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How to grow professional relationships

tej.as

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Re: How to grow professional relationships

#171

Post by mrcptthrowaway »

askafriend wrote: post #80
dennis_jeeves2 wrote: post #68

Nearly every professional 'relationship' I've had has been transient after you stop working with them, with people completely failing to reciprocate even after multiple attempts to reach out. From talking to people I know that this experience is not unique to me, this appears to be the norm, may be it's the industry I work in : software development.

Allow me to be crude for a second: half the people in software are likely autistic so I'm not surprised they struggle with building or maintaining relationships.

Yep, I thought this was a ridiculous statement. Then I got diagnosed in my mid thirties because of sleeping issues. My psychologist needed to evaluate everything about me and diagnosed me as autistic, despite not really having social issues that much right now (it's because the science of social skills is one of my special interests).

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#172

Post by mettamage »

reubenswartz wrote: post #161
tejaskumar_ wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. My relationships got so much better after learning to be better at conversation.

yes, and you don't have to keep in touch with everyone-- find the people you enjoy talking to, and just make a point to do it.

Huh, hadn't thought of it that clearly. Thanks!

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#174

Post by mrcptthrowaway »

> A lesson I learned from reading Mark Manson’s “Models” as an awkward stupid teenager who wanted to get girls is that the world is an abundant one full of all kinds of people: some who shun us, others who love us. When someone reveals that there’s no room for a relationship, they do us a huge favor and free us up to go pursue others who are open to it. I’ve seen great success in quickly being thankful for the data and moving on.

Getting strong pickup artist vibes here. I needed that sort of knowledge too. Married nowadays, would've been single forever probably if I wouldn't have gone through that phase.

It makes sense that you break social interactions down like this. This type of thinking flows from pickup.

It also puts into context that you said stuff like "you know you're a slut" (which you don't remember doing but you mentioned having done similar enough things). It seems you mixed pickup with work. I was a high schooler when I learned it and did it solely outside of high school. So I wouldn't run into these things.

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#175

Post by throwaway14356 »

01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote: post #136
ghaff wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a lot of the misunderstanding around "networking" you see in discussions. A lot of tech people see it as an unwelcome task/burden. Whereas, it should be generally viewed as a pleasurable opportunity to just get to know people who may (or may not) be useful at some point in the future.

I'm not used to putting effort into friendships, so it does sound like an unwelcome task. And it sounds phony, since I have never put effort before. If I have to put effort then am I not faking it?

minimal effort can be fun. you cam always think of people as specialized tools with needs. if you get a good idea about both and refresh it periodically you are done. If you document enough you will be able to satisfy some needs, sometimes with very little effort. They will remember they owe you and love to elaborate about what else they need. Listen and move on. fill up the rolodex

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#176

Post by throwaway14356 »

lukan wrote: post #121
the_snooze wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In software we have an unfortunate amount of people who don’t value social connections at all so we end up with a large tranche of people who can’t get past the “but why would I talk to them without a specific reason?” argument and then lament why all of their relationships end up transactional, or even better lament why no one will help them specifically because all their relationships are transactional and they ar…

"Yup, you get a lot of people complaining about the pointlessness of small talk, but the reality is that small talk is social glue." Only with some people. Trying to do smalltalk with me, will not make me your friend. I simply hate smalltalk. (Talking unimportant things for the sake of talking) But there are a million of other interesting non buisness things I am willing to talk about at length. I also like to joke a…

just make jokes? what did the weather do to you?

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#177

Post by BurningFrog »

gadders wrote: post #77
ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very good point. What's the old saying "A friend in need, is a friend, indeed." ? I like to have personal relationships, as opposed to corporate ones. Funny story: During the 1990s, my direct boss was a fairly low-key Japanese man. I really liked him. He was a marketing type, so we didn't really have a technical basis for our relationship. He was a decent chap, and I happily followed his orders. In return, he gave me…

A similar thing happened to me recently. A chap I knew at a previous bank when I was an AVP and he was a VP is now on the board of my (very large multinational) company. When we caught up it was nice to see that he was exactly the same, and remembered me and said hello.

The way I think of it, top executives or famous people are just someone with a different job than mine.

So I treat them that way, and that works really well for me.

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#178

Post by lelanthran »

digging wrote: post #164
ghaff wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a lot of the misunderstanding around "networking" you see in discussions. A lot of tech people see it as an unwelcome task/burden. Whereas, it should be generally viewed as a pleasurable opportunity to just get to know people who may (or may not) be useful at some point in the future.

I think the misunderstanding, in fact, is in reverse, demonstrated by the above comment. The networking required for career growth is, for many people, never going to pleasurable. My social circles don't have much overlap with, for example, startup founders. Developing personal relationships in my network is not likely to ever benefit my career growth. When people give the advice to "network" to enable my career grow…

> When people give the advice to "network" to enable my career growth, the people who would be most helpful tend not to have much in common with me, and building relationships with them often means not being true to myself, or even hiding myself.

Then it's best to recognise this early and decide if you want to be true to yourself or if you want to succeed[1].

[1] Depending on your definition of "success", plodding along for 40 years as an IC, contributing your skills to whichever employer and eventually retiring is, for many, "Success" with a capital "S". The people giving the networking advice are using a different definition, which is usually "rising in your career until you are making an impact far larger than an IC could". Not networking with the other rising stars gives you a very low chance of attaining that second definition of success.

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#179

Post by 3abiton »

mkmk wrote: post #9

On the practical side of things, one important behavior that I see people frequently forget is the importance of following up. This is probably the biggest differentiator between relationships that languish in the early stages, versus those that progress along the author’s continuum. It’s always a bit strange when you only hear from people once every few years, just as they need an intro or career advice or whatever-…

It really depends on the long term goals, I would also argue that if there are no personal stakes in such relationships it's tough to keep track.

Re: How to grow professional relationships

#180

Post by lelanthran »

lukan wrote: post #121
the_snooze wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>In software we have an unfortunate amount of people who don’t value social connections at all so we end up with a large tranche of people who can’t get past the “but why would I talk to them without a specific reason?” argument and then lament why all of their relationships end up transactional, or even better lament why no one will help them specifically because all their relationships are transactional and they ar…

"Yup, you get a lot of people complaining about the pointlessness of small talk, but the reality is that small talk is social glue." Only with some people. Trying to do smalltalk with me, will not make me your friend. I simply hate smalltalk. (Talking unimportant things for the sake of talking) But there are a million of other interesting non buisness things I am willing to talk about at length. I also like to joke a…

I'd like you to consider a different perspective. Maybe ask yourself if your current perspective is too self-focused and maybe also a perspective that lacks self-awareness.

======================

I think you might be using a different definition of "smalltalk" than most people.

Me, for example ... I don't talk about weather or sport. I won't pretend to be interested in 'em either.

And yet, I have no problem engaging even strangers for 30m or more at a time. I just pick something in context and mention it.

For example, if you can strike up, and then continue, a conversation with the person next to you in line for boarding a flight, then you're golden. I once lead with "That's a damn small plane[1]. I hit my head the first time I went into one of those." to a tall gentleman behind me in the line, and had a 30m conversation with someone who turned out to be a very interesting litigator.

I mean, if you're in a specific place, at a specific time, and cannot find anything contextual to use as a conversation starter, then I don't think that the problem is that the whole world is too dumb[2] for your level of "smalltalk" topics.

When you "connect", you're not looking to marry the person, just find something you both have in common. If you run into too many situations where you have absolutely nothing in common with people around you, you are the problem, not the people around you.

[1] Embraer 139, or something. Can't remember now.

2] I dunno how else to interpret "talking for the sake of talking".

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