whilst she was distracted working on a large project for 12 months, and consequently needed  to give things a push along.  Since her offering is what I would call “soft” she needed to get some new relationships happening (as compared to spending her bucks on SEO for her website).

Because of this, I decided to connect her up with another woman I had been dealing with recently who worked in a similar field.  My thinking was that there were some potential synergies and I was amused by the fact that they both had man’s names so there was a potential surprise for both of them.

My email went like this:

Hi X &Y.

1.   I like both of you, and am working with both of you.
2.   You are both sole practitioners operating in similar areas.
3.   I think you should meet  / have coffee / see if there are any synergies.

X is in Inner West, Y is in Inner East.   Ball is in your court.

X’s Contact Details

Y’s Contact details

Cheers
Brendan

I do this kind of connecting at least once a week as I am a big believer in paying it forward.   Sometimes I even do it on demand, but only if asked nicely, as per this great HBR article .  An interesting side effect of me doing this connecting  is I get an almost instant insight into the character of people.  From some people I get an immediate thank you, a note that lets me know whether contact is being made and another downstream to let me know if there is any outcomes from the connection.  From others I get silence, then usually  an email two months later asking for the contact details again.  So guess who I feel obliged to help out and will connect up again?

Just a reminder in a time of social media and personal brand, that manners matter.  And its difficult to measure opportunities lost, when you never knew they existed.

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