Networking is necessary but can sometimes go terribly wrong. Here are some tips for how to turn a bad networking experience around, including adjusting your expectations, planning your exit, and following up.
Networking is a necessary element of career growth. The more people you know, the more you’ll hear about great opportunities, and the more people will be ready to refer you for positions and promotions. We also need to connect with others in order to grow and learn about the world and its experiences.
Networking can take place in all kinds of settings, like parties, conferences, cocktail or coffee meetups, and in the virtual world. Some people are better at it than others, and it isn’t always easy. Networking can even go terribly wrong sometimes. Maybe you meet someone who won’t stop talking, expresses opinions that make you uncomfortable, or gets too drunk. Or maybe you’re the one who makes a gaffe.
In these scenarios, all is not necessarily lost. Here are some tips for how to turn a bad networking experience around, including adjusting your expectations, planning your exit, and following up.
How to turn a bad networking experience around
Adjust your expectations and way of thinking about networking
First, you may need to change your entire mindset about networking.
The biggest and most common mistake people make when networking is focusing on what they want to get. We head into networking situations hoping to meet someone who can do something for us, focusing on ourselves and trying to impress. We spend every conversation trying to find out what we can get out of the person we are meeting, and if we decide that the other person is not in a position to give us something we want, we try to get away and find someone more “important” or useful to talk to.
This shameless approach is counterproductive and not how people should approach networking. We should not be going into networking situations looking for what we can get. Instead, ask yourself what you can give. Can you help someone find a job or connect with someone who can be helpful to them? This way of thinking will make you more likeable, and people will want to help you in return.
You might think that only people in your industry, or who work for a target company, are worth networking with, but everybody knows people outside of their industry and company. You never know who someone else knows and might be able to connect you with.
Be open to meeting everyone, and remember that you can probably learn something from every single person you meet. Be excited to meet people, even if they can’t do anything for you. Perhaps ironically, this is a more effective professional networking strategy.
Have a gracious exit strategy
All the above being said, sometimes we get into a conversation we just can’t figure out how to get out of. We’re at an event and we start chatting with someone, time goes by, and we realize we’ve said all we have to say – and listened to all we want to listen to - and would like to move on. Sometimes this feeling is one-sided, but, often, both people realize this and are looking for an exit but don’t want to be rude. So, we stand there until it gets more and more uncomfortable.
A pre-planned exit strategy can save you from awkwardness and potentially hurting someone’s feelings.
Here are some strategies for extricating yourself graciously from this situation:
- Grab someone you know, introduce them, then move away.
- Excuse yourself to go to the bathroom. Not the greatest option but a strangely popular one. Just be sure that if you say you have to go to the bathroom, you actually go into the bathroom. Otherwise, it’s just weird.
- Invite them to get a drink together and/or walk around the room and mingle with you. Say something like, “It’s so great to meet you. Shall we go see who else we can connect with?” This is a good option because your new connection may introduce you to more people, or you can find more people to talk to together, then drift away.
- Simply say, “Well, it’s been nice chatting with you! I’m going to walk around now.” No need to lie. They may be equally ready to move on.
If you’ve set up a meeting for coffee or drinks, make it clear beforehand that you only have a certain amount of time and have to leave after 30 or 45 minutes.
Follow up
Obviously, you should not follow up with someone you don’t want to stay connected with but there’s a benefit to staying in touch with all kinds of people.
Here’s a not-so-secret secret: everyone is nervous when networking, and that person who talked too much or didn’t listen to you as much as you wanted them to may have just been feeling nervous and concerned about the impression they were making. It’s happened to all of us: we’re so worried about how we’re coming across that we mess it up. Maybe they’re just socially awkward or have social anxiety (it’s very common, especially these days). They can still be worth knowing.
Or maybe you’re the one who said or did the wrong thing. Most people have messed up a first impression or two over the course of their lives, so don’t beat yourself up over it. Unless the encounter was a serious disaster, you can still follow up on social media.
Send a note saying what a pleasure it was to meet the person. If you want to stay in touch, say so. This can be a very simple message.
“Hello, Noor. I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed meeting you Wednesday evening. I hope you’re having a great day.”
“Hi, Amir! It was a great pleasure meeting you the other day. I hope we can stay in touch. All the best.”
Another secret: almost everyone is mollified by kindness and a compliment. Have you ever hosted an event that you felt was a flop, and the next day received a thank you note from someone saying they had a great time? Did it not boost your spirits and make you feel 100 times better? There you go.
It’s absolutely understandable not to want to give out your phone number, but it can usually still be a good idea to connect with people on LinkedIn or other social media.
Focusing on what you can offer, pre-planning your exit, and a warm follow-up will set a different tone for your interactions and can turn a bad networking experience around. When it comes to networking, the idea is to be likeable and to make people feel good about themselves, which will, in turn, make them feel good about you.
