Success in Life and How to Achieve It

Social networking is one key factor to success in life. How well you hold onto your network of contacts at the age of 21-25 determines more than you would think.

(PRWEB) December 11, 2004 -- Success in life: one key factor is how well you hold onto your network of contacts at the age of 21-25. Success in life is course defined by many things but my contention is that the old school tie" or the modern version, the new school bonds" is very much alive and well. Some of our most powerful connections and bonds are formed at developmental stages in our career from the ages of 21-25 -- the question is whether we hold onto and cherish this formative network of contacts.

I dont mean the slavish nerdy networking that some over eager sales people indulge in making regular calls to every contact each month, but what I would describe as networking which is low key and with a soft touch". It is networking which is appropriate for each contact -- the level of contact of course depending on the situation, and the relationship.

Lets back up a minute -- what do we mean by success in life. Well of course there are a number of soft factors -- happiness, contentment and so on -- many of these areas of course developed from the results of our self calibration.

There are a range of hard and more measurable factors -- whether you have found the right partner or not, how much money you earn, what career you have, houses, cars and so on.

In terms of ones career -- one of the more commonly asserted signs of success, the traditional patterns of employment have shifted significantly over recent years. The traditional job for life has long since gone and the shift to a knowledge based economy where people have a number of jobs in the course of a successful career has been well documented.

What has been less well documented however is the importance of personal contacts in climbing the career ladder. There are scant figures around on the number of jobs and positions that are filled by personal contacts rather than through recruitment agents or head hunters, but my suspicion is that it is a surprisingly high number and those positions that are filled this way result in much higher staff retention ratios.

What else springs forth from having a strong network of friends? Well, the question is all about proximity and how far out from your comfort zone you are. What does that mean I hear you say.

Well, we all have to make decisions in our life -- what job should we do, what is the right work life balance for you, where should you holiday, what books to read and so on. Normally we would make these sort of decisions based on our own experience and seldom go beyond our comfort zone. The importance of the network in all this is that it gives you reference points outside of your comfort zone -- you may never have considered going abroad to Croatia or sailing around the world, but the fact that you know or may have connections to people who have brings it that little bit closer -- there is more proximity and your comfort zone by proxy creeps out further.

In essence, friends recommend new things which we would never have contemplated before and we push the boundary out and are more likely to try these new things.

The wider your network and the more you hang onto your core network from formative years, the more hits you are likely to get.

Of course the network after a certain level becomes more a self fulfilling prophecy -- we speculate the number of people you need in your personal network to achieve critical mass is 500 people. Its not as far as you think it might be -- we are not talking close personal friends here, but acquaintances and linked friends over the years. Remember that the weakest links are actually the strongest links -- you are less likely to recommend a really close friend for a job because of the repercussions should it go wrong, but a more distant friend -- well I didnt know them that well and its almost ok to disown them in a certain way.

Once you get to critical mass, you suddenly find all sorts of benefits and it becomes self referencing -- you know people who know people -- after all it really is a small world and it is all about whom you know -- the old school tie has been replaced by cool networking.

So what does all this mean -- should we be going network crazy and keeping up with everyone we have ever met. No absolutely not.

What we advocate is soft networking with a light touch -- its based on you who you - connect with -- you dont have to be brash and salesy -- its just a question of keeping the contact. Plus of course these days it just isnt cool to be the consummate networker -- no-one wants to be seen to be trying too hard

Of course there is a broad spectrum of ways to stay in contact -- mobile phone and text message are the more immediate, next you have email with its inherent time delay, followed by face to face contact and meet ups. After that you have a big void and then you are into the realms of friends reunited.

Where we believe a social network like http://www.linkyourfriends.co.uk/ or http://www.mates4dates.co.uk fits is somewhere between the last two options -- its the mid ground between regular contact and friends reunited where youve been 10 years since you connected. It might be only 6 months or 12 months between contacts but its a different level of connection between users.

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