Heading to network? Remember to bring your heart and wear it on your sleeve
Alisa Grafton
Lawyer and Speaker ?? II Scrivener Notary??at Notable Notaries || Speaker on Gen Z, Intergenerational Comms and Networking ??|| Founder of Great Networking?? & Author of "Great Networking" ?? || Head of Year at UCL ????
“The world is one big community”, said my Gen Zedder friend Josh. “I don’t need to be a member of any club to have a sense of belonging.”
“We are for sure connected, it’s just a different way of connection from the one that you know”, he continued.
Generation Z are very community-minded, and the connections-making for the sake of self-promotion – of the salesy and sleazy variety that often gives networking such a bed rep – are a big turn-off.
So if you are a leader with a young team under your management, this is what you need to know:
If an authentic reason for meeting new people and developing nascent relationships is not evident and clear, young people will be disengaged and disinterested in building connections for the sake of connections-building alone.
Networking with a single purpose of meeting influential people has lost its sparkle to the new generation: if people don’t trust that your message has heart, it will be a noise only.
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As a leader, I want to encourage interpersonal intelligence among the young people in my team. I want them to learn how to speak to strangers at networking gatherings, how to be clear about their roles, how to engage in a meaningful conversation and how to use these initial connections as a launch pad for new collaborative relationships that will enhance their profiles, increase their exposure in the industry, but will also promote my business.
Above all, I have learned that when I highlight the value that new connections create for the community as a whole, this starts making a lot more sense to the Gen Z workforce. I begin tapping into their core values, I start speaking their language.
And this is the moment when my message hits the spot for them.
In short, we can talk about the value of networking and connections-making until we are blue in the face, but if we do not understand and therefore speak the language of the new generation, we are merely wasting our breath.
Hear here from the experts: www.AlisaGrafton.com/boomer-to-zoomer-programme/
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