Networking is how careers actually work. It's how people find jobs. How they hire, how they find customers and suppliers, how they land buyers for the thing they've been building. Almost nobody argues with that part.
What took me a while to figure out was that the version of networking people are taught is the version that doesn't work.
Events. Business cards. The elevator pitch. The LinkedIn message with a Calendly link at the end. All of that is what most people mean when they say networking, and most of it produces nothing.
So here's what actually made it easier for me, and what I'd tell anyone starting out.
The one thing underneath all of it
Networking works when you stop calling it networking.
The moment your conversation has an objective attached to it, the other person can feel it. Not always on purpose. But something registers, and every sentence after that gets slightly more careful. Nobody names this out loud. It just changes the temperature of the room, and you rarely notice it in real time.
Which leaves you with a strange result. People who are deliberately networking are usually worse at it than people who are just interested in other people.
This isn't a folk observation, by the way. Casciaro, Gino and Kouchaki did research on it. Their paper on instrumental networking found that people pursuing ties for professional gain feel morally impure while doing it, and that discomfort is visible to the person across the table. The thing you're trying to hide is exactly what people read off you.
So every rule below is really a way to get out of your own way.
The four things that made it easier
1. Be someone people don't dread dealing with
Sounds too soft to matter. It's actually the whole thing.
Opportunities go to the people whose reaction is predictable, not to the most qualified ones. Skills get you shortlisted. Being pleasant to work with is what gets you thought of in the first place. That's a real distinction and most people mix the two up.
The mechanics of being approachable are small. Boringly small.
Look up when someone comes to your desk. Say yes to the coffee. Don't act interrupted. Reply to messages within the same day, even if the reply is a two-line "let me get back to you Thursday." Half of being approachable is just not making people feel they're inconveniencing you.
The "be happy" half isn't a mood thing though. If you're visibly stressed every time someone talks to you, they stop bringing you things. Not because they're being deliberately kind about it. They just don't want to add to what looks like a fire. And the cost of that is invisible, which is what makes it dangerous. You never see the conversations that quietly didn't happen. You just notice, a year in, that fewer opportunities land in your inbox and you can't quite work out why.
I've watched more than one talented person get quietly written off this way. Nothing dramatic ever happens. Just less contact, less inclusion, and by year two the network has moved on without them.
2. Have a reason to start a conversation. Any reason.
Not because you need a pretext. Because "no reason" is what stops most people from ever starting in the first place.
The reason can be almost anything. A question about something they're working on. A thing you read that made you think of them. An introduction between two people you know. A follow-up on something they mentioned three weeks ago and never came back to. It's honestly not the content that matters. What matters is that the awkwardness of opening a conversation is the actual barrier, and any reason clears that barrier.
Talk downward more than up. This is the one everyone gets wrong.
People are careful and prepared with seniors. They're lazy with juniors. Careless, interruptible, half-listening. Ten years later those juniors run things, and they remember exactly who treated them as worth a real conversation and who didn't. The math on that is completely one-sided over a career, and almost nobody plans for it.
3. The reason doesn't have to be work
This is the one I'd emphasise hardest, and it's the one most professional advice gets wrong.
Movies. Shows. Sport. What someone did at the weekend. Even daily soaps. It really doesn't matter what it is. Non-work conversation is what turns a colleague into a person, and that's the only route to the kind of relationship where somebody will actually help you later.
There's a reason for this beyond just being pleasant. Work conversations are transactional by construction. There's a task, an outcome, an assessment. Non-work conversation has no scorecard, which is exactly why trust forms there and not in the status meeting.
The mistake people make is treating small talk as a warm-up to be minimised before the real conversation starts. In relationship terms it's the opposite. The small talk IS the real conversation. The work part is what you do with the relationship afterwards.
4. Never ask for a favour unless you've already helped
This is the rule that matters more than the other three combined, and the one most people get backwards.
The instinct when you need something is to reach out to people who could help. The problem is that your first substantive contact then becomes a request, and that sets the entire relationship as transactional from day one. Even if they say yes, you've spent something.
The alternative is simple in principle and hard in practice: make yourself useful long before you need anything.
Introduce two people who should know each other. Send someone something relevant to a problem they mentioned last month. Answer a question properly when asked. Recommend someone publicly. Almost none of this costs you anything material.
Two things happen when you do this consistently. The obvious one is that people are glad to help you when you eventually ask. The less obvious and more valuable one is that you stop needing to ask, because people who know what you do start bringing you things unprompted. That's what a functioning network actually looks like. Not a list of contacts. A set of people who think of you when something relevant shows up in front of them.
The discipline is doing this when you don't need anything. It feels pointless precisely then, which is exactly why most people don't, and why it works for the ones who do.
What you actually get out of it
Beyond the obvious opportunities, four things. The first one is underrated.
Healthy banter brings peace and happiness, and it quietly protects your mental health. Work without any human warmth in it is corrosive, and the corrosion is gradual enough that you don't notice until you're badly worn down. This isn't a soft benefit. Sustained performance depends on it.
It deepens bonds with colleagues, acquaintances and friends. Relationships that only exist inside a shared task end when the task does. The ones with any personal substance survive job changes, which is when they matter most.
It gives you information you wouldn't otherwise get. Not gossip. Context. How a decision was actually made, why a project stalled, what a client is really worried about. Almost everything genuinely useful about how an organisation works is transmitted verbally between people who trust each other. None of it is written down anywhere.
And it raises your profile. Being known for something specific, by enough people, is what causes opportunities to arrive rather than be applied for. Most good roles and most good clients arrive this way, and the people who get them are rarely the most qualified. They're just the ones who came to mind.
Keeping a network alive without turning it into a chore
The part nobody explains: a network decays. Contacts you haven't spoken to in three years aren't a network, they're a list. But "maintaining relationships" sounds like work nobody has time for, so most people do nothing and quietly lose the lot.
What actually works is smaller than people expect.
Have a reason to reappear. The hardest message to send is "just catching up", because it has no content and both people know it. The easy one has a reason attached. Something you saw that's relevant to them, a congratulation on something real, an introduction. The reason does the work. The reconnection is the byproduct.
Congratulate specifically and immediately. New job, new role, an award, a launch. It takes thirty seconds, it's genuinely welcome, and it re-establishes contact without asking for anything. It's the single cheapest maintenance action available and almost nobody does it consistently.
Keep a very short list. Not a CRM. Twenty or thirty people whose careers you actually care about. Trying to maintain hundreds is what makes networking feel like work, and it's what causes people to abandon it entirely.
Let the rest lapse honestly. You can't sustain hundreds of real relationships and pretending otherwise is what makes networking feel fake. A dormant contact you were genuinely useful to five years ago will usually still take your call. A contact you've been sending quarterly check-in messages to won't feel any closer for it. They'll probably just find you slightly odd.
Be findable. If people can't locate you when they think of you, the relationship produces nothing. A current profile, a clear description of what you do, and something public you've written are what convert being remembered into being contacted.
How to actually ask for something
This is the part everything else is for, and it's the part people handle worst. Usually by never asking at all, having spent years building something they then refuse to use.
Three things make an ask easy to say yes to.
Make it small and specific. "Can I pick your brain?" is an unbounded request for an unknown amount of time, and the honest answer to it is no. "Can I ask you two questions about how you structured pricing when you started?" is a five-minute favour with a visible end. People decline vagueness far more often than they decline effort.
Make declining easy. Add the exit yourself. No problem at all if the timing is bad. Counterintuitively this raises your hit rate, because the cost of saying yes drops once saying no isn't awkward. It also protects the relationship in the case where they can't help.
Ask the person, not the room. A request broadcast to two hundred contacts is addressed to nobody and gets answered by nobody. One message to one person who can actually help will outperform it every single time.
Then close the loop. Tell them what happened, whether it worked or not. That single follow-up message is what turns a favour into a relationship, and it's the step almost everyone skips.
If networking feels draining
It's common, and it's usually not a character flaw. It's a sign of doing the wrong version.
If large events exhaust you, stop going. Room-working is one method, not the method, and honestly it's among the least effective. Depth beats breadth. Twenty people who genuinely know your work will do more for you than four hundred business cards ever will.
Use writing instead. Publishing what you know reverses the direction. People arrive already knowing what you do, which removes the introduction entirely. For anyone who finds rooms hard, this is often the single highest-leverage change available.
One conversation a week is enough. This really isn't a volume activity. Consistency over years beats intensity in bursts, and it's far more sustainable.
Play to the format you're good at. Some people are best one-to-one over coffee. Some in writing. Some presenting to a room. Any of them works. Trying to do it the way an extrovert does it, badly, works for nobody.
FAQs
What is the best way to network if you're introverted?
Skip large events and use depth instead. One-to-one conversations, and writing publicly about what you know. Writing reverses the direction. People arrive already understanding what you do, so no introduction is needed. Twenty people who genuinely know your work will beat four hundred business cards.
How do I start a conversation without it feeling forced?
Have a reason, and let it be a small one. A question about their work, something you read that's relevant to them, a follow-up on something they mentioned. The reason removes the awkwardness of opening, which is the real barrier. It doesn't need to be important.
Should professional networking stay strictly professional?
No, and this is the most common mistake. Work conversation is transactional by construction. There's a task and an assessment. Non-work conversation has no scorecard, which is exactly why trust forms there. The small talk isn't the warm-up. It's the part that builds the relationship.
When is it okay to ask a contact for a favour?
After you've already been useful to them, ideally more than once. If your first substantive contact is a request, the relationship is transactional from the start. Help people well before you need anything. The aim is to reach the point where you rarely have to ask.
How much time should networking take?
Far less than people assume. One real conversation a week, sustained for years, beats bursts of intensive activity. It's a consistency activity, not a volume one.
Does networking still matter if I'm good at my job?
More, not less. Competence determines whether you're considered. Visibility determines whether you're thought of at all. Most good roles and clients arrive through people who remembered you, and they rarely go to the most qualified person. They go to the one who came to mind.
Key takeaways
- Networking works when you stop treating it as networking. Objectives are visible.
- Be approachable, and don't be visibly stressed in every interaction. The cost is all the conversations that quietly don't happen.
- Have a reason to start conversations, and talk downward as much as upward.
- Non-work conversation is where trust forms, because nothing is being assessed.
- Never ask for a favour before you've been useful. The goal is to stop needing to ask.
- If it drains you, change the format. Writing and one-to-one both work.
Related reading: personal branding for beginners, how to write a personal bio that gets you noticed, and how to actually get value from marketing events and conferences.
