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Month: May 2017

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Best Practices Growth Human Resources Leadership Personal Development

3 Steps to Build Solid Relationships Over the long Haul

I am often asked how I grew such a powerful and large network of people and how I get the speakers I do for my networking dinners. Why do major public figures and corporate giants say YES to me?

The question: “What’s your formula, Jeanne?”

The answer: “I seek relationships, not outcomes.”

Our outcome seeking culture may tell you this is a bad formula because it doesn’t always yield immediate results. From my own experiences, the promise of immediate results doesn’t last over the long haul.

It is the long haul I am interested in.

I train my clients to utilize the principles of comedy improv as the foundation for relationship building, in every space they enter. For example, the audience watching an improv show feels engaged as soon as they understand the relationship of the characters. “Who are these people?” – is the ultimate question that needs to be answered, just as we need to answer this in interactions with others. We are made to go deeper like characters in an improv show. We strive to feel more satisfaction with the relationships we have. When we have known and interacted with someone over time, we remember.

Relationships are key to your success and they take time to cultivate. I never stop connecting and re-connecting. The most solid forces in my work and personal life are also relentless connectors. We understand and nurture this powerful group.

Everyone reading this can get real results when making someone feel good. People will remember how you made them feel which will pay out over time.

1.) Practice Pro-Active Communication

If you see an article or hear a story that reminds you of someone you know and want to get to know them better, e-mail then, private message them, share it with them via Twitter or LinkedIN and QUOTE them when possible. When I do this, I’m thanked for my thoughtfulness.

2.) Be Patient with people when you don’t hear back

If someone is not responding via e-mail and/or call and your instinct told you you’ve got a solid connection with that person, trust your instinct and NEVER giving up on reaching out to them. Give a few weeks or months and reach out again with positivity. Pick up where you left off when you last connected. I cannot tell you how many people I have done this with who have thanked me for my persistence and patience.

3.) Give without measure or announcement

If you take one tip away from these, let it be this one. Remember giving is giving and when we give well, we do so without seeking something in return. This idea smacks in the face of most outcome seekers because it is thought we must receive something in return. I have learned when I give without measure or announcement what I receive is better and richer than what I would have imagined as an outcome.

If you are reading this you are a C-Suite Executive likely doing what you love and chances are, most of the people you meet are moved by that and want to get to know you better. Focus on relationship building over the long haul and enjoy the unexpected gifts to come.

Categories
Growth Personal Development

A New Twist on Employee Engagement

 

I recently heard a speaker put a twist on employee engagement. She said that it isn’t engaged employees who are productive, but rather it is productive employees that are engaged. While at first I thought this sounded like a novel way to look at an age-old dilemma of employee engagement, upon further thought I have to disagree. Just because someone is productive, busy getting stuff done, meeting deadlines, checking things off the to-do list, does not mean they are contributing fully or really engaged. Just because they are productive does not mean they are not looking or willing to leave for the next great opportunity that comes knocking.

I was productive when I was an information security consultant. I spent my days working with clients, reviewing documentation, writing reports, and solving problems and my deliverables were always on time. But I was not satisfied or truly engaged and I was always trying to figure what I should do next. Now as an executive coach, trainer, and speaker I am fully engaged and productive.

Assuming a productive employee is engaged is a huge mistake for an employer. If my boss assumed that I was engaged because I was productive they were obviously mistaken and that can be costly when a good employee leaves, especially the ones you did not expect to lose or did not want to lose. We all know the cost of turnover is high, especially if you are employing specialists or are in a specialty field.

This article is not a “how to” on creating productive and engaged employees, there will be more on those topics in the future. This is meant to get you thinking and challenge your assumptions. If you think that just because you have productive employees that means you also have engaged employees this article is meant to challenge that paradigm. If you want to keep your talent and create a more powerful workforce you need to ensure they are truly engaged regardless of how productive you think they are.

Let’s dive in a little deeper here. Everyone wants to contribute in a certain way and there is no right or wrong way for this to happen. The challenge is that most people have not given it much thought as it relates to the work they chose to do and employers have not seen it as their responsibility to help their employees figure this out. The reason it actually is an organizational responsibility is because everyone is different, but many organizations and managers want to put everyone in the same box and tell them how to do their work instead of giving individuals the opportunity to work the way that makes sense for them.

Some people work very well in groups doing brainstorming sessions to come up with ideas and potential solutions while others really want to solve problems more independently. There are those who like creating systems and those who like creating relationships. Some of your employees want to make decisions through action while others want to make decisions through complex analysis. You have some sales people who are great at cold calls and are actually engaged in the process and others who want to be in the field, face-to-face with their prospects having conversations. Put the person who likes cold calls in the field or vice versa and you have just killed the engagement and productivity of those people who are actually great talent when able to contribute in the way that honors them.

Instead of putting people in positions based on a preconceived notion about what someone with a specific skill set should do, stop and ask critical questions: Who are you? How do you learn? How do you want to work? What is it that drives you to contribute fully? Of course this is just scratching the surface on how to best engage your employees by putting them in roles they will naturally want to contribute to with their full effort. The tool I use is called the Core Values Index (CVI) by Taylor Protocols and I use it with clients to do this very thing among others. You can take it for free by visiting www.c-suiteresults.com

When you find people productive and engaged I bet you big dollars that they are doing work that is truly aligned with who they are. They are doing work that actually lights them up, that they look forward to, and that they have control over. Why do you think so many people leave corporate America to start a business? It’s not because being an entrepreneur is easy or carefree. It is because they can do the work that they believe they are meant to be doing in the way they feel that they are meant to do it, which they did not experience in their corporate job. If more people were able to contribute at work the way they are meant to contribute I bet more good employees would stay employees.

If you are ready examine this in more detail then I recommend bringing in a professional. Someone who can help you examine your current situation, help you create a change plan where it’s needed, and support you along the way. Of course you can start looking at this on your own, but often when you are too close to the problem it can be very hard to see the gaps and even harder to come up with the solutions. Remember specialists are here to help you, they are not a sign of weakness. Just like you see a specialist to look at a medical issue, a coach to help your golf game, and an accountant to take care of the books, specialists have their place in your life and in your business. Change specialists, coaches, and management consultants are here for a reason.

Ask around, do your homework, and find someone that understands you and that you feel comfortable with. If you want a free consult with an executive coach, I am available to discuss your situation. You can reach me at sharon@c-suiteresults.com and learn more at www.c-suiteresults.com.

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Skills Women In Business

Executive Story Telling Lessons from Pixar

When I’m working with clients on their public speaking and presentation skills, one of the more common questions I get is, “I keep hearing that I’m supposed to tell stories, but where do you get your stories? I’m not a storyteller. How do you find them, and how do you know when to use them?”

There are lots of places where a well-timed, well-honed anecdote will be far more compelling than a dry, technical explanation. But what story should you use? That’s often the sticking question for many people. If only it was as easy as taking ideas from movies, but we can’t do that… or can we?
Pixar – the movie giant of Toy Story fame – has teamed up with Kahn Academy to create a program called “Pixar in a Box,” offering a range of different creative virtual training programs, and the newest series is “The Art of Storytelling.” While their short, interactive videos, transcripts, lesson plan and activity sequences are typically aiming for those in more entertainment-oriented industries, the exercises are great mind-openers to concepts and strategies that are very applicable in the corporate world. The concept of using storytelling in presentations and the like is not new, although it certainly has become more popular in recent years. Pixar’s take on it gives it a new spin, along with a step-by-step tutorial on how to build a story that has impact. While you may not be looking to create a 90-minute animated comedy feature film like Inside Out, figuring out how to use these strategies to weave compelling and persuasive anecdotes into your presentations, discussions, and other exchanges is a true skill worth developing. The key is about bringing information to life. It’s about painting pictures for the listener in a way that helps them personally relate to the topic at hand, where they can visualize what you describe, imagine smells and textures, and empathetically feel the emotions you want to evoke. If you’ve ever watched a Pixar film, you know they are the masters at this. (And if you have never seen a Pixar movie, that’s your first homework assignment this weekend! Try Finding Nemo or Monsters, Inc.) Do you need to go through all of the lessons like how to do storyboarding? Maybe not, but you never know! Maybe it will give you ideas for how to direct your IT department or graphics department on what kind of visuals you want in your slide deck. Or maybe it will get your creative juices flowing to help get you unstuck by doing different kinds of pencil sketches for 30 seconds instead of trying to compose in a linear format when you don’t know where to start and the blinking cursor is just staring at you on the screen. The nice part is that you can skip any pieces you don’t feel like exploring and jump around to the parts that peak your interest. The series is currently under construction but the first couple of lessons are already available. So go ahead, at your next lunch break, take a peek, watch one of their videos (each one is just a couple of minutes long) and play with an exercise or two just to see what it stimulates in your mind and on the paper. You may just find you’re a natural storyteller after all!

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Do you have questions or comments about the issues in today’s post, want to know how to apply them, or how to help others with them? If so, contact me at laura@vocalimpactproductions.com or click here to schedule a 20-minute focus call to discuss them with me personally!

Categories
Growth Management Personal Development

C-Suite Network Advisor Summit and Conference—A Unique Experience!

C-Suite Network Chairman and Co-Founder, Jeffrey Hayzlett, kicked off the program.

I had the tremendous honor to attend the C-Suite Network Advisor Summit and Conference in Dallas, Texas on May 22 and 23. I accepted the invitation to become a C-Suite Network Advisor after the December 2016 meeting held in New York, New York where the program was unveiled. So, this was my first opportunity to attend an official C-Suite Network event. I have talked about this unique experience incessantly since leaving. It is unbelievable how timely the content was and how beneficial it is to share some of the gems I took away with clients and friends.

C-Suite Network Chairman and Co-Founder, Jeffery Hayzlett kicked off the C-Suite Network Advisor Summit on May 22 with a rousing introduction. To put things in perspective, he reminded us of the fact there are over 28 million businesses in North America and that our target is businesses with revenues of $5 Million or more. Within this target, we are interested in small business owners, senior level executives (typically with the title of VP and above) and any of the 30 CxO roles (CEO, CFO, COO, etc.).

The C-Suite Network was started because there was nothing that provided what Jeffrey and his co-founders wanted for themselves. Therefore, inside the C-Suite Network there are 4 C’s they deliver which we should remember when explaining the unique value proposition of this network:
• Community: vetted network of peers.
• Content: curated content uniquely tailored for this elite group of leaders.
• Conferences: opportunities for private networking with executives from different communities to share perspectives and gain new insights.
• Concierge: services to support this elite group of leaders.

Jeffrey Hayzlett reminded us that the same services designed to support the C-Level executive’s members are available to the network of Advisors. I found this review and reminder extremely helpful.

C-Suite Network Advisor, Lou Diamond explained his C-Suite TV experience during the Summit and later signed copies of his book at the Author signing session.

I was encouraged to hear about the power C-Suite TV and the C-Suite Book club are having for those with content on those channels. The story Lou Diamond and Diane DiResta told about people recognizing them from across the country and the reaction to being in the elevator with someone while your content is being displayed is priceless. The distribution reaches over one million high end hotels and the top 50 airports across the U.S. and growing! More that 80 million people are viewing the C-Suite TV content every month! This is more motivation for me to do what it takes to get my content on both of these channels.

C-Suite Network Advisor, Diane DiResta explained her C-Suite TV experience during the Summit and later signed copies of her book at the Author signing session.

We had a couple of table exercises to share best processes we follow in our daily work and exchange tools we find most helpful. This was a very useful part of the Summit and we all walked away with something new to try, validation for something we were already using or a new way to leverage an existing tool in ways we were not doing before.

One of my biggest takeaways from this conference is the definition of “expert” and how to position my expertise. I had my own definition and understanding of what an expert is. The panel discussion on this topic stressed that we all are in the room as C-Suite Network Advisors because we are Experts! Steve Gallegos, whose career includes experience as a Board-Certified Trial Lawyer in California, amplified the reason each Advisor is an expert. He explained: “the courts were very clear that there is no “set standard” for someone to serve as an expert. A person can be deemed an expert if they can establish sufficient training, research or study in the particular field of expertise. How much training, the quality and/or the quantity goes to how much credibility the expert is to be given, but that is a subjective standard.” That was a very nice point of reference to use and further reason for confidence in each of our ability to be viewed as experts.

The day ended with marketing strategy, Advisor updates and action items incumbent upon all of us to take. It was an extraordinary day of community and content at an amazing summit of elite advisors!

C-Suite Network Advisors (L-R) Sheila Moore Anderson and Eddie Turner along with C-Suite Network General Manager, Lindsey Hayzlett and C-Suite Radio Headliner Connie Pheiff, pose for a photo during the C-Suite Network Advisor Summit.

May 23, 2017 was the actual C-Suite Network Conference where the 4C’s of the network were personified. I truly got to see first-hand just how special this group really is and I value my membership all the more.

The content of the conference centered around market needs for the C-Level leader.

Highlights:
• To Franchise or Not to Franchise? Advantages and disadvantages were discussed by C-Suite leaders for C-Suite leaders.
• Direct selling was the original gig economy! A panel discussed why direct selling is still relevant and the most effective ways of utilizing this model in the 21st century economy.
• The Power of Social! Facebook Messenger, What’s App and We Chat are messenger services. These 3 are out-performing the top 4 social media platforms COMBINED! Messaging applications is where it is at now. 80 billion messages per day are sent inside these cl
osed systems.
• The Digital Revolution: Many companies realize “software has eaten the world” and therefore they MUST be software companies. Domino’s Pizza does not call itself a pizza company any more—they say they are a software company that sells pizzas’. More business need to understand and act on this premise.

We discussed the power of media and its changing landscape and new ways to reach audiences like the new C-Suite Network partnership with ReachMe TV. Along with table exercises where we brainstormed best practices and exchanged ideas we also learned about effective methods for networking and interacting with C-Suite Leaders.

I left my first C-Suite Network conference with a deep sense of appreciation, a stronger allegiance to the mission and vision of being a member of “the worlds most trusted network for C-Suite Leaders and a renewed sense of zeal for the unique value I bring. This is a unique group that delivered a unique experience and I can’t wait for the next one!

C-Suite Network CEO and Co-Founder, Thomas White led a panel discussion on networking.

Eddie Turner is a C-Suite Network Advisor ™ and a change agent who has worked for several of the world’s “most admired companies.” Eddie is a professional speaker who has appeared on CNN LIVE and spoken internationally. He is certified as an executive coach, trainer and facilitator. He is a member of the Forbes® Coaches Council, a global workshop and program facilitator for the Association for Talent Development and for Harvard Business School Publishing. He has studied at Harvard and Northwestern Universities. Eddie “works with leaders to accelerate performance and drive impact!”™
Contact Eddie at (312) 287-9800 or eddie@eddieturnerllc.com

Categories
Best Practices Growth Health and Wellness Management

Friendly Rivalry

On June 1st the Cleveland Cavaliers will face off against the Golden State Warriors in the NBA Finals for the third consecutive year. This is the first time the same two opponents have met three straight times in the championship series in the over 70 year history of the league.

 

While the recent success of these two clubs has pitted each team against one another for the championship title, many sports fans, analysts and historians wouldn’t consider Cleveland-Golden State a heated rivalry — certainly not on the same tier as other sports rivalries like the Boston Celtics and Los Angeles Lakers, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox, or even the Green Bay Packers and Chicago Bears. In fact, a recent news article described the upcoming series as a ‘friendly rivalry’.

 

I was recently at a conference attended by many of my “competitors”. And while one could think that a conference filled with so many competitors could have created an environment that is hostile, guarded, secretive, and filled with an “unwillingness to share” attitude — it was exactly the opposite.

 

The whole event was overflowing with best practices, helpful and creative ideas and a focus of everyone wanting to help one another be EVEN better.

 

I’d argue that those I considered my closest competitors have become trusted advisors and, even, some of my closest confidants.

 

A little competition is healthy, and having friendly rivals can actually make you stronger and wiser.

 

As for the Cavs and Warriors, while they’ll be battling it out over the next few weeks and be fierce competitors, their underlying respect and appreciation of one another will raise their game to a higher level.

 

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Lou Diamond is the Founder & CEO of Thrive – a leading consulting and coaching company helping the best people and companies become even more amazing. He is also the author of the newly released international best-selling book “Master the Art of Connecting“ and podcast host of “Thrive LOUD with Lou Diamond”

Categories
Growth Leadership Operations Personal Development

Could You Own CustomerService.com?

Would you like to own a really cool website?

Since my life’s mission is to help companies create a customer service experience that their customers would think is amazing, I thought that could be demonstrated well if I owned the domain name CustomerService.com. But then I also thought that certainly some company totally focused on their customers would already own it. So, I typed the URL into an Internet browser, and do you know what I found? The site was for sale! Nobody was currently using this domain.

I thought that it would be neat for my brand to be the owner of this domain. But how much of an investment would that require? Well, I found out that the investment would be substantial, at least by my standards. I would love to have an asset that would brand me to customer service forever. However, budget is an issue for me, and domain names like these sell for really big dollars.

Well, if I can’t own it, which other brands can you think of who would love to have their name associated with CustomerService.com? The first ones that came to my mind were the obvious shining stars in the world of customer experience: American Express, Amazon, Ace Hardware, Nordstrom, Ritz-Carlton, Lexus, Zappos … The brands you know and trust for providing amazing service.

But what about a brand … like Comcast? Just a few years ago, a phone call from a customer to their support center was handled poorly and it ended up going viral across the Internet. Since then, Comcast has been working hard to improve their reputation. So, would owning CustomerSerivce.com help them along this path? If so, they better hurry before one of their competitors, like AT&T or Sprint, beats them to it.

Whomever does decide to buy the name should be prepared to pay quite a hefty price for it. The present owners will likely eventually sell the domain name, but for more than seven figures. For the right brand, though, it may be well worth the price. For example, who better to own Toys.com than Toys ‘R’ Us? In 2009 they paid $5.1 million for the site. And if you’re in the mortgage business, it seems like Loans.com would be a natural fit. In 2000 Bank of America bought the domain name for $3 million. Just imagine owning a URL that could help define who you are.

So, which brand do you think should own CustomerService.com? Why not you?
Hypothetically (or even maybe not), what if you did own the URL? To be authentic, that would mean you would also need to live up to “owning” customer service. Do you believe you are worthy of owning it? More importantly, do you believe that your customers would agree that you are worthy of owning it? If you did own the site, would you do anything differently than you’re doing now to live up to the expectation of a brand that owned CustomerService.com?

These are good questions. So, pretend you do own the URL. Take a few moments to answer the above questions as though you do own the name. Your answers may give you a few ideas on how to deliver to your customers an even better experience. The point is, whether you own CustomerService.com or not, treat your customers as though you do.

Categories
Best Practices Growth Management Personal Development

Why We Must Make Hand-Offs Excellent

I recently had a pair of shoes re-soled. I always take my shoes to this one little repair shop in the west side of town. The gentleman there is detail oriented, very friendly, and prides himself in providing high quality services, excellent explanations, and exceptional customer service. I picked up the shoes and they looked so good (almost new) that I immediately packed them for a trip the very next day.

While making a presentation at a client I noticed a weird feeling of being off balance. The heal of my left shoe was missing. The client noticed me looking for it and exclaimed, “it’s under your table,” pointing to this black object. I was embarrassed. I tried to fix the heal but it just would not stay. I needed to buy a new pair of shoes that evening to avoid further embarrassment and possible injury walking on uneven shoes.

The shoe maker had no knowledge of my problems. With the best of intentions, he did his work and it was not nearly up to the usual standard of care I had been used to seeing from him. His poor-quality workmanship (or mistake) cost me embarrassment, inconvenience, and money. Poor hand-offs cause problems for customers in ways that we often never come to know.

One story of tragedy involving poor hand-offs concerns the Titanic. We all know the story of the great ship which hit the iceberg. Although the lookouts that evening saw the iceberg, the size of the ship, it’s lack of maneuverability, and its speed all contributed to the inability of the crew to turn the ship in time to avoid the disaster. The lookouts were without binoculars that evening.

The person responsible for the binoculars had forgotten to leave the keys to the cabinet where the binoculars were locked up. The crew could not access the binoculars and so the lookouts were told to do their important job without them. The hand-off of the keys to their proper place might have played a key factor in the demise of the ship that night. If the lookouts had seen the iceberg sooner, could the great ship been turned in time? We will never know.

As leaders, one of our responsibilities must be to consistently communicate the importance of delivering hand-offs exactly how the customer (internal and external) needs them, exactly when needed, and with the proper quantity and quality. Furthermore, leaders must create the environment that optimizes the probability all employees can and will manage their hand-offs with these results.

Toyota provides a notable example of an organization that does this well. One of their tools is the “Four Rules”. (Bowen, 1999) The rules provide one of the practical applications of Toyota’s philosophy which can be described in one sentence: “The right process will produce the right results”. (Glauser, 2005) The theory is that processes deliver results where as many leaders still focus on how individuals deliver results (80-90% of organizations have pay-for-performance policies which reward top performers). Toyota (and Dr. W. Edwards Deming) recognizes that processes, along with cooperation to improve processes, deliver results.

Thus, the Four Rules help everyone manage the quality of their individual hand-offs. The Rules are:

  1. All work shall be highly specified as to content, sequence, timing, and outcome.
  2. Every customer-supplier connection must be direct, and there must be an unambiguous yes-or-no way to send requests and receive responses.
  3. The pathway for every product and service must be simple and direct.
  4. Any improvement must be made in accordance with the scientific method, under the guidance of a teacher, at the lowest possible level in the organization. (Bowen, 1999)

These rules enable any organization to empower all employees to be responsible for the continuous improvement of their hand-offs. Setting this up requires optimum leadership. It requires a shift in thinking to results by process not results by individuals. It requires leaders to remove barriers instead of evaluating individual performance. It requires a creation of an environment with trust and a reduction of fear.
Focusing on improving hand-offs can avoid everything from embarrassment to hitting an iceberg.

Dr. Wally Hauck, CSP helps leaders boost profit by unleashing the genius of every employee. By showing leaders how to get the best from their teams, with proven methods and by avoiding morale-busting mistakes, leaders can achieve their strategic goals more quickly and with less waste.

For more than 20 years Wally has worked with nearly 200 organizations, hundreds of leaders, and thousands of employees to optimize engagement and customer experience. Many have achieved significant transformational improvements.

Wally holds a doctorate in organizational leadership from Warren National University, a Master of Business Administration in finance from Iona College, and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania. Wally is a Certified Speaking Professional or CSP. As a professor of Organizational Change and Development at the University of New Haven in Connecticut Wally received the highest ratings of all professors in 2012.

Wally is a proud member of the C-Suite Advisors Network

Bowen, S. S. (1999). Decoding the DNA of the Toyota Production System. Harvard Business Review.

Glauser, E. C. (2005, April 1). The Toyota Phenomenon. Retrieved from The Swiss Deming Institute: http://deming.org

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Management Marketing Personal Development Women In Business

Networking with Confidence and Purpose (i.e. Why Networking Doesn’t Have to Suck)

I am constantly surprised by how often I’m working with clients and the issue of networking comes up. In all the coaching – and group training – I’ve done around this issue, I’ve noticed that, broadly, there are two kinds of people in the world: those who generally enjoy networking and those who loathe it. But there is one thing both groups have in common: most people don’t feel like they get true much out of the experience beyond a glass of wine or beer and a handful of business cards from people they’ll probably never see again.

One of the key reasons for this frustration is that most people fail to bring one thing into the networking event: a purpose.

When you attend a networking event, why do you go? Maybe you enjoy the social interaction, or you’re just following the conference schedule, or maybe a colleague dragged you along as a “wingman.” Ultimately, none of these approaches have an underlying purpose that would make networking valuable. So how can you make networking a useful and positive experience with actual ROI… and do it with comfort and confidence?

Networking with Purpose

A purpose should be specific, but can also be simple. For example, I might know that an HR exec I want to meet will be there, so my goal is to have two minutes of face time with her to be able to introduce myself in person, and get her to agree to setting up a follow-up conversation a few days later. Once I’ve accomplished that mission, everything else is gravy and I’ve networked with purpose.

If you don’t have something that laser-focused as your reason for going, here’s a simple rule of thumb: Networking is simply planting the seeds for a new relationship. It doesn’t have to result in an immediate financial transaction, but the purpose is to meet someone that you can then build a relationship with.

Ultimately, whether or not you become each other’s client is not the issue. The key is that you never know when there will be a reason for you to contact them – or for them to contact you. Maybe you’ll read an article that you think they’ll appreciate and you send them a link. Maybe you’ll look through their contact list on LinkedIn and see someone you’d like them to introduce you to. Or maybe they are chatting with someone else at another networking event a month later who just so happens to need your services, and they can make the introduction.

There’s a terrific book called The Go-Giver that epitomizes this perspective. It’s an easy read in parable form that you can skim in a weekend, and will clarify both how to do it and why.

Networking with Confidence

Interestingly enough, one of the biggest stumbling blocks people face is not why they should talk to someone, but simply the mechanics of how to start the conversation, much less how to sustain it.

First, it’s important to distinguish the difference between networking and small talk.
“Small talk” is simply a communication tool used to break the ice, and initiate conversation with someone new. It can be something as mundane as the weather or how slow the elevator is to a more organic offering like a compliment or asking a question about what you’re looking at on the buffet.

I’ve struck up great conversations with other women by saying, “Just wanted to tell you – I love your shoes!” With guys, tech is always an easy in-road: if he’s looking at his smartphone, try, “Hey, is that the new iPhone? What do you think, worth the upgrade?” Or, while in line at the bar, it’s an easy cause to talk about what someone drinking. “Arrogant Bastard Ale (or Cupcake Chardonnay)… that’s an interesting name! Any good?” Then it’s easy to segue with, “By the way, I’m Laura.”

Natural next-steps for the conversation include asking if it’s someone’s first time at a particular event or what prompted them to come, what they thought of the keynote speaker, what organization they’re with and what kind of work they do. It doesn’t have to be rocket science, so don’t over think it. It’s about finding common ground, and/or showing a genuine interest in knowing more about the person, and the above topics are easy and “safe” for any networking event.

Simply put, enter any networking event with purpose and the mindset of discovering some interesting new people who have the potential to create a mutually valuable relationship – of any sort. When you take this perspective, you’ll realize how valuable and easy networking can be, and you might even learn to enjoy yourself in the process!