A crucial requirement for anyone seeking to make progress both within and beyond their own organisation will be the development of a strong contact base. And a contact base requires good networking skills – an area that often makes less confident people cringe. Yet many disparagers actually fear networking, thinking it is something they will never excel at.

Much of this fear is based on playground experiences as a child – the place where the concept of networks and hierarchies among peers first arises. Yet youthful notions of exclusivity are inappropriate for the workplace because, here, those that won the playground hierarchy battles have to learn a new skill: co-operation. While being tough in the playground or cool at university is a vital element for success in those environments, in the workplace – meanwhile – being plugged into the machine is the key need.  

In Network Your Way to Success (2002), marketing director John Timperley offers a development plan for connecting us with our peers and, most importantly, creating “rapport” from those connections.

“Put simply,” says Timperley, “if you have the ability to generate rapport with others, you’ll be happy and successful; if you don’t, you won’t. Without rapport in your networking you’ll just be going through the motions.”

Yet the first thing we must do is get ourselves out there: around our office, out to meetings and off to industry events. Indeed, networking opportunities are many and varied and we should be constantly alive to their potential, although the most intense networking moments are at industry events – both internal and external. And we should lobby to attend them as soon as we can.  

These can be frightening episodes for the under-confident, but they don’t need to be. Here are Timperley’s tips for networking at events (with added thoughts of my own):

·     Smile: however forced, it’s better than a frown (the usual expression of the fearful). Practice your smile in front of the mirror to ensure it lights up your face and doesn’t make you look like a maniac,

·     Put them in the spotlight: be interested in who you meet. Who cares whether you have got your vital points across? In fact, by listening you have – you have informed them you are interested in them, which is crucial for good networking.

·     Mirroring: broadly mirror the person’s body language, although not to the point of freaking them out. By adopting the same general posture, speed of speech, arm placement – that sort of thing – you can build unconscious rapport.  

·     Dress to impress: forget attempts at individualism and adopt “group norms” says Timperley. And in the world of work this means dress. While different sectors have different uniforms, most office work involves the standard office attire (either suits or smart casual). And for men that also means being clean-shaven, avoiding wacky piercings, tattoos, jewellery or hair products. And the clothes you wear to work should look like they are meant for work – not for impressing potential conquests in a nightclub.  

·     Seek to understand and seek to empathise: no matter what they are saying and how far it may diverge from your own perspective, you are not there to argue but to win people over. So you should seek agreement, however strained the notion (don’t worry – extremists tend to stick to their own events).

·     Use names: Timperley cites Dale Carnegie’s line that a person’s name is the “sweetest sound anyone ever hears”, so you should make efforts to remember people’s names. One trick I was taught in sales training was to repeat back someone’s name immediately you are introduced. “Hi I’m Daphne,” she says. “Hello Daphne, how are you?” we say back.  

·     Make contacts feel special: this works across the board when dealing with people. We can be so inwardly focused – so often wrapped up in our own feelings of insecurity – that we forget that the most effective thing we can do in any people situation is to make the other person feel like the valued one. Pay subtle compliments – it’s the best sales tool known to man.

·     Introduce yourself well: practice a good intro. For instance, if you say something like: “Hi – I’m the boring one you won’t want to talk to” you’ll quickly prove yourself right. Don’t lie, of course, but focus on the positive, or make a joke. “Hi – I’ve just started in waste management – boy is that sector in need of a clean up!”  

·     Shake hands: in most situations it’s polite to offer a handshake, but take note of the norms in the room. Avoid the “moaw, moaw” kissing unless it’s de rigueur in your industry, and even then don’t over assume. And those handshakes. Everyone seems to insist on a firm handshake, so I will do the opposite and warn against the bone-crusher. A gentle squeeze is fine – too firm and you can come across as a rooky salesperson. 

·     Reveal yourself: all that listening means you should offer something of yourself, or they may feel interrogated. Be open, you have nothing to hide. I have also found the line “I’m new and keen to build up my network of contacts in the industry” a disarming gambit that often has people keen to prove they are a worthy contact.

And there are some clear “don’ts” when it comes to both networking and office behaviour generally, of which number one is “don’t mix sex and networking”. Being overly flirty changes the dynamic of a conversation, alienates everyone else in the group, is unprofessional and destroys reputations faster than any other trait bar theft or violence. Even if it appears to be initially successful, by using the prospect of sex as a means of advancement you’re announcing that you have no other skills worth considering.

For other ’don’ts’ we should turn to Dale Carnegie’s famous tome How to Win Friends and Influence People, originally published in the 1930s.

“Criticisms are like homing pigeons, they always return home,” writes Carnegie.

Being nice about people was his first and most important principle. And it is especially true when networking. Bitching is a trait based on our own insecurities.  

“Any fool can criticise, condemn and complain,” says Carnegie, “and most fools do. But it takes character and self-control to be understanding and forgiving.”

Carnegie also implores us to avoid arguments, show respect, see the other’s point of view, begin in a friendly way (even if angry) and to try and get a “yes” at the beginning of a conversation – any yes.

Yet all this networking needs to have some impact, doesn’t it? Absolutely not. As long as we are on the right ladder knowing other industry insiders is a dividend in itself. Networks are like ripples in a lake, each fanning out to hit every shore at some point. Sales, jobs, partnerships, staff, publicity – all may come to you from some distant shore at some distant date, thanks to the ripples started from one conversation.

Robert Kelsey is author of What’s Stopping You? Why Smart People Don’t Always Reach Their Potential and How You Can. www.robert-kelsey.co.uk