Speed Networking; Being Thankful
Monday Dec 01, 2008
Speed Networking
I recently attended a "speed networking" event at Santa Clara University law school. The concept is similar to "speed dating." I met with each student for about 7 minutes, and answered whatever questions they had about working in-house, what I did as a lawyer, how to go about getting a job, what I thought of their resume, etc. It was interesting to see which students were prepared and had thought about what to ask, and which students were not at all prepared and sat down with a deer in the headlights look. The latter students definitely need to get out and network more.
If you aren't comfortable talking to complete strangers, you need to spend more time networking. As a professional, this skill will come in handy, believe me. You'll be talking to clients, outside counsel, lawyers and their clients on the other side of a case or transaction, and you need to be able to do it confidently and competently. This is something that I've really had to work at - deep inside I am a painfully shy person who would love to walk into a room, pick one person I know really well, and talk to that person the whole time. But you don't make a lot of important connections or a lot of progress that way!
You don't need to have an official speed networking event to benefit from this idea. Next time you are at a networking event, challenge yourself to meet everyone at the event (if it's relatively small) or a certain number of people (if it's larger). Don't just stand in one spot and talk to people you know and are comfortable with! Take advantage of breaks in the conversation and people moving from group to group as "transitions" to move from one contact to the next. It's a little harder than speed networking, because you don't have someone ringing a bell indicating that it's time to move to the next person - so you have to be cognizant of the time and not get bogged down in any one conversation. Think of it sort of as a square dance, where people are always shifting, moving, and changing partners. Write down names or collect business cards if you're not good at remembering names. It's amazing how important those contacts are!
Being Thankful
Over Thanksgiving I always ponder things I'm grateful for. I think it's especially important to focus on the positive when there's so much financial turmoil, terrorism, and emphasis on the negative. Here are some of the things I came up with, in no particular order:
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