Gauge and Engage Your Network

What is my Network?

What do we mean by “network” in this program? We mean the people in your life, including, family, friends, coworkers, and the people you’ve known. Your network is a core foundation in life and is key to gaining fulfillment and enjoyment, as well as helping you achieve in life.

The people in your life are clearly in your network, even if you only see them every year or two. At the infrequent end, your network includes people you’ve had contact with before, have a clear means to reach in the future, and have reasonable belief they would remember you and respond if you reached out to them. People you know “of” and know how to contact, or had only passing superficial exposure to, don’t meet this definition. The others may be reachable, but are not “your network.” It is helpful to have an extended contact ability, but we don’t consider these people your network.

The more time or contact you have with someone in your network, the more influential the person is likely to be in your outlook and perspective. In the realm of helping drive your future proactively, the key is not frequency of contact, but who the person is, what they might do on your behalf, how you listen, how you ask, and your mutual openness to opportunities that may arise.

In the outlook and perspective arena, the influence could be driving your fulfillment, encouraging you to achieve your aspirations, or, unfortunately, a catalyst for dissatisfaction, and so on. From the proactive angle, your network helps steer your decisions, make introductions, and actively assists or “invests” in your future. As you tune up your day to day network, you will find increasing opportunities to reach further out in your network to expand opportunities beyond your core circle. Clearly, this is a rich topic and more characterizations apply, but this gives a basis for now.

People rub off on you

How you let your network influence your outlook is key to your own growth and achievement. It is also crucial that you are a positive influence and great friend or supporter for others in your network. It’s important that you learn to notice both positive and negative effects from the circles you engage with, whether socially, in your career, or other areas.

Cynical, Negative, Groups

If a group you spend time with has a cynical, negative, outlook on the world, that will influence you. It may seem like idle banter or relief of stress, but negative groups are much more insidious. They usually dampen enthusiasm, promote cynicism, and darken people’s outlook and expectations. Even if you avoid the direct affect on you, others will form opinions and assess your reputation based on the company you keep.  Your reputation is tied to the groups you associate with. Choose carefully.

If your outlook and optimism trend upward in a negative group, you will most likely find your optimism reflected as veiled cynicism. It may superficially appear as encouragement, but notice the qualifiers, the “buts,” and the tone of stories your optimism evokes.

If this describes parts of your network, notice the effect on you. Find respectful ways to ramp down your time with negative groups to an absolute minimum. Don’t disown people or sever friendships, but a sizable shift in where you spend your time will open up countless beneficial options and creates opportunity for a positive network to emerge.

Breaking the social equilibrium in a negative group is comparable in difficulty to each person losing a lot of weight. It can be done, but it is not an outcome you would bet your future on. Raising the group outlook is a noble goal, but mostly a pipedream.

Be aware that you can’t wait to find new circles before you ramp down, as your own outlook and associations will keep you from clicking with the very groups you’d want to be in. It can be very valuable to shift where you spend your time and the network you associate with most closely. 

Powerful, Supportive, Enabling Groups

Now to the nicer side of the coin. Some groups are incredibly supportive of each other. A strong story I’ve heard conveys the epitome of a supportive group.  Four people met when they joined a global enterprise on the same day, very early in their careers. They quickly became friends and made a pact to support each other, even above their own interests. Several decades later, all four had risen to key executive positions with the company. They held four of the top eight positions at the global firm, which had tens of thousands of employees. There were many supporting vignettes of cases where the team helped each other and sacrificed short term opportunities for others in the group’s benefit. This characterizes a profoundly supportive group.

Beyond your work life, when you look to the future, your network of friends and acquaintances should be supportive and encouraging. People often inadvertently “encourage” you stay in a small life, under the guise of sensible and risk averse feedback. It is their own reservations and limitations that are limiting their feedback, not yours. Further, if you are timid about some change or opportunity, you’ll unwittingly get most of your advice, and certainly the best sounding advice, from those very people.

A truly supportive network gives strong encouragement to growth, opportunity, change, and reasonable risk, while being blatantly honest and helpful with their feedback. They will encourage you to jump, but only to a higher level, not off a cliff. They will be there to help steady you when you jump and to help you get up and jump again if it is needed.

The best elements of your network can come from family, school, career, or other circles. When these connections appear, it is important to tilt your time in that direction and be open to the influence. Make sure you are a supportive and genuine person in return. Be genuinely helpful to others whether you see a gain for yourself or not. If this is hard for you, do it anyway. We’ll hit this topic more directly later.

Find a Mentor, Coach, or Guide

If you haven’t already, augment your network with mentors or coaches that guide you in key areas of life. This can be a formal or informal relationship with people you know, or a commercial relationship with someone providing professional services. One or more positive mentors or coaches offering high quality perspective and an no-holds-barred feedback will accelerate your path to achieving aspirations. A regular discussion, whether weekly, monthly, or quarterly, on key areas of your life will help track and drive your progress.

Engage Your Network

When you are close with truly supportive people, make sure they know you are working on yourself. We’re not suggesting a group meeting, or hosting an “all about me” party, but rather honest one-on-one discussions. Let them know the areas you are striving to improve, ask for their support, encouragement, and honest feedback. When people in your life hear and echo your commitment and reflect both your advances and the occasional setback, your progress is greatly amplified. Most importantly, the alignment, openness, and honesty strengthen the relationships far into the future.

Think About…

1. What pivotal decisions in your life were influenced, positively and negatively, by your circle?
2. How can you be a better supporter in the positive circles you keep in your life?
3. How will you politely, quietly, and quickly cut your time from negative groups?

Take Action…

1. Take concrete, respectful, steps to shift time to more positive groups.
2. Find activities, groups, seminars, workshops, classes, teams, etc. that will energize your outlook and constructively expand your network.
3. Find mentors, coaches, or guides that act as sounding boards and experts to help achieve your aspirations.