Train your networking muscle đ Day 1 - Networking Advent Calendar
Meet Emma. Emma worked as a freelance developer for almost a year. Emma has been applying to full-time jobs at Berlin startups. She went as far as to the technical interview stage with 2 companies, but was rejected by both.
Jan is facing a similar situation. Jan worked as a designer for about 3 years and even has some pretty recognizable logos on his resume, but also struggled to move past the 2nd or 3rd interview after a few months. Jan wonders if he should even apply to junior designer positions.
And this is not just a problem faced by early career professionals. Max worked at one of the most well-known websites in the world for 10+ years and their most recent title was âDirectorâ. They were very close to getting an offer, but couldnât land roles that matched what they were looking for.
Networking unlocks opportunities
Emma, Jan, Max all had sufficient experiences in their fields to land them a job. But why hasnât it happened yet?
All three of them only looked for job postings on LinkedIn (which only represent a tiny portion of all jobs out there). They lacked insights into the truly relevant jobs and companies. They lacked critical feedback on what theyâre doing right or what theyâre missing. They also could use referrals to help them stand out from their competition.
Anyone can network
I believe networking is like using a muscle. The more you train your networking muscle, the stronger you are at it, and the easier it gets.
Networking isnât archaic or complex either. For me, networking is meeting new and interesting people that could help you (or be helped by you) in a professional setting. To demystify networking and to exercise your networking muscle, I present you â
The Networking Advent Calendar
An Advent Calendar is a special calendar used in Germany to count down the days to Christmas. You can open a window of the calendar everyday to get a piece of chocolate or another small gift. Well, what better gift for yourself than a step up in your career?
For the next 24 days, Iâll share 1 networking task everyday. Complete the tasks to exercise your networking muscle, so that when the new year and new recruiting cycle start, youâll be ready to land your dream job!
Day 1: Where do you want to be?
What does your ideal work environment look like? What does your ideal job look like? Even if youâre not looking for a job, how do you see yourself develop professionally?
Open up your notes, Notion page, or just take a piece of paper, and describe where youâd like to be. You can write it as a list of bullet points like so:
Innovative startup
100-500 people
In the field of consumer software
Supports remote work
Or paint a picture:
Working in an environment where people from all kinds of backgrounds can truly thrive and not just working under a slogan of diversity and inclusion. Building software products that can genuinely benefit peopleâs lives and not just always looking for the next big funding round or getting bigger profits. Organized and structured learning opportunities for every team member to learn from each other or from outside the company.
This task will help us understand why we want to network in the first place, so we can then identify the potential people we could connect with. Check out Day 2 to find the people youâd like to connect with.
Are you excited to see how you can exercise your networking muscle? Any feedback for me? Looking forward to hearing from you!