A friend of mine recently asked me if it would be OK for her brother to contact me to pick my brain about book publishing and marketing. Naturally I responded that it would be my pleasure to help in any way that I could. It took a few attempts back and forth to finally coordinate a phone call, but we were able to connect this afternoon.
I spent about an hour sharing my experiences with this new author and, more importantly, sharing what I had learned in the process. Like with most things, if you've never done it before it can be hard to understand the ins and outs of a new field. While I'm certainly lightyears from being an expert in this area, I still know more than a novice, and I was able to provide him with some thoughts that were helpful.
When I finished the call, I was thinking about the whole nature of networking. This person got connected to me through his sister who was a friend of mine. In a similar way, I have many times reached out to my network of connections to find a particular thing, be it knowledge or some assistance or even another name. Networking like this presupposes that each person is willing to help another person knowing that in the big picture others will similarly help you. It's a great example of the simple benefits of kindness for everyone. I'm always glad to play my part in that chain.
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