From the course: Creating a Career Plan

Manage your professional network

From the course: Creating a Career Plan

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Manage your professional network

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- The foundation of all your networking is what I call the granular database. You've heard the expression, "It's not what you know, "but who you know." I take it one step further. "It's not who you know, but how well you know them "and how often you appear on their radar." The granular database, the home to detailed profiles of everyone you know, allows you to track and deepen relationships with the people who can hire or refer you for work. It needs to be portable and electronic. Yours will probably live in your smartphone so you can always have access to it. And you may not even need a special app to do this. A granular database includes this and email addresses and relevant websites, places they've lived and work, job titles, names of their significant others, children and pets, important dates like birthdays and anniversaries, hobbies and interests, and personality traits and quirks, sweet spots I like to call them, like, "concerned about global warming," "hates baseball," "collects elephant carvings." You find work through the relationships you develop, but as your network grows into the thousands you won't be able to remember details about everyone. Don't even try. Let your granular database store that information. So how do you get the information into your granular database? Glad you asked. Here's my tip: as you network always try to meet in person and over a meal. In every culture, people let their hair down and share things when they're breaking bread. Email, texting, tweeting, not conducive to that. Depending on your budget, it's coffee, breakfast, lunch or dinner. The more time you spend with someone the more likely they are to feel comfortable talking about themselves. Your granular database will be your best resource for regularly staying in touch with your contacts, which is how you find work.

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