How engaged are you within your professional network?
Let’s talk about why LinkedIn isn’t Facebook — with a case study in how mapping connections and a few clicks can unlock growth and opportunity.
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Are you engaged in your professional network?
Lately, I’ve been talking a lot about your inner circle of friends, especially as we seem to be consistently in a season of layoffs and transitions. But I also gotta give a shout out for the power of a professional network.
I’ve had some interesting conversations lately with folks earlier in their career who seem to think that LinkedIn is no different than Facebook. No one is sharing cobbler recipes and (almost) no one is spewing political propaganda on LinkedIn. What we are doing is mapping connections and also a surprising amount of good e-learning.
Another friend of mine was laid off this week, who is an amazing human that happens to be a VP of marketing type. Completely unrelated, a buddy of mine pinged me about do I know any marketing leaders who were available. This wouldn’t have happened over text or e-mail or Facebook, but 3 clicks and a fast intro later and they’re now talking.
My friend was looking at the fractional CMO route, a few more clicks and I introduced her to two other fractional CMO’s who happened to also be great humans and they’ll talk among themselves.
In a business world of Zoom and Teams, your professional network is the difference between seeing your work world through a small screen box – or virtually covering the globe. It blows my mind that folks I first connected with as a product manager or a field engineer are now VP’s … SVP’s … CXO’s. Think of any company you wanna engage with and I bet you’d be surprised to find someone two clicks away who could give you a fresh perspective, support an endeavor, or maybe even open a door for your next adventure.
Nothing beats in person to meet, greet, and grow – but for a lot of us, our professional network starts with and thrives by a click.
See you next Monday
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