I am a regular attendee to the Communitech Sales Peer 2 Peer sessions. This week’s session focused on networking and was titled, “Relationship for Results” lead by Jane Jantzi from Deloitte. Jane is well known in the KW tech community and is an excellent choice for this topic.
There were many good nuggets shared with the group. Some of the highlights for me included:
- Pick events that have the partners or customers that you would like to connect with
- Look to help other attendees, not just yourself
- Meet as many people as you can
- Don&t be afraid to sell to friends and family if you can help them
Perhaps the best piece of advice from Jane was: “Follow-up or Fail”. I find one of the biggest mistakes is making connections and not following through on an email, newsletter, Twitter, or LinkedIn.
The culmination of the presentation was Jane’s Top 10 Networking List
- Know who you can meet
- Have something interesting to say
- Be memorable
- Don’t talk or sit with someone you already know unless…they can connect you to someone they are talking to
- Physically position yourself correctly in the room
- Don’t spend a lot of time with any one person
- Listen
- Get out and network and get involved
- Smile
- Don’t be shy
I would also like to add that Steve and I have worked with Jane somewhat and more so with another one of her coworkers Jamie Barron. We often send the startups we work with to Deloitte to get help with accounting and consulting on items like SR&ED. They understand the start-up world and are very reliable.
If you can only go to one tech conference this year I suggest the Communitech Tech Leader conference. It has great speakers, break-out sessions, and a great mix of attendees.
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