Don’t Knock The Hustle

As a shy child I dreaded any activity that required an introductory game. Birthday parties, bar mitzvahs, and youth group mixers were attended with the resignation that the first half hour would involve enduring some sadistic adult’s idea of fun. I would do my best to disappear against the wall or attempt to excuse myself to the bathroom. Eventually, I would be shamed into compliance, made to sit cross-legged with all the others as I rubbed my damp palms on the knees of my jeans.

I’m not sure why I found making small talk so daunting at that age. Selling the idea of myself felt embarrassing, beneath me. It still does. I think even as children we can recognize the dishonesty inherent in these forced acts of friendship, and for me, that deceit bred anxiety.

I’ve since shed my shyness, growing into a confident woman with a firm, dry handshake. I’ve had twenty years in the hospitality industry to get comfortable with initiating first conversations. But I never grew out of my disdain for icebreakers. I comforted myself with the belief that their tyranny would end with the completion of my education, a notion promptly trampled by the discovery of their adult equivalent: networking.

Networking events tend to be terrible. Even thinking about them can elicit groans as we are confronted by the guilt of not squeezing enough of them into an already overstuffed schedule. While not mandatory, most fields consider them a necessary means of convincing other humans that you too are a human, and not merely another email address to be dismissed or relegated to spam. Ironically, the perceived way of doing this is to suffer through a series of robotic conversations. These are tolerated with the hopes of converting one of these strangers into an acquaintance whom you can bombard with reasons as to why they should help you over a free lunch.

This game of marketing oneself can still feel a bit gauche, even for the extroverted. It’s no wonder when our blueprint for networking success is still based on the immortalized images of Gordon Gecko and Patrick Bateman. Worse than the discomfort derived from this tendency toward inauthentic pushiness, is the realization that these efforts are actually ineffective. People don’t buy into what you’re selling because of a clever pitch, they buy into the idea of what something stands for.

As the representation of their businesses, entrepreneurs and freelancers are given the unenviable task of promoting themselves in a way that conveys their experience and professionalism while refraining from coming off as boastful or insincere. These can be rough waters to tread, and so many choose to play it safe, relegating themselves to awkward pleasantries and polite gossip.

This behavior is contradictory to the rebelliousness, determination, and vision that first inspired them to become entrepreneurs, the qualities that ultimately, make them attractive to work with. The problem lies in insisting on following an archaic map to navigate the modern business landscape. In order for networking to yield results, it needs to be reframed to reflect our demand for authenticity. We need to stop “networking” and start fostering trust.