Networking followup – do I have to?

First of all, you don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to. You can choose to stay in touch with people in your network or not, but the reality is if you don’t stay in touch they probably won’t be part of your network for long. So the question really is, do you want to develop a large network?

Why would you want to develop a large network?

Well, it’s been said that the most successful people have very large networks, and I believe that to be true. I consider a network to be an asset of tremendous value, and not only from a business  perspective. To help illustrate this point let me share with you a short story.

For nearly 3 years I’ve been quite involved (in a volunteer capacity) as a director with a wonderful non-profit organization called the Kindness Foundation of Canada. The organization’s vision is ‘a kind world’ and our mission in a nutshell is to inspire people to be more kind. Pretty simple really but the results of kind action can be very powerful and have far reaching ripple effects.

The Kindness Foundation has experienced significant success and accomplished incredible things in it’s almost 11 year history but as a board we recognized a couple of years ago that in order to ensure sustainability and remain relevant, we needed to embark on a major internal restructuring process. We’re just coming out the other end of that tunnel now and it’s hugely exciting because we’re now poised to accomplish even more amazing things over the coming months and years.

Why do I mention this here? Because it has everything to do with our topic of networks.

You see, at various times during this transition we had a need for knowledge, experience and skill-sets not possessed by any of us on our current board, yet vital in terms of us getting from where we were to where we wanted to be, and were able to successfully recruit that talent primarily by tapping into our individual networks.

Our networks have connected us with some amazing people and by utilizing simple ‘followup’ practices we were able to develop these connections into relationships and commitments that have served our organization extremely well.

Important reasons to follow up with your network:

• Develops and strengthens new relationships.
• Nurtures and strengthens existing relationships.
• Keeps relationships alive that may not appear to have much value now but might one day provide you with exactly what you need in an unexpected situation.
• Provides you with access to the networks of others.
• Enables you to connect other people for their mutual benefit … establishes you as a valued resource.
• Leads to referrals.

We’ll explore ‘how to’ methods around this subject in upcoming posts, so come back often and please feel comfortable in commenting or contributing along the way.