There's Gold In Dem Connections

I was chatting with Pete Caputa earlier today. It was one of our usual fly-bys where we exchange a load of facts and jokes in about 20 seconds. I ended up launching into LinkedIn since I knew Pete uses it and I knew I was quite behind the times with it. After inviting Pete, he asks me if I know this guy Auren Hoffman.

Of course, I don’t know who he is. But damn should I have. For anyone that’s met me, or dared attend a networking event with me, they know that I can whore out quite quickly. It’s a skill that takes loads of time to develop and polish off. It’s not about the volume at all really, just about dissecting an encounter and understanding as much as possible from it. You never know if the next person you meet will change your life - why take it for granted?

Back to Auren. Well, Auren is quite the enterprising connector a la Malcolm Gladwell’s Tipping Point. Even more interesting/important, however, is that he’s leveraged it into a business - and a lucrative one at that. Who would have imagined that someone would outsource their own networking? Well it’s happening. Is it a trend that will grow? God I hope not. I’m still old fashioned in the belief that if people want to meet, they need to do it face-to-face, but I commend Auren’s work because it’s not impersonal like other technology-derived approaches.