I have a lot of things I wish they had taught me in Business school and Networking is one of them. Of course there was never enough time to add the topic of Networking to the curriculum.
Regardless if you are starting to understand what networking is all about or you feel that you are pretty comfortable with the concept one constant remains the same: Your attitude.
People who like to self-admit that they are not good at networking have already created their own constraints, their own limits. In fact, the reverse is true. Anybody can be an effective networker if you follow the right path and embrace the right attitude.
The Law of Abundance
In line with the right attitude when it comes to networking I find it appropriate to discuss a fundamental truth that applies to Networking. It’s called the ‘Law of Abundance’.
The Law of Abundance is fundamental in networking because if you understand this law and believe in this law and start sharing your network, you will receive in droves. It goes something like this:
In order to get into the right spirit of this law we must recognize that the world has tremendous abundance. The world is abundant with opportunity, abundant with clients, abundant with ideas and abundant with good fortune.
To bring this law down a few notches to business, Stephen Covey in his widely-acclaimed book titled The Seven Principles of Highly Effective People, illustrates what he calls the Abundance mindset. According to Covey, an abundance mindset is “a paradigm that there is plenty out there and enough to spare for everybody. It results in the sharing of prestige, recognition, of profits of decision making because it opens possibilities, options, alternatives and creativity.”
In other words it’s when we as people believe and agree that there are unlimited resources and success to share with others.
This abundance mindset is in complete opposition to the ‘scarcity mindset’ which is founded on the idea that, if someone else wins or is successful in a situation, that means you lose or the zero-sum game if you wish.
Individuals with an abundance mentality reject the notion of a zero-sum game and are able to celebrate the success of others rather than feel threatened by it.
Perhaps before reading this article you were reluctant to share names of contacts or colleagues with others. Perhaps your view is that ‘your contacts will remain your contacts – only’!
Networking in line with the law of abundance mindset has proven time and time again that the more you share, the more you get in return.
Covey continues with: “Scarcity mindset is the zero-sum paradigm of life. People with a Scarcity mindset have a very difficult time sharing recognition and credit, power or profit. They also have a very hard time being genuinely happy for the success of other people.The Abundance mindset, on the other hand, flow out of a deep inner sense of personal worth and security.”
Call it an act from god, Metaphysics, luck, the planets lining up or your skill but when you do good things for others, those good things have a way of making their way back to you—often from a different person or group of people.
In order for you to gain from Networking you need to look at from the perspective of the law of Abundance. The more you give out names of people and contacts in the spirit of genuinely helping people, the more you will receive. The less you give…well good luck to you!
Ultimately people that behave ‘Small’ with their network, remain small – ‘Great’ people become greater.
“A Networking Book” is now available on Amazon and I will be launching it officially at Management 360, on June 19, 2014.