548: How To Create Connections When You Despise Traditional Networking (Without Schmoozing)

Scott Anthony Barlow 00:01

How can you accomplish goals that require having connections, but not be transactional? Well, it turns out there are easy ways to begin relationships that are genuine and feel natural to the other party. What's the key? Well, it turns out, stop forcing it. What if we only focused on what's easy for you?

Introduction 00:26

This is the Happen To Your Career podcast with Scott Anthony Barlow. We hope you stop doing work that doesn't fit you. Figure out what does and make it happen. We help you define the work that is unapologetically you, and then go get it. If you feel like you were meant for more, and you're ready to make a change, keep listening. Here's Scott. Here's Scott. Here's Scott.

Scott Anthony Barlow 00:51

I remember in 2006 I had just recently been fired from a job that I did not particularly enjoy. It was pretty rough. I was pretty determined at that point to not have to go back to just another job where I could spend my days just, you know, waiting for the weekend, as I grinded it out in meetings that had really no meaning for me. So that's the point in time, some of you have heard this story before, but that's the point in time where I began learning everything I could about people who get well paid and also love their work. And that's where I started to call these people happy high achievers. One of the things that I observed right away as I was studying this group of happy high achievers, is that they often don't get jobs by traditional means. When you're outside, and you're looking in on their situation, it almost seems random, it's not though. It's not random. It's not even close to random. Also, it doesn't have anything to do with the Blind 200 plus times or, Indeed, or applying on LinkedIn. So the question becomes, well, how do they do it? How do they do it? How do they create these opportunities? How do they engineer these opportunities? How do these opportunities happen seemingly serendipitously? Well, we've talked about in the past about the importance of prioritizing what you want. And that's step one. Like you have to have an understanding of what you want, where you're going to make it easier to get there. So that of course, is where it starts. That said, though, happy high achievers realize that people hire other people, people make the opportunities for other people. It's not companies, it's not computers, yes, there can be computers and technology involved. But ultimately, it's people that end up making the final decisions or creating the final decisions. This means that a very large shortcut to find the work that fits you, or even getting positions created for you is through, you guessed it, relationships. Now, over the years, I have personally found that there is a huge, let's call it not a shortcut, but the fastest way to begin a relationship with someone else, it's not networking events, it's definitely not speed networking, even though that sounds like it should be. It's also not always anything to do with social media. Sometimes it can be. The continuous question that always pops up is, "How do I make connections? How do I build genuine relationships when I hate or despise traditional networking? I do not want to feel like I am schmoozing." Okay. Now, regardless of how you feel about schmoozing, or traditional networking, in this episode, we're going to cover and focus our efforts on how do we begin natural, great connections. I'm also going to give you five specific examples of ways to do this, along with some of my personal favorites. At the end of this episode, I'm going to give you a few actions that you can start with today, like right now. But first, let's go into where a few people struggle with this. Let's uncover some of these struggles so that we can begin to not just dissect them, but give you some solutions to those struggles.

Scott Anthony Barlow 04:24

One of the things is reconciling this idea of, hey, I know that my goal is to get a job. I know my goal is to find my way to my ideal career, meaningful work, whatever it is that I have as a goal. And I also know that I don't want to schmooze. I don't want to be transactional. And what I found over the years is that many people have problems reconciling the two. How do I have this goal? How do I make progress on the goal? And how do I not create a transactional relationship with the other person? Okay. Now the hardest part of this entire concept is getting people to temporarily let go of the outcome here. Temporarily let go of the fact that my ultimate goal might be to get a job. We have to disconnect the goal from the interactions with the other person. That way I can focus solely and genuinely on the other person. Okay. Now, that's a really, really difficult concept. It sounds ridiculous in reality, but it is, "the struggle is real" we'll say. What you can do, you can have a goal, you can strategically seek to build relationships with those people who are likely to be able to help you or hire you. But don't do it only for that reason. Do it because you actually want connection with that other person. What you can't do, you can't let that goal block your ability to be genuinely interested in that other person. This is hard. Also, you can't fake interest. Humans have pre-installed BS meters that are hardwired into us for many years of evolution. Okay, for a second here, let's break down what goes into a great connection. Great connections when you start to think about what are those pieces and parts that must be there. We're not going to be able to uncover all of them. However, those also come from years of evolution. It's those situations where we feel some level of familiarity. That familiarity breeds trust. Well, what creates familiarity? Often a variety of things like rapport, like being able to find that common ground, like being able to have somebody who is genuinely interested or showing care in you. Okay, those are just a few of the things. But they're going to serve us well as we continue to talk about how to find a few ways that fit you to create genuine connections here. Okay, let's start with number one here. Number one, I call the path of least resistance. A path of least resistance, as it turns out, is introductions. It is something that is probably the easiest, shortest pathway, and maybe even the most powerful relationship-building hack that you already have in your toolbox. It allows you to connect with all kinds of people, simply because you already know some people now. Okay, I can hear some of you saying, "Well, I don't have that big of a network", or "I am trying to build relationships in another city." What we've learned over the last 10 years is, yes, that feels like a struggle. And sometimes that can add to the challenge. However, in most cases, you have a far bigger network already. And far bigger number of relationships in one way or another that are already there, already operating in existence from friends, family, co-workers, and other people that you interact with on a regular basis. Okay, let me show you how, though this idea of introductions can work. Let's break it down into an actual connection here. Let's say that you and I know each other well enough where I have some level of trust and respect for you. Now, let's say that you tell me, "Scott, I have someone you must meet. You have to meet this person." When you introduce me to someone else, a portion of that trust and credibility comes over from them. Think about it as it almost, like, comes over from them. Because it's a familiar source, and then passes on to the other person– the new person, the person you're getting introduced to, which creates instant trust and credibility. Now, there's a really great group of research about this, who Robert Cialdini had pulled together in a rather famous book called "Influence: The Science and Art of Persuasion". But even if you didn't know anything about this research, you've seen this happen already. Let's use an example here that you have either done yourself or you've seen happen. You invite your friends to dinner. One of your friends asked if they can bring another friend of theirs. Okay, so fast forward, dessert and a glass of wine. And a couple hours later, you have a brand new relationship, because now you have interacted with them. And let's assume at that point, you've liked them. And you have a measure of trust with this newest person who entered your life less than two hours before, right? Okay, think about what would happen if instead, that same person that you've never met before, shows up randomly and unannounced. Like they just show up at your door. Like, you know, they weren't invited by a friend. The friend didn't say, "Hey, can I bring this person along? " Instead, this person just shows randomly up at your door, and they're like, "Hey, so I heard you're having dinner here. Can I have dinner with you?" You're probably pretty likely to say ‘no’ because that's strange. It's out of context. And that request is coming from this person you've never met before. You might call the cops but you're probably not likely to say, "Yeah, come in and eat dinner." You're probably like, "Why are you here?" Okay, but instead, let's go with it for just a second. Let's say that you do actually choose to invite them in, because you're just that nice of a person, and you're already eating dinner anyway. So let's imagine that you do allow them to come in. You're probably pretty likely to be more skeptical, or the relationship and trust-building process is going to take longer, it's going to move slower. This means that when you are creating introductions, and you already have a relationship with one person, it speeds up the trust in relationship-building process with the person you're being introduced to. Okay, so now, let's use that analogy of, you know, being brought to dinner as a friend. This is what I want you to do. Your goal now is to create the time, place, and events that allow you to enter the life of someone else in a way that increases their chances of liking you, trusting you, and deeming you as credible. Okay, if you remember our happy high achievers that we talked about earlier, and out of my studies of what they do, you begin to realize there's lots of ways to leverage introductions to build relationships. And we've have talked a little tiny bit about this on the Happen To Your Career podcast from time to time, we teach a lot of these to our coaching clients. And there's some measure of this inside, some of our programs like Career Change Bootcamp. But for today, I want to really go in-depth into something that we don't have anyplace else quite in this way. And I want to focus specifically on introductions by email.

Scott Anthony Barlow 11:48

Now, I'll say that you can adapt these email introductions to conversational introductions to social media introductions to, like, text message introductions, they can be adapted all over the place with a little bit of changing the verbiage for the situation. But let's assume that for a moment, you already have the basics in place for an introduction. And the basics are simple. Someone knows someone else that you want to know. That's it. There's probably this situation right now. And you just might not be totally aware of it. Most people, when they're faced with this situation, simply ask for an introduction. And that would be a mistake. Okay, let's talk about what does it do. I'm going to give you a formula for introduction, no, this is not a script, it is a formula that works rather well. It is not the only formula, but it's one of them that we use regularly that we've seen a lot of success with and tested over the years. Okay, I want to just read you an email here really quick. This email example goes like this. "Hey, Patricia. I'm spending the next couple of months researching companies trying to decide on my next career move. I was wondering if you would be willing to introduce me to Tim over at Google. I noticed that you are connected with him on LinkedIn. I'm really interested in product development and we'd love to ask him a few questions about what he does. If not, no worries. But if so, I would very much appreciate it. Just let me know, yes or no. And I will write up an example and something just to make it easier on you. Thanks so much." Okay, that's an example of a super simple email. But I want to break down, what is the formula that's at work here? We've already got someone that you already know. And the assumption here is that they know you and they like you. They have some measure of trust with you. What we're asking for is, we, or I should say, what we're doing here is we're sharing the context of the request, we're sharing the request itself, what's the "ask" here, expressing what the intention behind the ask here, which is incredibly important, we'll talk more about that in a second. We're giving them an out. So we're giving them a way to say 'no', which is important too, especially from a psychological aspect. That way, they don't feel like they're being backed into it, which increases the higher level of commitment. We're sharing in appreciation and gratitude. And we're making it so easy. It's something that they can say yes to. We're not asking for something that they feel like they can't do in one way or another. Okay, if we do those things, it significantly increases, not just their willingness to make the introduction for you, but also the chances that they're going to be able to say yes. You probably didn't realize there was that much buried in that super short message that I read to you. But I want to break it down again here. Okay, so the other thing I should tell you too, is I will make sure that we have a link to these messages inside of your show notes. You can go back and look at them where we break down and show in the message, what is the context. What is the request? What is the place where it makes it easy for them to say yes, etc. And then that way you can have a visual at the same time. All right, that message again here says, "Hey, Patricia. I'm spending the next couple of months researching companies trying to decide on my next career move." That is the context. I'm sharing the context in which I am contacting them. That way, they understand what to do with this message, and they're willing to read on. Alright, and then I go on to say, "I was wondering if you would be willing to introduce me to Tim over at Google." That's my request, that's my ask. I put it up front and center. I make it easy for them to understand. And then I go on to say, "I noticed that you are connected with him on LinkedIn, I'm really interested in product development and I would love to ask him a few questions about what he does." That's my intention. Because if they know Tim over at Google, what if they're worried that I'm going to try and sell Tim some stuff? Or what if they're worried that who knows? Like, if we don't fill in the blank for them, then our human brains are amazing and they will imagine something a reason to try and fill in the blank for them about why we're trying to contact Tim. So we just need to share our intention upfront, it makes it easier for them to be like, "Oh, yeah. Like, that's great idea. Yeah, you should totally do that. Yeah, I'd help." Okay. And then I go on to say, "If not, no worries!" That's four words, I tend to put exclamation points after it. But the important part is I'm giving them an out with those four words. And then from there go on to say, "But if so I would very much appreciate it." That's the appreciation part. That's the gratitude part. And then I make it easy for them to say yes, by saying, "Just let me know, yes or no. And I'll write up a short example, and send something over to make it easier on you." Another thing to point out, there's only 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 6 and a half sentences really in this. And then that's it. It's a really short email, as to the point it has all the pieces. And that's part of what makes it work. You'll notice that every line set of words is there intentionally. And then when you send this as an email, or you send it as a message on social or we could send it as a text. In a text, you could probably even reduce it further, like you could, you know, with even more shorthand and less sentences, if you need to do. Your next step after this is, after you have something like this drafted, all you have to do is press send. Like this is your easiest road, easiest road by a long shot to be able to create natural connections. But it doesn't stop there. The important part in order to finish creating, or I should say, engineering these natural connections, is what happens after that. What happens after I've asked for an introduction? Most people think that your work is done here like all I need to do is figure out a time to schedule with a new person, and voila, okay, instinct connection, but that would be inaccurate. And that's also why people have bad experiences with introductions. My work does not stop here. First, and maybe most importantly, if they say no, that's okay. That's okay. They might be connected to the other person, but maybe they don't know them really well. Or maybe they just aren't comfortable with the intro. Either way, that's okay. Move on. If you can try not to just get discouraged from that, just try to understand if you can, that that's their right and if they made that introduction, then it might not go that particularly well anyways. They have a reason in mind allowed them to decide what is best there. Don't force it, as we talked about earlier. But if they do say yes, that is amazing. That's perfect. This is the point where you get to, instead of waiting on them, you get to prepare an intro for them. Now, when I say prepare an intro for them, I'm talking about preparing the email or the text or however, they're going to introduce you to this other person. Write it for them. writing an introduction serves a couple of purposes. Number one, it makes it easier for them to send it even though they said they're gonna send it or maybe even some people are like, "Oh, no need to send over an example." Do it anyway. I promise you that people have great intentions to write their own. But a lot of times they may be busy and may not actually be able to follow through on it or something may happen in their lives where this priority gets dropped and it falls to a lower priority level. And in order to allow them to follow through, which is good for you and good for them, they feel good about themselves. And it helps you just write the introduction. It's also easier for most people to modify something that is there versus writing something from scratch. So if you're creating an introduction for them, they may only use one line of it. And that would be okay. But that actually makes it possible for them to send it because it reduces the cognitive load. And it reduces the steps that have to happen in order for them to get to the point where they actually send the introduction, email or text, or whatever for you. Okay, I want to give you an example of what it sounds like to respond back to them. And what an introduction email might sound like, as well. So I might send them a one-liner saying, "Here's that introduction for Brett and Sue. Thank you so much, again, for being willing to do this, feel free to use anything that I've written, or feel free to make changes or use nothing at all. Again, I really appreciate it. Let me know when you have made the intro so that I can respond." Okay, then I would paste below the email, as well, the actual introduction email, too. So let me read this off. This example says, "Hey, Brett and Sue. Hope you're both doing well up there in Massachusetts. It's 75 and sunny here in Dallas today. So I can't complain. I wanted to introduce you both to Anna. Anna and I met through a business coach that we both work with, she's currently interested in learning more about the roles available at your company located there in Boston. She's really engaged, she's really excited about your particular mission of helping companies realize the potential of their employees. And I suggested that she talk to both of you based on your levels of influence and your respective roles. I just sent Anna an idea of your product and I'll share the results as soon as I have those as well. All the best connecting, take care." Now, one thing I might change on this email, something that I use a lot, I will embed another line in there to really level up and say, "I would suggest that you connect in the next week via short phone call, or connect in person." And then that way I'm giving permission and instruction for what the other parties can do. This actually helps a lot. It helps a lot because it gives guidance as to what to do next. And having that guidance as to what to do next increases the chances that I'm going to be able to then meet and have that connection, begin that connection with the other person or in this case, people. Okay. Don't forget to ask them if it's an email to CC you on the intro, and then that way you can respond and then you can just take it from there. After they've sent the introduction, you're off to the races, get a call scheduled with the person or a time set up to meet. One of the things that we'll talk about and have mentioned in future episodes is, it's a whole art form to be able to schedule in ways that reduce the cognitive load required. But that's another episode for another day. Work to schedule the call with the person, get a time set up, you've probably guessed that there was even more ways that you can make this process more valuable. We're going to come back at the end. And we'll talk more about that.

Scott Anthony Barlow 23:17

But let's go into number two. Idea number two for how you can connect with other people. This is called the conference goer. Here's an example. One of our clients, we're gonna call her Jennifer. She was really excited about a conference, she was heading to this conference that she was attending. And she really wanted to meet with one of the panel speakers. She had been following her work for a while. So here's what she did to create that initial connection. She initially had interacted with the speaker on social media just by responding to some of her comments in various different places and then sent an email beforehand. So later on wasn't out of the blue when she emailed the panel speaker again and said, "I'm really looking forward to your panel discussion. I'll be in the front row wearing an orange jacket. I'm really excited to meet you afterwards." Okay, so this series of relatively small interactions via email and social allowed her to be able to get to me and connect with the speaker afterwards. Now, she was really pumped. She was really pumped. And one of the things is that this feels really natural. It may not feel natural to you if this is the first time that you've done this, and this is a point that I should distinguish. None of these things might feel natural to you. We're gonna go through five different examples in total, and at first, they might not feel natural to you, but they will feel natural to the other person. And that's what we're going for. So in this case, Jennifer had been able to begin that relationship with somebody that she really wanted to know. And that's the important part here. And it actually didn't take that much in time total, probably researching and messaging and everything else and thinking about what she was going to wear and how she's going to do that probably took like 90 minutes, right? You can really ramp up the relationship building here to another opportunity to be able to level up in this case is by circling back around with that person after the conference too. And when you speak with them, letting them know that you're going to wrap back around with them after the conference too. Because if you think about it, as someone who is on a panel or somebody who is a speaker at conference, what I've noticed is that as soon as someone does their presentation, then everyone wants to talk to them afterwards. So there's limited time to connect, right? So I'll make a point to find ways to work around this. One of the ways is what we mentioned for Jennifer. Other ways is, I might request to meet up with them before their speaking time, or well after their speaking time in a way that's easy for them. Here's an example, "I'm going to be at the conference on Thursday. I would love to buy you a coffee at 7am before the conference gets started for the day. Or if that doesn't work out, I'm also going to be around after the conference. I'm hanging around till Sunday at 3pm. I'd be happy to do breakfast at this time or buy coffee at this time." It is relatively easy, but especially if you've already had some level of initial connection with that person at the conference, it can work really, really well. Another thing to note, too, is that it doesn't actually have to be speakers, something else that I've done quite a bit is I'll find out who's going to do attend the conference, and be able to contact those individuals prior to the conference going. That does two things for them, it gives them something to look forward to, that is out of the ordinary of the conference. And often if you're meeting with them early, it can give you another person to be able to experience the conference with and then that often creates a stronger relationship too. And especially if you meet up with them earlier on, shortly after they arrive or before the conference really gets going, then it heightens the chance that you're going to be able to spend more time with them in a variety of different ways, even if just passing and waving again in the conference hallways. Okay. So it does require a little bit of detective work to do that. What you'll find is a lot of conferences nowadays, or events in one way or another, try to create a community around it. And they'll use apps, they'll have attendee lists, they'll have, there's a lot of different ways that you can find out who is going. And then you can pick and choose from the people that you're really excited to get to know for one reason or another, whether that happens to be an industry they're in, a role that you're excited about, just somebody that you have heard of, and hadn't connected in your industry with or somebody who you just happen to be on their social media and realize that, wow, this might be a cool person. All of those are okay. And 100% of those are great reasons to be able to reach out to them, share what attracted you to them in the first place. And it doesn't have to be complicated. It can be as simple as, "Hey, I clicked on your social media, I realized that we have this and this in common. I realized that we both do mountain biking and are attending this conference. And I would love to get connected with you. What day are you flying in? I'll be there on Tuesday, I would love to buy a coffee." It can be that simple. Okay, this next one is called the "gatherer". This is where you're bringing people together. Bringing people together and allowing them to bring other people together along with you in one way or another. So instead of you going to someone else, someplace else, and seeking out connections, this is the backwards approach where you're bringing people to you in one way or another. Now, this is something that I've done over and over again. But also recently we had a client who did this exact thing.

Jill 29:20

The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker, and I love gathering people together. So the Art of Gathering book talks about how to bring people together in a meaningful way. And I would say that's one way that I have practiced everything that I've learned, and that is by bringing people together. So I had a party at my house a few years ago called Chats and Charcuterie, where just had a Charcuterie board and then I brought people. This was kind of like towards the end of COVID. So people only talked about COVID when you got together, and I was tired of talking about COVID and so I was just like, "Okay, no, we're gonna talk about different things." And so I invited people over to my house, we set up a big circle and it just organically took place like the conversation. And we never brought up that subject and everyone just really connected.

Scott Anthony Barlow 30:09

That by the way, is Jill and we'll put a link to her full story and full podcast from the Happen To Your Career podcast. But I wanted to share that tidbit for how you can use this to connect with other people in a gathering-type format. Now, I've done this quite a bit, I mentioned that earlier. Sometimes we connect around a particular idea. For example, you know, we had somebody who used to work with our Happen To Your Career team and she was just copywriting for us. She is amazing. And one of the things that she did was she hosted parties at her house every single month to connect with other people to talk about Enneagram. And that turned into this thing that everybody looked forward to for years. And she got to meet so many people through that type of event over and over and over again, every single month. And she didn't have to go anywhere, she did have to do a little planning, they would make tacos every single time and that was it. That was the extent of it. Pretty cool, right? But you can actually combine this together with the conference goer, too. An example of that, where you're combining the conference goer with the gatherer, well, I've done dinners or meetups big and small, many times where I've organized people together for conferences. Remember those lists we're getting access to other people who are going to be there? Well, I've invited a group of people to dinner and I will state exactly that, "Hey, I'm putting together a group of really interesting people that I would love to meet. And I would love to have you there." And then I would reference why I'm interested in having you there. What's the context and say, "We're getting together on this night, this day, at this place, it's going to be a small dinner, there'll be about six of us or so. And we'd love for you to join us." That's it. That's an example of a small one. I've also organized groups that are like 40, or 50 plus people where it turns into a full-on meetup. And it doesn't have to be complicated. The invites can be very, very simple. Generally, when people are going to a conference, they want to connect, they want to have things that are outside the normal, they want to feel like they belong in one way or another. This is an easy thing that you can not take advantage of but appeal to. And then this allows you to be able to begin a connection in a new and different and very natural way. Now the cool thing out of this, the extra benefit out of this is you get a lot of connections all at once. So you might know that I'm very much a maximizer. I love creating multi-purpose or multi-benefit activities. And this definitely falls into that category for me. Let's go into number four. Number four is what I call "The Friend Maker". Meaning I'm going to make you my friend. This is something I've also done over and over and helped many of our clients too. Here's how it goes. You find a person that you are genuinely interested in. You want to meet. And you take a very direct approach with that. I want to tell you how I met my friend, Jenny Foss, who's been on the podcast. She runs a really interesting resume business, which she's transitioned and grown over the years. And the way that I met her, I don't remember how I got introduced to her work, somebody must have sent me something or I happened along the interwebs ended up hearing about Jenny. And right away, I could tell that this is somebody who I wanted to know. This is somebody who I would likely be friends with. And she lived in the Portland area. We had that in common. Because I've lived in Portland in the past, she just seemed super fun. She seemed into some of the same things that I was into. She had kids approximately the same age. There were all of these different things. So I had emailed her and said, "Jenny, I don't know how we have not met before. We happen to work in... We both work in careers. And we have some similar friends. And I would love to connect. I'm coming to Portland in two weeks and wondering if I can invite you to dinner or if I can buy you coffee." So in result, super simple, but of course she said yes. And I've been able to grow that friendship. She's super fun. I got to meet up with her a variety of different times different ways. She's been on the podcast, I've done different partnerships with her. It's turned into something else, but that's not how it started. That's not how it started at all. It started from simply saying, "Jenny, you're awesome. I'm going to make you my friend." That's it.

Scott Anthony Barlow 34:47

But you can do the same thing if that feels too forward to you, then here's an example of another one. We call this one, the "Doer". The doer is where you're able to connect through work, in one way or another by doing the work. This can be in quite a few different forms. For example, one of the things that you could do is connect through a volunteer cause where you're actively working, you're actively rolling up your sleeves in one way or another, to be able to connect with other people that you either want to meet, or involved with organizations that you're excited about, or anything else that you might have in common with. Now, another example of this might be where you connect by project. For example, there's a variety of open source projects out there, let's say that you are someone who can write code or you do project management or any number of other things like that, then you can actually become involved through a project and actually do the work. Now, one of the fun things that we've seen about this is not only can this be a way to experiment with something, we talked about experiments in detail in both the HTYC book and on the podcast. And I'll put a link to a variety of different types of career experiments, which also talks about different ways to connect. And I'll put a link to that in the show notes. But not only is this a great way to experiment, it is a wonderful way to get to know people and have just through the natural course of interaction around a particular cause. Being able to have natural recommendations come up, "Oh, you have to meet this person. Can you introduce me to them?" And guess what? That actually leads us right back to the beginning. Here's one of the fun things over and over again. We started with introductions. And this leads us into our bonus way to connect with people. When you're meeting people in any context when you're in the course of normal conversation, people might say like, when you're volunteering they might say, "I've got a friend who's in strategy at Microsoft", or "My sister, Jenny, has worked in the craft brewing world for years." And if that interests you at all, all you have to do is ask. You can say, "Oh my gosh. I would love to meet Jenny. Would you be willing to introduce me to Jenny?" And then that sets you right back at the path of least resistance. Introductions can lead to more introductions. And when you make it easy on people that are very willing to help, introductions become the gift that keeps on giving. Pretty cool, right? All right.

Scott Anthony Barlow 37:24

Last but not least here. I want to share a couple of things that you can do. A couple of things that you can do today, right now, in order to make this easy on you. Thing number one. If you're less comfortable, I would encourage you to practice. Practice with someone else. This might sound ridiculous, they're like "I don't need to practice." But what we find, even though we're working with really, really talented people all over the world, is that almost everybody, almost everyone is somewhat uncomfortable with this. And that's okay. It's because we don't take the opportunity to practice. So if you're in that category of being less comfortable, find somebody to practice with, find an accountability partner, join our community, find a coach, find a friend who's willing to practice with you and have these types of interactions, have these types of beginning conversations or practice asking. But in any case, start to practice. If you find that you want to do something, you want to reach out to someone in one way or another or that you're nervous about a conversation that you have scheduled, that's your indication that it's going to be useful for you to practice. It's okay. Practice and you'll feel more confident when you go to have the actual conversation or an actual interaction. Number two, if you're already comfortable or have some level of comfort, then I would encourage you to choose one of the examples today. The Path of Least Resistance, the Conference Goer, the Gatherer, the Friend Maker, the Mentor, or the Doer. Choose one of those examples and start today. Again, you'll find all of the references, all of the links, resources, and everything else that we talked about, you'll see them in the show notes, or you'll have them emailed to your inbox and take advantage of those.

Scott Anthony Barlow 39:17

Hey, if you've been listening to our episodes here at Happen To Your Career and you want to make an intentional career change to much more meaningful work and have it neatly laid out into an organized framework, well, guess what, we actually have that available for you in the Happen To Your Career book. It's available on Amazon, Audible anywhere else where you get your books. You'll learn about the five hidden obstacles, stopping your career change, how to figure out what would truly make you happy with your career. And what brings you more happy more often. And more importantly, how to transition to a much more fulfilling career and life. You can find the book on Amazon, Audible anywhere where books are sold, by the way, people are particularly loving the audio book, which you can access right now in second.

Scott Anthony Barlow 40:11

Here's a sneak peek into what we have coming up for you next week right here on Happen To Your Career.

Scott Anthony Barlow 40:18

What's the best way to meet new people, quickly test new careers, and pave the way for creating your very own role, maybe custom fit to you even? Most people think that it must be some amazing tactic, but it's not. It's one particular type of experimentation.

Scott Anthony Barlow 40:36

All that and plenty more next week right here on Happen To Your Career. Make sure that you don't miss it. And if you haven't already, click Subscribe on your podcast player so that you can download this podcast in your sleep, and you get it automatically, even the bonus episodes every single week, sometimes multiple times a week. Until next week. Adios. I'm out.