The Tectonic Change in Networking and How it Can Make the Difference in Your Journey to Success

Networking, simply stated, is doing everything you can on a regular basis to secure and expand your personal relationships in order to increase the likelihood for success--your own success and the success of others. I would also define networking as developing an extended group of people with similar interests or concerns that interact and remain in contact for mutual support and assistance. Through the benefits of technology, your networking reach can be wider and deeper than ever before.

In 2009, while serving as CEO of Fusion-io, I was in New York City meeting with the lifeblood of our business--our customers. There, I met a fascinating guy--Hylton Van Zyl, one of the Heads of Research and Development for Credit-Suisse, one of the top financial institutions in the world. He was kind enough to share his business card with me.

Having only met Hylton one time, it would have been easy to tuck the business card away and forget about it. Our interaction could have been left to a handshake and a "Hylton, it was nice meeting you." But, instead, when I returned home from that trip, I logged his contact information in my database and reached out to follow up with him. I extended a LinkedIn invitation, and Hylton became a contact for me in the New York City area.

Three years later, in March of 2012, as I was looking to grow HireVue, I sent out a LinkedIn blast to what were then my 196 direct contacts in the New York City area. Hylton Van Zyl responded. He introduced me to Neill Ochiogrosso with Investor Growth Capital in New York. I followed up with a note to Neill, and a meeting was arranged. The introduction turned into a stellar connection. A couple of days later, I found myself seated in a big conference room with a number of partners and associates of IGC. As our meeting was reaching completion, Neill turned to me with an enthusiastic grin and said, "David, this is right down the middle of our fairway." Stated in another way, HireVue was at the size and historical point in its development as a company where his group liked to invest. We'd talked a little about golf and the analogy was fitting. Through that simple connection, we were able to raise a total of 22 million dollars.

The moral of the story is this: business is all about connecting. The more you connect, the more efficiently you connect, and the more credibly you connect, the more success you will have. Social media networking enables people to connect more efficiently and cost effectively than ever before.

Combining Character with Technology

There is tremendous power behind the mouse when a person can combine character and relationships with technology. It is this ability (and one you can develop, too) that has helped me create, build, sustain, and nurture deep relationships with such widely dispersed people as the inventor of the Apple computer, an NFL Hall of Famer, the man who took Google to a half trillion in value, and a man who cam within a whisker of being the President of the United States in 2012. 

Networking is an opportunity, not a nuisance.

Can I share what I've learned to help you succeed, as well? The possibilities are endless when you harness the tools that compel the masses. While the principles themselves are timeless, the marriage of principle and application create the synergy that we often see as an "overnight" success. That missing link is what I believe many of you in business are hungering for but are somehow missing. If you want to massively increase your chances for success and step Up Your Game, use these twenty-first century tools together with the underlying six principles I reference in my book, Up Your Game, and throughout my blog and published posts.

Networking effectively allowed me to help build a billion-dollar valuation for a company that had been shipping product for less than three years. Through simple, clear steps, my database has grown deep and wide enough to create a massive pool of talent and intellect for me to tap into to grow boards of directors, find capital, and bring leadership. There are keys to help in finding, tracking, and sourcing the best possible talent for your team.

You can apply old-fashioned principles of supportive relationships to this brave new world of digital communication and social interaction. The first step is a new mindset: networking is an opportunity, not a nuisance. It is for the CEO, COO, the hiring managers, customer-facing reps, and everyone in your organization who helps think critically to improve the situation in some way. Hopefully, that includes everyone in your business from top to bottom. In a regular day, most people meet between one and five new people. How many of those new acquaintances are now connected with you on some social media platform? Are they Twitter followers, Facebook friends, Instagram followers, or LinkedIn connections? If not, then why not? If you are not taking full advantage of the horsepower of Facebook, Twitter, Google+, and LinkedIn, you have--at minimum--a competitive disadvantage in the marketplace. I built up a large personal network of 10,000 plus connections on LinkedIn, 5000 Facebook friends, and nearly 25,000 email contacts while running several multimillion-dollar companies through one simple guiding principle--do it every day!

More here, including speaking topics: https://www.davidbradford.com/book/