Networking and Netweaving questions

by Byron Woodson II

I wrote in my last post about the seven levels of networking. In it I started to describe the differences between the various strategies for networking. I wanted to supplement that with something a little easier to digest. What I present below is the same seven levels, but instead of having a description, these are questions that networkers can ask themselves to determine the kind of networking they're doing.

Networking Questions
1. Siphon - what can your network do for me?
2. Tap - what can you do for me?
3. Exchange - what can we do for each other
4. Provide - what can I do for you?

Netweaving Questions
5. Give - what can my network do for you?
6. Integrate - what can our networks do for each other?
7. Weave - what can those networks do for each other?

You'll see in the first set of questions, the person asking themselves these questions hasn't started to think about their own network as a resource for others. Their awareness of networks and networking is limited to themselves and other people. However, netweavers, who ask themselves the second set of questions, immediately start thinking of themselves as part of a network, and look to offer people assistance from people in their network.

The suspicious part of you may be thinking "if you're giving all the time, how do you get benefits from this?" The assumption I'm making, and I encourage you to make it to, that at first you should give freely, that is not seek anything in return. But if you just give and give to someone, then you either ask them for a scratch-back, or stop giving to them. For the most part, people who have been helped feel a little indebted to the person that helped them. So when they get a call asking for assistance with something, they'll be willing to help.

Enough of that, this isn't supposed to be a long essay on the balancing of netweaving, rather this post is a tool to help you diagnose just where along this continuum between siphoning and weaving you are.