Generating Connections - Networking in Action

I was prompted and encouraged to write this post after meeting up with "Mr Connection Generation", Iggy Pintado, and his good wife, Kerry Pintado, (both pictured at left) at an engagement party for their niece and the son of a good friend of mine. We did not know until the party that we were connected in this way too - in addition to being LinkedIn and mutual followers on Twitter.

Iggy and I were having a discussion around how many people not into social media yet just do not realise what can happen through a combination of traditional networking, person to person contact and the viral nature of social media. Let me go back a step though - and share a connection trail that has potentially lead to a long term consulting assignment for me in my business.

Wind back to May 2009. I have just been introduced to Roger Lawrence (pictured left) ex Microsoft and now Head of Cloud Services at HP Australia (@Rog42)who introduces me to Twitter as it is one of his preferred means of communication. I am a little skeptical saying it is not for me but business need called and I plunge in and start following Roger and others including a good colleague of mine from PwC, John Groarke (@jegcmc), who is now an IT Strategy Consultant (pictured right).

About 3 weeks after entering the Twitterverse, I see Roger tweeting about being at a NSW Government Small Business conference and seeing Iggy Pintado speak about Social Media in Small Business. Then I see John Groarke tweet too about being at the same conference and is due to speak after Iggy. John and Roger do not know each other and I have no idea who is this Iggy Pintado!

Later that day, a network colleague calls me and asks if I would like to attend a network event the following evening as one of her guests has dropped out. I say yes and go - and who happens to be speaking - but this Iggy Pintado! I meet Iggy, share my connection story, buy and have autographed his book "Connection Generation" follow him on Twitter and LinkIn with him.

I continue to follow people on Twitter and gain more followers too. One of the groups of people I start following is the various accounts of The Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia of which I am a member (see @Chartered_Accts).

Fast forward to January 2010. I am sitting at home watching the one day cricket and simultaneously following my Twitter feed and see the Charter Magazine Twitter account (with only 15 followers compared to 50,000+ members) tweet out "CAs with exciting career and life experiences? Email: charter@charteredaccountants.com.au and tell us your story!". Reflecting on my experience, transition and career reinvention over recent years,I think this could be an interesting opportunity. I email back, The Institute is interested and I am privileged to receive a 2 page profile article in the March 2010 edition of Charter magazine - which particularly focuses on my work through the GFC in career transition and my social media presence.

About 3 weeks after publication, I receive an email from a fellow PwC Alumnus who has seen my profile article and wants to get in touch with me because he has just been appointed into an Acting Managing Director role in a major Financial Planning business. We knew of each other in PwC but did not do any work together and it was nearly 10 years since we would have been in the firm together. We arrange to meet and have a number of discussions over about 3 months before he is advised that his business wishes to appoint someone else to the role. He requests I work with him in a professional coaching capacity to assist in his career transition as he now wishes to leave the organisation which I have been doing for over six months now. I am assisting him with developing his future career strategy including getting him online through LinkedIn.

Recently, he says to me "You should meet my financial planner - you two would get on well and could have some mutual business opportunities". I duly do this, find out that he is just in the process of merging with some accounting firms and, because of my significant experience in the PwC merger in 1998, there is now the possibility of some significant long term business opportunities. Interestingly, this financial planner only works on a referral capacity in his business - he does not work with unsolicited approaches or "tyre kickers". He is not into social media (yet!) although I would not have met him if not for social media.

Anyhow, back to Iggy. I meet him at this engagement party and also introduce him to my wife who is just in the process of getting the Coeliac Society of Australia Twitter and other social media presence going (see also my recent blog post "Mate! Have you lost your Mojo" on this). Iggy and Kerry have very kindly supported that too with their ReTweeting as they are passionate about good causes.

So, what Iggy refers to as the Connection Generation has many threads through this tale of some of my travails of the past 2 years. It's not all about social media though - its also about doing good work, personal contact, networking events, patience, persistence, presence and some luck.

So, if you are not yet on Twitter, when are you going to join the revolution? You too may derive some significant personal and professional benefits - particularly meeting some really interesting people along the way.


PB

Copyright: Peter Black 2011