There are hundreds of networking events across the USA, where up and comers meet at restaurants and hotels, put on name tags, and talk to each other about synergies and deliverables.
“The goal is to network with lots of people,” says Detroit attorney Janine Turnquist, 38, “but sometimes you end up spending the whole night with one guy talking about pre-conceptual strategies.”
To avoid such a scenario, earlier this year she started the monthly Detroit Speed Networking meet-up at the Loristan Hotel. Participants have exactly 125 seconds to talk to someone before moving on. That, says Turnquist, is plenty of time to ascertain core competencies, key assets, and much more.
It’s simple: You pick a partner, the buzzer goes off, and in 125 seconds it goes off again and you pick another partner. It’s important to make the most of the time in between, and Turnquist recommends these four topics:
- Discuss in terms of inches and feet how far you’re ahead of the power curve, the learning curve, and any ancillary curves
- When benchmarking best practices, do you listen to music? Describe.
- What would cause you to push the panic button? Would you prefer that instead of a button it was a whistle that you blow?
“The people who come tell me that this way’s much better,” says Turnquist, noting that attendance increased from 7 at the first event to 14 at the sixth.
“The more people you talk to, the better the chances that you’ll eventually understand why they invented networking evens in the first place.”
