Networking? Bill Your Time!
Do you have a networking opportunity coming up soon? “Go in as if you are billing your time,” advises Cathy Delhanty.
Cathy was one of the three speakers for WBN’s Entrepreneurial Academy event on 28 January. Cathy’s networking workshop was preceded by an inspiring speech from Christy Aikhorin, a Nigerian social entrepreneur and project manager in The Netherlands. Christy explained to us how she went from managing projects in the oil and gas sector to social entrepreneurship with her sustainable clothing and accessory-line ‘UnikBlends’. Her key word was ‘transitioning’; Christy never quit one thing for the other, she transitioned and transformed her activities and time to give her a more purposeful life. She urged us to be bold and to not ‘wait’ for the right time to start your dream.
Christy Aikhorin
After Christy’s speech, the attendees were divided into two groups. The first group participated in a workshop led by Christine van Andel. She gave a workshop on ‘how to overcome securities about the next step in your career’. During this workshop she showed us how we can consciously influence our thinking to positively affect our behaviour. This means that we get more confident about taking the steps we want to take and actually follow our dreams with less insecurities.
Christine van Andel
I participated in Cathy’s workshop about networking. Cathy is a very bold lady, maybe even slightly intimidating when you first meet her. Not because she is not nice, but because she has a very to-the-point approach to her interactive workshop. Even when you think you know everything there is to know about networking, Cathy will make you question yourself. I really enjoyed this way of being challenged in my thinking. The main takeaway of her workshop was that you need to go into a networking event as if you are billing your time. Networking is a very important business activity and should be treated as such. Do not waste your time hiding at the wine bar; be brave and find any opportunity to talk to other ‘networkers’.
This blog post was written by Lieke Venema, an International Business Administration student at RSM. She regularly attends WBN events and writes about it for our members.
