Career Shift Blog
by Rachel B. Garrett
The #1 Networking Mistake
Often clients come to me complaining that they’re terrible at networking. Sometimes they’re doing the work to reach out to their people. They’re having multiple conversations a week…and yet nothing comes of them.
They say, "We had an interesting chat, but who knows what will happen." Or "He asked me how he can help me and I froze."
There’s an easy fix for this common challenge.
Have a goal in mind for each conversation. Each meeting's goal will be unique and most often it is NOT – give me a job.
Here are 10 examples of networking goals:
Learn about the person’s role.
Learn about the culture in his/her/their company.
Ask for an intro to a specific person or company.
Ask for intro’s to colleagues in a new city in which you’d like to relocate.
Learn about a specific leader or colleague with whom you may be working closely.
Learn about the organizational structure in his/her/their company.
Learn about his/her/their career transition and tips to making a switch.
Ask about skills or education needed for his/her/their role.
Ask to send in your application for a role to a hiring manager or HR.
Share specific roles you’re looking for so if they hear of them, they can reach out to you.
When you have a clear goal for the conversation, you know if it you hit your mark or not. You’ve also given the other person a specific and actionable way to help you, which makes them feel good, like they hit their mark.
Remember that when it comes to networking, long-term thinking is best. While you will have a goal for the conversation, you also want to consider that you are building a relationship, and this is not simply a transaction.
Your sub-goal is always expanding and curating your network so that you can continue to expand your impact within your career. With this sub-goal in mind, even if you didn’t meet your specific goal in the conversation, you can continue to cultivate the relationship.
Perhaps you will reach out when you are clearer in your own vision of what you need and most importantly you can show your gratitude with generosity of your time and expertise.
Permission To Want What You Want
In my work with women, there’s one epiphany I’m grateful to witness often. An insight that turns the ship around and provides a new lens to look back on a life half-lived.
Sometimes it starts with a feeling.
Guilt. Anxiety. Frustration
And then there’s a moment where the unseen is seen. The common refrain—I don’t know what I want—becomes untrue.
In its place arises something unfamiliar and beautiful. Many wants.
But still no permission to want them.
As women we are so accustomed to cloaking ourselves in the needs and desires of everyone else in our lives that our own oxygen feels selfish to breathe.
Yet when we inhale and imagine, we see a glimpse of what is possible, and we are filled with hope.
This is the shift that can forever change you. It is an honoring of what you want. No matter how you may fail or fumble. Especially because you may fail or fumble. It is agency. It is trust.
It is admitting to those you love that you have wants and they are important. And practicing together. Continuing to remind each other that they are still important, even when they are inconvenient and throw off the equilibrium of the old systems that put your wants at the bottom of the list.
Your wants are worth fighting for even if there’s chaos before you find your order.
We were not taught to want outside the lanes our culture drew for us. And yet every time we unlearn these bounds—we find who we are meant to be.
The Broad Experience Podcast Features Rachel Garrett
I’m thrilled to be featured on The Broad Experience podcast with Ashley Milne-Tyte discussing the impact of the pandemic on women’s careers—and within my own business.
You can find the full episode of the podcast on The Broad Experience Website, on Stitcher or Apple Podcasts.
Working Parents Are Preparing For An Unprecedented Summer
The good news: you made it through the most challenging school year in history, during which we were all collectively making it up as we went along.
The bad news: the school year is now over, as is the structure and the hanging on by a thread reason for your kids to be occupied and leave you to get at least some work done.
If you’re anything like me, you’re having the same nightmare vision every time you let yourself think through the realities of this summer.
It’s Lord of the Flies time, people.
Most in-person camps are cancelled. My kids are not thrilled about the idea of virtual camp. I don’t want to invest in camps they’re rebelling against before day one.
While I’m typically the person who has every day of every week of summer white boarded and accounted for—the uncertainty of the life we’re currently living is driving me to try it a different way.
Welcome to The Garrett Improv Summer.
I’m working with a few guiding principles. (Plus, a reminder that my daughters are 9 and 12, so this will be tougher for kids under 7 or 8.)
There will be:
Fun
Creativity
Alone time off screens (meaning make your own fun instead of watching 6 seasons of Glee)
Learning
Movement
Rest
Nature
Helping others
To drill down into some more detail here:
We started with a Summer Ideas Workshop this past weekend.
I wrote down the principles on a big pad and then gave everyone a big piece of paper and markers.
With pictures and words, we listed activities that fit under each category on our respective Summer 2020 blank slates.
We presented our ideas to the rest of team Garrett.
Example brainstorming for me:
Fun: Outdoor weekend day trips, games, date nights!Creativity: Writing daily (blog/book), Writing workshop with girls 2x per week
Alone Time: 9 - 4 work hours for sessions/writing/learning
Learning: Online course, continued racial equity learning, reading as a familyMovement: Yoga/walking
Rest: In bed by 10, journaling
Nature: Prospect Park, Upstate NY—walks, hikes, swimming (not sure where or how)
Helping Others: Bringing supplies to Uncle Ray, Working on political campaigns aligned with my values.We attempted to map it all together into a loose schedule. That’s where team Garrett lost patience and came to terms with our disappointment for the summer we are collectively having, one that is not the summer we wanted. There were tears and frustration.
Instead of setting a schedule, we decided on boundaries and guidelines that included when the adults must be left to do their work and when the kids can "finally" get onto their devices. All other activities can be chosen by each kid or adult based on their lists.
To make it all work, we’re bringing back a former babysitter for a couple of weeks to hang out with our younger daughter and she may be able to help sporadically for the rest of the summer. But again—we’re playing it by ear and taking extra precautions to make sure it’s safe for our sitter and for all of us.
We have selected some free learning options for the kids to include into their schedules, like Camp Kinda and Camp Khan Academy.
Summer Ideas Workshop results aside, we’re going to learn from our rocky start to virtual learning in March. For those of us planner types, we will remember to shoot for loose guidelines and not rigid schedules. We will remember that our first priorities are still the physical and mental health of our families. We will ask for help when we need it. Of course, I’m grateful that my business is designed for the flexibility of cutting my workday, during the summer—and yet I have never run this experiment before. I’ve always had camp and childcare coverage to keep the same pace as in all seasons.
So, onward we march...into the great somewhat unknown of Summer, 2020. Ready for smiles, tears, insights and boredom. We are here for all of it. Because...we have no other choice.