Fearless Networking

The quality of your life is inextricably linked with the quality of your relationships. Being effective at meeting people and building strong connections are therefore essential skills. Developing friendships, career contacts, and a community we can serve lead to both professional success and a meaningful life.

Being great at this is not easy, though. Books and training on networking usually focus almost entirely on technical skills such as planning, strategizing, and communication techniques. But that’s just part of the equation. Without astute emotional intelligence and refined interpersonal skills, desired results can be elusive.

My take on networking is a combination of a wide range of personal development training and best practices validated through many years of in-field experience in all sorts of settings.

My coaching work addresses self-mastery, core attributes, authentic confidence, and technical skills. You can learn to be highly effective at connecting with people - even in the most intimidating environments, even if you’re an introvert, and even if you consider yourself a shy person.

Areas of Development:

  • Access to the natural, calm confidence that is available to all of us

  • Deep presence and listening skills that build rapport and trust, no matter the setting

  • Genuine personal, professional and community relationships built on acts of service

Personal Mastery:

  • Letting go of fears (of rejection, of failure, of being seen)

  • Self-awareness and managing mental energy

  • Freedom from attachment to outcomes

  • Getting out of your head

  • Calming the fight-flight-or-freeze survival impulse (both online and offline tools)

  • Charisma (yes, it can be developed)

Technical Skills:

  • Best practices for approaching

  • Powerful first and ongoing impressions

  • Leading intriguing conversations

  • Expert listening skills (beyond active listening)

  • Engaging celebrities and VIPs

  • How to navigate any room

  • Increasing follow up response rates

Authentic Confidence:

Increasing your self-confidence doesn’t mean pumping yourself up. It’s about removing the dusty layers of self-doubt and fear that have accumulated during your lifetime. I wrote an article about revealing this type of Authentic Confidence at my artistic pursuits website. While that article was written from the perspective of interacting with strangers for street photography, the ideas also apply to networking and every other type of human interaction that can benefit from confidence and presence.

The link to that article is via the Talking with Strangers page -> here

 

Being a fearless networker isn’t just for business networking. The skills we develop on the journey are completely transferrable to all types of interpersonal effectiveness - whether that be personal relationships, collaborating with work colleagues, or a Board presentation.

In the age of AI and automation, our people skills have become even more important. I invite you to make heightened interpersonal effectiveness a key personal and leadership development priority.

Engagements

I do keynote talks and custom programs on the skill of fearless networking, such as the one described in this event for the Greater Vancouver Board of Trade:

 

For 1-on-1 coaching, I work at all levels: from the painfully shy looking to find their confidence to the seasoned professional building a next-level skill set for specific challenges. If you’re looking for support on this topic, either 1-on-1 or in a group setting for your organization, contact me to see if we are a fit to work together.