Tried-and-True Networking Tips from Decades of Experience
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Welcome to the H, B. R idea cast from harvard business review. I'm curtainless.

There's a case study that's been taught at business schools for twenty five years now. It's titled highty raison in details the networking practices of the silk valley venture capitalist and former interpreter of the same name. IT features how he cultivates an extensive personal and professional network to benefit her and to benefit others.

Now it's remarkable about this cases that IT came out right after the dot com bus and before the rise of web two point o and all the social network. Since social media that followed at the time, there was no linked din, he didn't have any twitter followers or facebook friends. And yet the case is still taught today because the networking insights in there are as relevant as ever.

Our guess today says, fundamentally, nothing has changed about building a strong professional network, all that digital technology and the promise of frictionless scale of scars, a simple truth that human connections are assembled one by one, interaction by interaction. Our guests today is highly roisin. She's a partner at thresh adventures, a lecture at stand for graduate school of business and the subject of the harvard business k study hidy rising hidy. So glad to have you on the show.

Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure to be here.

Were you always a good networker? I mean, obviously we all get Better with time, but are you extravert was where your parents good networkers? I'm just curious if you had a head start.

It's an interesting question because I I think first, while people conflate being an extrovert with being good at building a network, and I don't think they need to be the same thing, I think in fact, sometimes that person who's an extrovert who we know wants to be the center of the room and is always talking and all of that, those aren't necessarily the best skills to build a relationship with someone else.

I have always been a person who's been interested in other people. I think people's stories are interesting. I think meeting people is interesting. And i've always gravitated to getting to know other people.

And so I do think that that is something that helps me or has helped me evolve my own abilities to, as I call IT, build a relationship driven life. But I have to say, I think IT really came into focus when I became an entrepreneur of a company that was not funded. And every day you get up and think, who do I have to convince? What to move the ball forward with my company. And so IT really becomes, do or die when you when you're entrepreneur.

what's your philosophy on networking? How do you approach IT?

I'm going to start by saying I hate the word networking because networking implies it's it's very transactional IT implies this idea that you're monkey borrowing your way from person to person to get something you want. It's the antithesis of what I believe in. What I believe in is that you are you human being, and you're Operating the world.

And until the AI overlords take over, we are still, depending on other humans, they work with us. And so it's good to build relationships with other people and to build them based on mutual fact and trust and a level of honesty and all of these things that IT isn't about gathering the most names. It's not about going to a cocktail party and walking away with the most context.

It's about finding the other people in any situation who are fellow travelers with you on any particular journey you may be on, and building relationships with those people. And so, you know, IT doesn't matter if i'm one of a hundred in a room, if I find three other people that I resonate with and that I can follow up with and do something positive involved directions. And that was a good day.

So if collecting the most cards or piling up a linton connections is one big mistake that people make, what are the others like? What are things that you see people doing that just kind of seem counter intuitive to you.

So when I was first approached about the case, they told me what they wanted to write the case about building business relationships. And I said, well, isn't that just kind of common sense and they said, well, common sense is not that common, trust me, is not that common. And so one of things that I tell people over over again is trust your common sense.

Would you ask someone for a favor the first time you meet them? In a social and just a Normal situation, you generally will only ask favors of people you already know. And yet I find that very often, people, the first time we'll reach out to me is because they want something from me that just doesn't feel good, that feels kinda ki.

Likewise, if I reach out to somebody, the first time I reach out to them is simply because I want them to do something for me. IT feels like you're diminishing the relationship and prioritizing the transaction. And that, to me, is sort of the foundation of everything I talk about nowadays, is prioritized the relationship, not the transaction.

And if you have that as as your high order bit, so to speak, IT will kind of help you dictate everything you do. And I think IT really does become common sense. Why would I expect someone to be kind to me or respectful towards me if i'm not respectful towards them? Why I would I expect somebody to do me a favor if i've been sloppy in the way i've asked and dumped a bunch of work on them. So much of this is common sense that probably, you know, you learned in first, greater your parents taught you. But we somehow lost that along the way.

We'll help us remember here then. So let's go through just a couple of the basic best practices you think for for networking. I mean, sometimes you realize you want to reach out to somebody or get somebody in your network because you do need them because .

you do need something. And there's no there's no problem with reaching out to someone and giving them the reason why if you don't have a relationship with somebody, you can start a relationship with someone by saying i'm reaching out to you because i've identified that you are a person who could help me with this. And so i'm reaching out for the specific help, but also I believe we could be helpful to each other in the future as well.

So much of this isn't the way you do something. So much of this is in the way you ask, again, understanding your role and understanding in a relationship. What is your role in the relationship? And so if you put IT first and say, I am not in a relationship with this person, I would like to build the relationship with this person.

Relationships are two way streets. And so generally you should think through, I am coming into their world, i'm coming in with an ask, but what might the future asks be of me? What might the benefit to them be of knowing me? And that may not be clear in the beginning there, maybe particularly with idea, with a lot of students.

And so particularly students think they have nothing to offer. But I say, you know what, even you're gratitude, even being able to articulate something you learned, even just being respectful, following up, doing your homework before you make and ask, these are always that you show respect for a potential relationship. And by the way, they should also lead to a Better result in your ask.

Yeah, I was wondering about that because, you know, somebody reaches out to you, you're highty roys and you are very accomplished. I mean, you're your friends with bill gates, right? So that I may be a two way street, but IT feels like to a lot of people, like there is a bigger lane on one side.

the other yeah. And by the way, don't reach out to me and ask me to forward something to bill gates when you don't even know me. I mean, these are kind of the rules of of of the road sort of thing.

yeah. And so what isn't ask that you've had recently where I came from, somebody you do at the other end of this power dynamic, if you want to call IT that. But they did IT well and you were glad to help.

So the first thing, if you're asking somebody you don't know for something, they want to figure out who you are. And so making yourself easy to find is really important. For example, I think people's linked in profiles are very, very important.

I say that you should have a click to your linked in profile unless you're a very well known person or the CEO of a company or something. If you're not that well known, put a linked to your linked in profile in your email signature. So I get an email from you, I don't know who you are.

With one click, I can learn about you, and you control the message on linton. I think making yourself easy to find, making yourself easy to help, this is another thing people do that I think is a big mistake. When they ask for help, they dump ed the work on the other person, because are all busy people, right?

So when you want to ask someone for help, you draft the email request, or the voice mml ler, whatever, using the least amount of your own time. When the respectful thing to do would be to package up the request and the ground work for the request. So it's easier for the other person to do.

I see this all the time in emails, right? Here's an email that I would like you to forward to someone else, or even worse, to three other people. And then the request is expecting me, the favor giver, to spend time working on those emails or changing them or commodation the fact that it's supposed to be for three people, but you can't send one email to three different people, especially when they are competitors.

So I just think, you know, again, another tip is when you're asking someone for help, think through making IT as easy for them to help as possible. If somebody makes a very generic request, you know, my joke is if you could tittle the email deer occupant and still send IT, it's not a good email. You need to think about, why am I asking this person, what is IT about them that makes me believe they can help me? That's actually compelling to people.

We are we are wired to be helpful, but it's easier to be helpful when there is a unique tie or reason IT gives you a foundation to build on in that helpfulness. And then I do think people just resonate with we're all humans first and we're our jobs second. So a human element that doesn't mean telling your life story on something, but just explaining, for example, when people explain to me i'm reaching out to you because you were a woman who started a tech company in one thousand nine hundred and eighty three, and i'm now trying to start one forty years later than you.

And i'm still facing some chAllenges that I bet you faced. Could I spend fifteen minutes talking on the phone with you? There's another mistake.

Who ever dictated that the standard meeting time is an hour over coffee? Whoever did that does not understand busy people. So being grateful, being respectful of someone else is time not overstepping your bounds?

You know, part of this is keeping the relationship warm over a period of time. But people are busy and you don't want to just like you feel there IT inbox either. So yeah, where do you come down on sending somebody a note when you saw that they got you don't mention that the press or they raised around the funding? Or do you know that you if you have a good relationship with somebody that is, you know you can reach out to years later and it's just not going to seem abNormal.

There are certainly relationships where I may not have spoken to someone in years and I can take someone sentence. It'll be responsive and vice's a somewhat is a judgment call on how well do I know that person. I also think there is a great value in being personally consistent, right? I have a very consistent communication style.

I have a very consistent approach style. So if I reach out to someone, they kind of know what they're getting with me, which is I think I A helpful attribute. I'd hate to call IT personal brand because that sounds very sleezy, but I think, you know, a brand is a promise of consistency.

And I do think that consistency in how you approach people and how you respond, I always responsive. I always closed the loop bym all was respectful. I try to be a little humorous.

And I think that that again, that that style and that holding up my end of the deal, even when i'm the one asking for a favor. And by the way, whenever I ask someone for a favor, I always and the ask with, and by the way, if if this makes you uncomfortable at all, it's inappropriate. I come up with the wording that says, if you don't want to do that, it's okay with me.

I give people permission to tell me now, which also helps, I think, build the relationship because again, it's not about this individual transaction. If you want to say no to me, that's fine. IT is about the relationship.

And so I think I think a lot goes in to just the crafting of how you interact with other people. By the way, I I have no contact management system. I have no ticklers that say you should reach out to the person now because you haven't talked to them for six months.

I'm very old school. I don't have any of that. I use email. I use linked in a little bit social media.

I'm not a fan of social media for reaching out because it's so overwhelming, you know, when is your birthday and you don't even put the right birthday on facebook and you have five hundred people wishing you a happy birthday that you don't even know that that doesn't count. So I think that that's another important thing. People should understand some people or phone people, some people or text people, some people email people.

And so understanding how to communicate with someone without forcing them into a new paradigm of communication, it's just another way of respect. A lot of when I approach people, it's very organic. Like, you know, I get these newsletters every day that tell me who got funded and i'll see one of my former students getting funded or somebody maybe that we met with him didn't fun that got funded.

I think it's a really nice gesture to send them an email just saying, hey, just read about this. congratulations. Not because I have an intent with that, not because i'm expecting that whatever they are going, i'm going to let me in their next round or something is just because they took their time to, for example, on the pitch thing, they took their time to pitch me. We didn't invest, but I have respect for them as a person and I might send them an email if if I see that they got funding just because that a nice respect thing to do for someone who took their .

time to pitch you. How has just the explosion of social media and the scaling of social networks, and obviously the venture capitalist into the king valley, you know about network effects. How is that influenced networking? You know, for good and for bad, in your view.

for me, I think the biggest positive to social media is, is a tracking device of other people. I can see what other people are thinking. I can see where they're currently working. I don't have to pay attention to who switch jobs and who got to wear. And so IT is a useful tool. I do not believe that IT stands in the stead of the other way I see IT is an and not in nor IT is not a replacement for real world or one on one communications. And I don't personally use IT that way, but understanding how you're making that connection and what that connection should be as important regardless of whether it's person on email, on linked in, on facebook.

whatever IT is. So that sound like social media is kind of a relationship tracking tool for your relationship management, maybe not a relationship building tool. I have to ask about A I, right? Because somebody could send you a pitch or and ask, they might read something you rode, they might see a video of an interview that you did and they could say, all, I really appreciate you what you said about this.

And that made me think about you about, you know, such and such. A I can kind of speed lot of that along. And A, I can help you with the rating of making something sound a more personal, kind, respectful, can help you with your voice. And i'm just curious how you see that tool cropping up in the the communications you get. I certainly do.

Oh yeah, I do. I do. A, I is a dog word. A, I is a tool can use IT well, or you can use IT poorly.

I think that people use IT poorly when they substitute their own effort and creativity for that of AI. And IT will show in the result. I still do not think AI captures your unique human personality.

Maybe IT will in the future. But right now, that is that is far a field. And that is the thing that I think we look for ign communications from other people. The piece of advice i'll give everybody about this is when you are sending any form of communication to get somebody to do something and you are in a competitive situation, you should think hard about what is everyone else going to say. And what I need to say that needs to be different, because if I sound like the other eighty five people who are all applying for this fellowship, I have just missed an opportunity to set myself apart.

I want to ask about people just, you know, early in their careers or entering the workforce. Now, you know, a lot of people work remote, full time doing their jobs from coffee shops often, right? Are you worried that workers are kind of missing out on those relationship building skills that you get by working together in an office? The connections that you built early in your career that that probably helped you out a lot later?

So this this is such a meti and naughty topic. Naughty with A K uh, because remote work has had so many positives. I think IT has had so many positives about releasing us from the geographical bounds.

I think IT has released from some demography bounds. I think there are so many positives with IT. And particularly in the startup world, we often say that you know it's the best startups are about the best people, not about the best ideas.

So there are many good things about IT. But the downside is that isolation, that lack of human connection, that lack of serendipity in getting to know other people at the again, as human beings. First, their jobs.

Second, we have lost a lot of that. And I I think that is something that every business leader needs to think about. How do I engender that with people when I have a remote first or a hybrid format? And how do I make sure that my hybrid citizens are not second class? I think IT does Frankly involve people getting on airplanes or driving in their cars once in a while to go be with other people. And I think that IT means also being thoughtful about what does that mean to go be with other people if IT means that you're just requiring people to come to an office and then sit on zoom all day long because half of the people aren't in the office, that is not gna be a successful way to do this.

I read that one thing that you recommend to people trying to build their their network and build relationships is controlled randomness. Ess, can you explain that?

Yes, if you ask people about, you know what, we are the most important turning points in your career. Almost never. I say, well, I I read a hundred books and I I made myself a list, and I went, and I did certain things that were prescribed.

And then my career changed. Generally speaking, people's life stories about their careers involve a lot of nomex. I SAT next this person at a dinner.

I SAT next this personal plane. I, I met this person of conference. It's that kind of stuff. And so there's a lot of randiness, but just to say, well, just go out and experience randomness. Ss, you don't necessarily wanted just go talk to the ten people in line at the safeway with you and that may not be the right target, target rich environment .

here .

in the paleo safe way. Maybe, maybe that is the but thinking about, I don't know who the individuals will be, but I know this particular event, this particular venue, this particular company, this particular educational institution is going to attract a group of interesting people. The one thing none of us have, any more of anybody else, is time.

And how to judiciously use your time is really, really important. But I think the problem is if we're always only reactive, if we're only replying, if we're only responding, if we're only doing the work that's thrown at us, we're never thinking about how to bring new things into our life. And that's where I think this idea of controlled, randomized, i'm gonna go to a conference.

I'm gona go to this conference because IT attracts people in my industry, but who are a few years ahead of me. I am going to work with my trade association. This is something I did in both the software industry and the venture capital industry because the trade associations tend to be, in many cases, some of the leadership of the industries that you are in.

And Frankly, a lot of people don't go help trade associations because it's working for free. But you can distinguish yourself if you actually do the work by getting to know the other people in your industry through that work. And so that worked for me very well in both of the industry associations of the two big industries that i've been in.

The other thing I think you can do is a lot of these sorts of things. You can get an attending list in advance and literally looking through the attending list person by person, and thinking, who would I most want to meet, right? Who is and not who's the most important person in the room? Because everybody's going to try to get to that person.

But you really want to think about who are the other people here that ryme with me in some way, that, you know, that had my same undergraduate degree, or that are in a company. I want to work for something like that. And believe me, it's really easy to walk up to someone and say, I read the whole td list in advance, and you're one of the people I most wanted to meet that person's gone to talk to you.

People are gone to listen to this, and they're gonna turn around me like I need to do a Better job of sort of the building relationships, maintaining my network, getting back in touch with people who, you know, I think can be valuable or just people I care about. Are they going to listen to the conversation? They're to have a little more motivation to sort of do IT right and and be consistent. What are the first couple of things that you would. Recommend they do just try to get the ball rolling and and turn this into.

I have a well, the first thing to do is going back to that. Make yourself easy to find, go look at your social media, make sure it's up to date, make sure you're properly reflected, and wherever people are gonna to say, hey, I wonder what someone goes up to when you reach out to people. I think the second thing is right.

Size the outreach to whatever IT is you want. Sometimes it's just saying, you popped into my head today. Haven't I haven't talked to you in a year now.

I hope you're doing well. If you want to catch up, let me know just something like that. Just letting a person know. I thought about you today is actually, I think a is a very reasonable thing to do.

Another thing that I think is incredibly, i'll just tell you, this is really IT really works on me IT makes me really happy is when I get an email from a former student or someone who used to work for me, and they say, I just want you to know that I just accepted this new job or I just got this promotion or I just finish this project. And part of the reason that IT happened is because of something you said to me or something you did for me. I think that there is not enough gratitude in the world today.

I think, again, this goes back to the everybody's busy and IT is time out of your day to proactively think, who should I think for what today? And I don't think this should be overly gravy, gravy or anything like that. But I do think, for example, I have A A co worker who looks at her calendar every friday night.

He looks back at all the meetings SHE had. And SHE thinks, what should the follow up be even if the follow up is just thank you for taking the time and that is very powerful. It's always interesting to me that entrepreneurs, they will come in pitch of a firm and they will you know, they were taking an hour of their time.

They're taking an hour of our time. And if we let them know that we're not onna, fund them for some of them, it's the last you ever hear of them. They literally just drop you.

They ghost you. And yet for others they say, hey, we still want to thank you for taking the time. Now we learned some interesting things in the meeting or what I was just sing.

I appreciate that you took the time and then interestingly, when those people contact you six months later and they say, hey, in the meeting, you said something about this company, could you maybe make a connection for me or something? I'm going to be way more likely to do that than somebody who was unresponsive and then only reaches out to me when they want to transaction again, what defines the difference? Redeem those two things.

One of them feels like a relationship, the other one feels like a transaction. So I think that just starting simple, starting with a few exercises in gratitude, a few exercises and outreach, again, it's not about volume. It's about the quality and consistency of what you do. And so starting small, I think, is a IT should be the girl for everyone, right? The idea of reaching out to one person a day, something I used to call aggressive hour, take one hour a day, that you set aside for not just doing what other people are asking you to do, but doing positive outreach that may not even have an immediately objective. In fact, I think in many ways, it's stronger if it's not an immediate objective just to continue to build the connective tissue between you and the other people that that you value.

Well, how do you this has been a really great conversation. Thanks so much for coming on the show to talk about IT. Thank you.

That's highty raison partner at thresh adventures and lectures at stanford graduate school of business. You can read more in the harvard business school case study titled highty roisin. You can find IT at h.

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