In-House Counsel

The Road Not Taken: Summer School

Networking is casually given so freely as advice, as though the very word can solve all of a person’s career problems.

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Ah, the lazy days of summer. Those of you in school are off to summer positions. Those of us with full-time gigs are gazing out our windows and wishing we could enjoy the season a little more than we are. Whether it is true or not, summer feels slower and as good a time as any to take on a personal project.

This year, I’ve decided to actively improve my networking skills. By “improve,” I mean “obtain.” I am terrible at networking. I hate that “networking” is casually given so freely as advice, as though the very word can solve all of a person’s career problems. I hate the fallacy that talking to someone with a cocktail in one hand and a tiny quiche in another is enough contact to convince another human being to do another a favor. I hate that networking is talked about in the context of career development as though it isn’t a contrived means to manipulate others.

Most of all, I hate talking to people I don’t know. If I’ve spent 50 hours at networking events, I guarantee that 20 of those hours were spent in the bathroom with two glasses of wine, waiting for the minutes to tick by so that I could leave without feeling like I had totally failed at the networking attempt. I am nervous around strangers. I get jumpy. I get defensive. I get insecure. I know I’m not the only one. There is an entire industry devoted to helping people learn to network. If it were easy, everyone could do it. I’ve read books on the subject and tried, truly I have, but I have yet to find success at any networking event, if I could even define what “success” would be.  There has to be some trick I don’t know that can help me interact with other human beings without feeling so weird about both the experience and myself.

I have asked a few friends and colleagues who are very good at networking to give me some advice to improve my skills. I will take their recommendations, try them out myself, and report back. I’m hoping to learn something from my discomfort that I can share with you.

This is a good time to practice networking for me because I don’t need anything from anyone professionally right now except to expand the circle of people I can talk to about work. I’m happy in my job and I’m not hustling for clients, so it is a low-risk venture. Low risk, except, of course, for the possibility I will become known as “that weird lady who took a bottle of merlot into the bathroom.” But that’s not going to happen. Not this summer.

The last networking event I went to was a local legal organization event for the finalists of an award given by a business publication. I attended with a colleague who is both adept at networking and was already acquainted with several people at the event (probably because of her networking skills). I spent about two hours at this event, 15 minutes of which were spent hiding in the bathroom. I was proud of myself for that. I did not set goals for that event other than “show up and don’t throw up.” That experience will be my baseline to see if, at the end of the summer, I have improved my networking skills.

As summer projects go, it is daunting for me because of how intimidated I am by the idea of putting myself in a room with a bunch of strangers and interacting with them, but it could be worse: there could be no wine and no bathrooms.

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Celeste Harrison Forst has practiced in small and mid-sized firms and is now in-house at a large manufacturing and technology company where she receives daily hugs from her colleagues. You can reach Celeste directly at C.harrisonforst@gmail.com.

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