Networking In a Large Group Scenario
I attended a networking meeting last evening. The meeting was organized by a business networking group which I attend weekly that meets in the morning. Our evening meeting was to attract individuals, who like each of us, have our own business and are looking to join a group of fellow entrepreneurs to help promote and grow our respective businesses.
When I first had a business of my own 10 years ago, and began to realize that network gatherings were part of the process to help develop one’s business, I struggled with it. While I can be very personable, I tend to be more so in one to one situations as opposed to larger groups. In those type of gatherings I tend to be more of an observer, than the type of person to interact with everyone in the room. And, so in my early larger group networking get-togethers, (particularly those that were evening based), I would often say to myself, “What was the value of that event to me? Why did I even bother going to it?”
As time has gone on, my networking skills have improved. The business networking group of which I am a part has provided me an educational foundation of what good networking is all about. While our group last evening had about 15 of our members and 15 guests, I did not make it my mission to connect with everyone in the room. Certainly if someone came up to me, I spent those moments speaking to them, focused only on them, and not having my eyes wander all over the room. As our group is about business networking, I listened closely to what their business was about, explained mine, and we looked to see if we might have common connections. Even if we did not, knowing they had come to the group as a visitor, I looked to learn more about what they knew about our business networking group, how it operated, if they were interested in attending a future meeting at our regular morning time. It helped to ease the person I was speaking, to see that our group was indeed welcoming to business owners who might compliment the professions we already had in our chapter.
By the end of the evening, while it is possible that I could have missed a person or two that may have been a good connection for me, I did indeed make 5 new connections. This morning, I have looked to further the connections by reaching out to connect with them on Linked In. With 2 or 3 of those, where we touched on ways we might be able to work together, I will look to schedule a follow up coffee meeting or lunch with one or two of the individuals I met. One in particular had a business very complimentary to mine, and I know has a lot to offer as a speaker to the job search support groups which I facilitate.
So in summing up last evening and the principles that I have learned, applied and do work:
- When networking at a large gathering, don’t worry about connecting with everyone in the room. Look to focus on the people you meet directly, or if you have heard what someone does and it appears to compliment what you do well, make it a point to connect with them.
- When engaged with an individual, concentrate on them completely. Do not have your eyes wandering all over the room, wondering what is going on in other conversations.
- Look for ways to provide value to the other person. Don’t make it all about yourself. For example, even businesses which really don’t have much to do with mine, I could alert them to why our chapter might be right for them, given the mix of businesses in the chapter.
- And, while it did not occur, if you find yourself alone at a large group networking meeting, look for others that appear to be alone too. Start a conversation with them. They will appreciate that someone reached out.
