Do You Have a Relationship With a Lie?

Real-time, face-to-face connecting is absolutely the best way to begin a business relationship. Facebook and Twitter are fun to play with however they can never replace the effectiveness you feel with you are talking with someone who is standing before you.

The tools available to networkers have drastically changed and increased with the arrival of online networking. In the past, networking was an activity conducted mostly face-to-face through formal and informal groups such as professional associations, local Chambers of Commerce events, networking clubs, breakfast meetings and events. Your little black book of contacts, probably still was a black book or a rolodex!

“Faux familiarity is worse than none at all. Sure, it’s easy to grab a first name from a database or glean some info from a profile. But when you pretend to know me, you’ve already started our relationship with a lie. You’ve cheapened the tools we use to recognize each other and you’ve tricked me, at least a little. Direct mail used to take advantage of this technique a lot, and since they measure everything, they knew when it worked. Online, though, we’re seeing less disciplined marketers (big and small) continually mess it up. The clues are obvious to even the untrained eye – typefaces that don’t match, references that don’t make sense, and most of all, the weird disconnect we get when we think we’re supposed to know someone and can’t remember who they are. That’s a lousy mood to get your prospect in, I think.” ~ Seth Godin

Social networking works to a certain degree but at some point in time you will have to crawl out from under your shy shell and start networking face-to-face. Some people find it easier to simply network from the comfort of their keyboard than to wear something other than sweatpants and slippers and attend an invigorating networking meeting or event.

Many networkers fall into the trap of thinking online or face-to-face networking, rather than combining the two different types of networking for maximum effect. Do you realize that Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are fantastic tools for keeping in touch with people after meeting them at an event? After the face-to-face meeting is over it is always important to continue a valuable relationship by following up. Make reference to your previous conversation of when you met. This will help jog their memory in case they don’t remember speaking with you.

The online environment can never replace the benefits of meeting someone in the flesh. Never! This doesn’t mean that online networking isn’t valuable. Often it can be the beginning of a face-to-face meeting. It’s important to build your online network as strategically and thoughtfully as you do your local network. Use the same “let’s help each other develop business” approach. Building long-lasting business relationships begin with giving, not getting.

“I like seeing the whites of someone’s eyes when I start a relationship. A real handshake vs. a virtual one and a real smile vs. a smiley face on the computer help me learn so much more meaningful information about the other person.” ~ Lillian D. Bjorseth

Just like online dating, we are unable to develop true, lasting and trusting relationships with someone online, unless we can meet with them in person and know whether our personalities click. Face-to-face networking leaves people with a lasting impression of who you are. They can tell more quickly with that first handshake whether a long-term relationship that benefits both of you can occur.

Social media can be used to enhance the already existing connections that you have within your business networks. Part of the problem with online networking is how it makes everything less personal. In person you can read their expressions, tone of voice and body language to gain insight into what they’re thinking and how they are reacting as you meet. People are typically more willing to help those they know than total strangers. If you use social networking as an excuse to not have to attend networking functions, your are making a big mistake.

So… what’s the bottom line. Whether you start your relationships on or offline, do a little of both, however never abandon the opportunity to mix and mingle with other energetic networkers face-to-face. Whether it occurs online or face-to-face, business networking is a useful tool for everyone seeking to enhance and increase their business. There is no better way to interact with potential clients and business partners than with face-to-face interaction. It establishes you as a credible business person more rapidly.

BONUS Article: A Data Base Does Not a Network Make
Shy, eh? Get Over It!
Working a Room If You’re SHY – No Pills Required

Copyright © 2012 – Larry James. Larry James is a Professional Speaker, Author and Coach. He presents networking seminars nationally and “Networking” coaching by telephone or one-on-one. His latest book is, Ten Commitments of Networking: Creative Ways to Maximize Your Personal Connections! Something NEW about Networking is posted on this Networking BLOG every 4th day! Visit Larry’s Networking Website at: “Networking HQ!”

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The Joy of Collaboration – Part 1 of 3

Ian Percy, Guest Author –

Life is not a game you can play alone.

It doesn’t matter how rich or poor you are; whether you are an athlete or a couch potato. Being good looking, amazingly clever and highly educated doesn’t change a thing. You could be of royal descent, and it still wouldn’t matter. No way around it – life is something you do in teams. Life requires collaboration!

Literally nothing happens in this world unless it is powered by two or more people. You can’t be born without at least two other people involved. You can’t even be officially dead without a doctor standing there to say you are. And in-between those two bookends of life is the irrefutable reality that we have not been created to be alone.

Life is not like a game of “Pick-up-Sticks,” where the purpose is to make a move without touching anything else. Every move you make does touch everything and everybody else! You cannot live a life independent of others any more than you can breathe your own air.

Anything worth accomplishing is accomplished by two or more people working collaboratively together in a miraculous, purposeful and passionate way.

Knowing the very meaning and purpose of your life depends on others. Surely we would all admit that standing alone on an island, remarking on our unique qualities and potential is pointless: there is nobody to care.

This means that my life has meaning only in relationship to your life. And your life has meaning only in relationship to mine.

This is why, in virtually every dimension of our lives, we are placed in a group of some sort. These groups of ours involve family, school, play, worship, work – every human activity you can think of. We are part of hundreds of groups and the busier our life, the more groups to which we belong.

Membership in a group is not to be trivialized, regardless of how many memberships you have or how incidental the group seems to be to you.

If you’ve been extended membership you are expected to participate in line with the group’s norms. Indeed, if particular individuals do not participate well and violate the laws of the group, we ostracize them by revoking their group membership or simply ignoring them. For more serious and deadly offenses, we punish these people by putting them in solitary confinement!

There is something about being alone that is frightening and unnatural. We are not meant for it. It is our greatest fear.

Where did this need to come together – to group – originate?

Human ‘grouping’ behavior is a fundamental reflex – as basic as our need to breathe and eat. Personally, I believe God designed it that way because he saw something potentially majestic and wise in it.

But let’s be clear about one thing – there is a huge difference between a group and a team!

We humans are given the incredible opportunity, and at times responsibility, to turn groups into teams. Unfortunately, we have not learned to do this very well and have let ego, selfishness, greed and a whole host of other contaminants get in the way of experiencing the miracle of teamwork. Consequently, we often limit ourselves to being a group and fail to cross over to the joy of being a team.

This book (The 11 Commandments for an Enthusiastic Team: Collaborating With Purpose and Passion) will show you how to make this wonderful leap, releasing passion and purpose in a most amazing way.

A group is a collection of people who have a convenience or even an advantage in doing something together in order to achieve an outcome they all want.

In a group you do not need to feel some deep level of connection with the other participants because the real purpose is to use the group to get something you, as an individual, want. It is not a very gracious observation, but the truth is the group is there to serve you. When it stops serving you, you leave it.

Even a family can be a group rather than a team. If there is no love between the family members and they live together just for the convenience and economy of doing so, we would hardly call them a team.

Here is another example. Maybe you attend a place of worship regularly. You can go, sit, sing, pray, confess or whatever, and not once feel a special connection with the community of worshippers around you. The most you can say is that you were part of the group that attended the service. It does not have to be that way, but it often is.

At work a number of you are in the “Home Products Sales Division.” Each of you has an individual sales quota to meet. You each scramble to claim any customer who comes by, and are always on guard so that one of the others doesn’t ‘steal’ a customer from you. There is certainly no sense of ‘oneness’ in your Division and, in fact, calling yourselves a division is entirely appropriate. After all, if you are not unified, you must be divided. It seems like even on a good day, the group’s motto is, “Every man for himself!” No collaboration needed here!

If there is no common purpose and passion, collaboration is unnecessary.

Group members tend to be self-focused. Team members tend to be other-focused.

In a group the whole is the sum of its parts. In a team the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

So how does one move from being a group to becoming a team?

Note from Larry James: Thought this fit with this article. “Collaboration is about creating a bigger pie for all. People cooperate because they have to. People collaborate because they want to.” – Dan Burrus

IMPORTANT: To read part 2 and part 3 of this article, please go to: http://www.tencommitmentsofnetworking.com/ianpercy2.html

Copyright 2009 – Ian Percy. This article is an excerpt from “The 11 Commandments for an Enthusiastic Team: Collaborating With Purpose and Passion” by Ian Percy. This incredible book comes as a gift set and includes an audio CD of Ian giving this presentation live – all bound into an embossed sleeve. Contact your local bookstore or go to www.IanPercy.com where you can order it securely online.

Larry’s Review: Incredible! The best I’ve read about creating team. Everyone who networks, collaborates, builds community, etc., should have this book and CD combo. Truly a masterpiece!