How to network for ‘non transactional’ people

If you want to build transactional business relationships, keep doing what you’re doing. I’m not great at that.

However….

If you want to build a professional tribe of people you can both have good life with and make money with, then the below may help.

The context: You have to want to do meaningful work with people you love

I posted this on twitter..

I have a theory that the ultimate goal for professional life should be “spending every day doing meaningful work with people you love”.

Here’s the logic:

- Statistically there should be enough good people in the world with whom you can both make good money AND have a good life.

– We now have the tech tools and global connectedness to make this happen like never before.

Is this your goal? If so, read on. If not, no worries.

How to optimise for a life of meaningful work with people you love

In short. By having an amazing network.

Below are the heuristics I’ve built up over the years to try to do this. The TLDR is

Be the biggest truest version of yourself and don’t be afraid to put it out there.

Here are 6 things I do. In no particular order:-

1. I post lots of stuff on LI and Twitter about who I am and how I think so that people feel like they really know me.

- People who are interested in me self select

2. I am my truest self with everyone IRL. And I mean everyone – Clients, investors, suppliers, team etc.

- People who are interested in me self select

3. If I am looking for someone specific professionally (ie a lawyer or a tax person) I send request to my networks and tell them my values, how I like to work and on what terms.

• People who are interested in working that way self select

4. At events, I deliberately only gravitate to energy.

• The energy that people give off is my favourite heuristic of all time. One of my golden life rules is to ruthlessly cut ‘drains’ out.

5. Be real and vulnerable as soon as possible in any conversation.

- This avoids BS small talk and creates an emotional bridge for life

6. Have deliberately tangential conversations as soon as possible.

- Opens up more serendipitous opportunities and white space that you wouldn’t otherwise get to.

Overall it’s based on trying to be the most authentic version of you and ‘filtering’ against your own values. It saves a lot of time and a lot of fakeness (which I find exhausting). But it also means really knowing yourself and what you want, which is the harder bit and a constant journey.

Let’s see how it all pans out.

Would love to hear other things that have worked for people.

A