Be a Well-Connected Islander

Remember text adventure games? Some of the earliest computer games were choose-your-own-adventure style textual games, where you read the storyline and made choices, hoping the options you selected led you down the path of survival and not into a lurking Grue. Networking is a lot like these games, especially one particular game, Survival Island. The point of that game is to survive as an islander making your island and community stronger by networking with other surrounding islanders for food and necessities. If you are successful in your relationship building, and balance out the give and take of trade, you will survive and thrive. Fail in cultivating those relationships and you will find yourself struggling to make ends meet.

To have a career in academe, you will certainly be faced with the need to establish and maintain a network. To be involved in higher education today means having a presence on the web. For some people, this is a pleasant reality and they have taken proactive steps in this area, creating a LinkedIn profile or even starting a personal blog or website to highlight their work and achievements. Others are more reluctant to set sail into the digital ocean and build their island's network.

If you are concerned that building your network takes too much time or effort, don't be. The time and energy put into initial set-up is payed out in full later on. If you think LinkedIn and other professional networking sites are just for job seekers, think again. Your profiles act as passive networking tools. They serve as a place to organize your work history, achievements, publications, and projects. These online web presences are working 24/7 to enhance your career or job search.

If you are a job seeker, the benefits are even more immediately notable. College and university human resource personnel sift through online accounts and profiles like the My HigherEdJobs accounts and LinkedIn profiles to find job seekers. Search committees will "informally" narrow down a group of finalists to the final few by seeing what the different candidates are doing online. Some skeptics may say, "If I have nothing online, they can't see something that might hurt my candidacy." Those people would be mistaken, because not saying anything says a lot about how you perceive yourself and your achievements. Schools are looking for engaging and creative professionals. Show them that you are the person they are seeking, and that they should call you in for the final round of interviews.

Your online network, be it on Facebook, LinkedIn, Ning, or Blogger, should be connecting you to other people who are in the same field as you (or field you are looking to enter). Your profile or account should always be projecting to the world the online version of your 2-minute elevator speech. Clearly stating who you are, what role in higher education you are looking to be involved in, what your accomplishments are, and how to contact you. Simple as that.

Nothing more is needed in this online venue, but also not less than those basics. Like in the game, if you reach out to other islanders around you and successfully cultivate relationships, you will survive and thrive. It is fine to be an islander, just be a well-connected islander.

"Networking is not about hunting. It is about farming. It's about cultivating relationships." - Dr. Ivan Misner, NY bestselling author & founder of BNI

Don’t Wish Upon a Star, Make Yourself One

Lillian Gish never earned a master's degree or a Ph.D., but she was a consummate artist in her field.

Gish began her career in 1912 in silent movies. Acting in such films as The Birth of a Nation and The Scarlet Letter, she demonstrated a peerless expertise in nonverbal communications. Her ability to touch an audience without words made her one of America's most beloved actresses, and then all of a sudden, the field of acting changed forever. The technology of sound was introduced.

Many of Gish's fellow actors were unable or unwilling to adjust, but she did. She acquired the skills and knowledge required for excellence in speaking parts and combined that new competence with her foundational training in acting. Her flexibility and willingness to learn enabled her to act for 50 more years and earned her a Special Academy Award "For superlative artistry and for distinguished contribution to the progress of motion pictures."

Gish's experience is a wonderful illustration of what it takes to succeed in today's ever-changing world of work. In fields as different as medicine and higher education, logistics and publishing, we are seeing transformative developments as radical as the shift from silent movies to sound, black and white to color, realism to animation and galaxies far, far away. The truth, however hard it may be to accept, is that change is now permeating every corner of the workplace.

The only way to survive, let alone prosper, in such a constantly shifting environment is to be a lifelong student in one's field and to be a lifelong networker among one's peers. In the Career Fitness System, those two activities are the first two of the seven regular exercises a person must practice to build a healthy and rewarding career:

· Exercise I: Pump Up Your Circulatory System recognizes that your expertise in your field is the very heart of your career. If you don't constantly push yourself to extend and enrich that knowledge, your expertise will atrophy and your ability to compete for employment will decline.

· Exercise II: Strengthen Your Circulatory System acknowledges the limitations of your personal awareness and access. If you don't build up and maintain supportive contacts in your field, you will likely miss out on opportunities for which you are qualified and be overlooked for others.

Both of these two activities can be accomplished in many different ways, so each of the exercises in the Career Fitness System involves four steps. Some people elect to do all four, while others pick and choose those that seem best for them. The key, however, is to ensure that you're performing each of the exercises in some way and doing so on a regular basis. That may not win you an Academy Award, but it will make you are a star who's widely recognized in your field. And, as Lillian Gish proved, there's no better security than that.

Thanks for reading,
Peter

P.S. My new book, The Career Activist Republic, has just hit bookstore shelves. You'll find it at Amazon.com and in many bookstores around the country. I'll quote one description: "The most innovative and exhilarating examination of the American workplace since The Free Agent Nation, and one that makes more sense!". I hope you'll take a look at it.