Becoming a Member of the Club - Ch 1 of Never Eat Alone
March 9th, 2007 by digerati
This is the first chapter of the Never Eat Alone
Where are the places you go to meet the kind of people who could most impact your life?
We often hear about the important of mentors in our lives. The people you will learn the best from are people you can interact with in person. You have to meet these people somewhere, but few people think about actively going out to meet them. Most people assume they will just run into these people randomly. As I’ve said before, I try to go to random places a lot, which makes them not so random.
If you are a college student looking to meet a mentor who is in the business world, you will not do that on campus. Go eat lunch in the business district, go to happy hour near offices, etc. You have to actively decide who you want to meet and then seek out the places those people go. You may be able to pull this off even if you are trying to meet a specific person.
Nothing came close to the impact of mentors.
I’ve found this to be very true in my life so far. There are a small handful of people who have made the majority of difference in my life. Some of these were more mentor like positions - family members in business, professors, … - but some of them have been good friends too. It’s important to realize that some people have an impact on you, and it is important to decide if that is the influence you want in your life.
The real networking was about finding ways to make other people more successful.
This point can’t be stressed enough. If you are selfish, especially in networking, eventually it will catch up with you. It is far better (and easier actually) to set out to network in order to help other people. Later we’ll discuss why having mentees (proteges) is as important as having mentors. It is also much easier to start out networking if your goal is to not just meet a bunch of people, but to pick some people you’d like to help. You can work on their projects, support their campaigns, or volunteer in the same organizations. The point is that you are not selfishly trying to meet the person, but rather trying to understand them as how you can help each other in the long run.
Finally, networking is most certainly NOT about meeting people. It is about connecting with people. One of the coolest aspects of networking is when you really make the connection.
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Never Eat Alone is one of the best networking books written, period. Buy it now and follow along as Catch a Gideon goes through each chapter of the book.
Finance Guide 101 Says
Whenever I have met my mentors it was almost more than just a meeting because there was always big discussions on all the topics. So I always visited them in the evenings and mostly on weekends.
“Networking is most certainly NOT about meeting people. It is about connecting with people. One of the coolest aspects of networking is when you really make the connection.” I am completely agree with this.
Daniel.
Mar 16th, 2007 at 1:20 am