I had a session recently with a group of top executives from a large international company in which we discussed the issue of culture change. Their particular company has been taken over by an even larger company which appears to have a different culture. Not surprisingly my group say they prefer the culture they know and point to how successful it has been over the past number of years. Their success is presumably one of the reasons they were purchased in the first place.

What has networking to do with culture change? Well networking can help provide a ‘space’ in which to address the issue of culture change by focussing on the relationships between the people.

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Kingsley and I spent an interesting day last week in a ‘thinking’ seminar with Ruth McCarthy of 'think it through'. Motivated by the ten components of a thinking environment from Nancy Kline's More Time to Think we had asked Ruth to spend some time with us to help improve our “attention” in delivering our Networking Programme. Outcomes included - redesigning the agenda for our two-hour seminars for small groups and creating an outline for a new two and a half hour workshop for larger groups.

Attention

What do I mean by attention? Attention is the first and most important component in creating a thinking environment (see a brief review of More Time to Think in my Amazon reading list on LinkedIn). It is also central to first-person Action Inquiry (also reviewed Action Inquiry, Torbert & Ass. 2004) and is implicit in many other approaches such as Peter Senge’s Presencing, Otto Scharmer’s Theory U and in Hanson and Mendius’s Buddha’s Brain.

            Attention, mindfulness or presencing is about bringing attention to both your inner and outer worlds. As applied to others it is about creating an environment in which others are given the space and time to think, to be heard and to be their best. According to Ruth, the average time we get to speak before being interrupted is between 10-20 seconds!

Our first exercise for the day was to practice listening and attention by working in pairs in which we gave each other 3 mins uninterrupted attention to speak and instead of jumping in when the other person came to a natural pause, we followed on with a simple question such as “is there anything more you would like to say”? This is based on the assumption that “while the other person may have stopped talking, they haven’t necessarily stopped thinking”.

            Bringing attention has all sorts of practical benefits both for the person doing the thinking and the person doing the attending. As the neuroscience literature shows what we bring our attention to increases neural activity in the brain which in turn increase our opportunity to learn i.e., what we bring our attention too we can learn from (see Buddha’s Brain).

In this seminar, we focused on Kline's concept of attention which has three central components:

-          attention to the ‘content’ of what the other person is saying

-          attention to ‘your response’, and

-          attention to creating ‘a thinking environment’ for the other person.

Take note however, if you become too fixated on the content you may not register your response to it. If you become too fixated on your response, your thoughts may become more important than the thinker's next thoughts. If you focus too much on creating a thinking environment for the thinker you may come across as detached and artificial. Balancing attention to the content, your response and to creating a thinking environment is a complex task. This is explored in detail in first-, second- and third-person Action Inquiry (Torbert & Ass, 2004)

More on attention....

            Attention is about listening without interruption. It is listening while resisting the need to ‘answer the question’ or ‘solve the problem’. It is listening with an open mind rather a critical ear. It is listening without feeling the need to help. It is listening without the need to ‘direct’ “with our questions and impress with our tools”. It is listening with respect and love and with the knowledge that the person who raises the question usually has the best answer.

As a practice, try to listen to what is being said and then to what is going to be said. Listen and resist the urge to reply. Let the silences happen, leave the space open, resist the need to rush in with your thoughts. The listener needs your attention more than your advice. As we discuss later, you can later follow up with ‘incisive questions’ if necessary.

While bringing attention to others, focus on their eyes and don’t take notes (do that later). Breath out and get interested. Know that your ‘attention’ is what is required not your answers and not your notes. It is your ‘attention’ that will act as a catalyst for their thinking and the solution to their problem. Know that for others, “the knowing” that they won’t be interrupted is a phenomenal force for their mind. Again, resist the urge to respond, resists the urge to interrupt. Know that the urge to interrupt rises in proportion to the awareness of the content and the creation of a thinking environment.

Finally, Kline notes that attention is the catalyst for creating a thinking environment and is implicit in each of the other nine components. Attention allows the asking of questions, the kind of questions the thinker’s mind may ask itself if allowed. It is the uninterrupted attention that allows the thinker’s mind break through and answers its own questions. We can help with our incisive questions such as;

“if you knew that you can figure this out, that your ideas matter, that your feelings count, that you are important, that you have choice, that you can face anything, that you can solve this, even when the experts haven't, that you are a delight - what new ideas would you have in this moment, what thoughts would you dare to have”? (p. 38)

The power of Incisive Questions

According to Kline, everything we do, think and feel begins with an assumption. The excitement starts when we begin to notice these assumptions and replace the ‘untrue or limiting assumptions’ with the ‘true ones’. Structurally by putting the ‘true assumptions’ into an incisive question it frees up the mind. It works as follows…following a sequence:

You are thinking along. You come up against an ‘untrue limiting assumption’ which you regard as true. You stop, you can’t go forward, but you commit to understanding it, to breaking it down, to looking at ‘how true it really is’ You spend the time, you pull it apart, you realise its untrue. You then ask, Well if it is ‘untrue’, what words do I have for what is true and liberating instead? Figure that out and then ask, ‘If I knew that, then how would I go forward?  This is the incisive question that liberates the mind.

As applied to Networking-Matters.

As noted above, as a direct result of the thinking session we redesigned the agenda for our two-hour seminars for small groups and created an outline for a new two and half hour workshop for larger groups. We added in new concepts such as the introductory and closing rounds and working in listening pairs. We also added the unblocking sequence and incisive questions.

The introductory round works on the assumption that no one has entered the meeting until they have spoken. An introductory round can be quite short, 30 seconds or less, in which everyone introduces themselves and says something nice, useful or good that has happened to them recently. This helps to set the tone of the meeting and to creating an appreciative environment in which to work. We guard the concept of appreciation and try to give it out in a ratio of 5:1 appreciation to criticism. Why, because appreciation works better than criticism, because we don’t do enough of it and because it is better in terms of creating a thinking environment.

While working in thinking-pairs you are guaranteed not to be interrupted for 3 minutes. As noted earlier, we are normally interrupted after 10 seconds or so. Try it yourself. Just how anxious are you to share your best thoughts just after someone has started talking to you. This is partly because your thoughts appear much quicker in your brain than what the other person is saying.

In the thinking pairs, it is essential to bring attention to what the other person is saying and to allow them to continue thinking even after they may have stopped talking. The objective is not to have a conversation or even a discussion, but rather to create the best possible environment for them to think. Should they pause during this 3 minutes, the person asking the question may say something like, “what more do you think, feel or want to say about the topic”? Say thank you to each other at the end.

There is no need to report back on the thinking from these pair sessions. The session leader might ask however, “what is your freshest thinking on the topic now”or “what is your new thinking on the topic”!? This just acknowledges that the thinking goes on long after the talking has stopped.

The second part of day focused on the unblocking sequence and incisive questions and how they could be used as part of our Networking Programme. For instance, how could we use ‘incisive questions’ to deal with ‘rejection’ in the solicitation part of the programme? Rejection can be very difficult to take, particularly in this case where you have spent time rating and screening your prospects and developing a relationship with them. In fact, the closer the relationship, the greater the sense of rejection. What sort of incisive questions can you ask? These might include;

 “I appreciate that you don’t want to conduct business right now but it would be really helpful if you could tell me why”. Is it me, my organization or the terms of the proposal?” or

“could you tell  me what is making it most unsuitable for you right now”? or

“I know I did not get the business but could you give me some advice on why not”? or

“Is there something particular about the proposal that you are uncomfortable with”?

Get over feeling rejected and see this an opportunity to learn something important about you, your product or service and your relationship with your prospect

            We also talked about the unblocking sequence as way of understanding why people don’t like asking for referrals. Many people it seems don’t ask for referrals because they are afraid, afraid of being rejected and afraid of stepping over some imaginary professional line. Following the ‘unblocking sequence’ may help to find a way out.  

I think the day went really well for us at www.Networking-Matters.com and has helped us to tweak the presentation of our Networking Programme. In fact we tried out the introductory and closing rounds and thinking pairs in our two hour seminar to-day. Here is what some of the folks said in their closing comments;

-          I really liked that exercise in attention

-          I get this attention stuff – we need to put aside our ‘pitch book’ and learn to listen first

-          I need to do more cultivation, listening and pay more attention

-          I need to listen and not interrupt so much

-          We’ve been too focused on transactions, we need to listen more

-          I need to give more attention

Edward & Kingsley

www.networking-matters.com

We think of networking as a ‘noun’ rather than a ‘verb’. It is about you building a great network rather you becoming a great networker. Networking for us is not an event but a process in which you ‘contact, connect, involve and then evolve’ a business relationship over time. We turn this process into four disciplines, ‘research, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship’, which we discuss below.

Underpinning our approach to networking are two opposing concepts; the value of strong-ties and the value of weak-ties. Professor Robin Dunbar of Oxford University tells us of the value of strong ties in our network and Mark Granovetter of Stanford University tells us of the value of weak ties. Which one is right? They are both right it seems. A brief introduction to both concepts follows. 

Dunbar's 150 [i] states that we are limited in our capacity to manage more than 150 inter-person relationships in our network. This includes family, friends and business associates. An inter-personal relationship is one in which both parties exchange personal and emotional information. Why is this important in the context of our programme on Networking? Well because not all contacts are equal. As part of the programme we ensure everyone audits their network and distinguishes between ‘a contact, a connection, a one-off transactional relationship and a sustainable relationship’. Only sustainable relationships get included in Dunbar’s 150.

The value of weak ties on the other hand reminds us that the people we know well, our strongest ties, tend to know the same people we know and be exposed to the same opportunities. Thus in building our network of business relationships we need to step outside our ‘echo chamber’ and meet with people we don’t know well, people who have different networks and who are exposed to different opportunities.

Central to this is having a Networking Plan, both off-line and online. Off-line because you can’t maintain strong ties unless you meet regularly ‘face-to-face’ and on-line because as we can now connect with all sorts of new networks of people in a way previously not possible. Balancing this plan is what Heraclitus called “the harmony of opposites” long thought by the Greeks to be an immutable law.

The Networking Programme

Our Networking Programme has two main drivers; an internal mindset based on integrity and mutuality and an external method based on the four disciplines; research, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship, discussed as follows:

INTERNALLY the programme is about creating the right attitude to networking, both in the individual and the organisation. This is based on integrity and mutuality in the way we communicate and interact with others. This is motivated by the question “what can I do for my network today?” and is based on the understanding that “you give to each individual in your network but you get back from the network as a whole”. Integrity and mutuality may sound like lofty ideals, but can you imagine trying to maintain a sustainable relationship without them?

Here’s why integrity and mutuality are absolutely essential. It is integrity and mutuality that enables us to move beyond “one-off transactional relationships” to “sustainable relationships”. You don’t need unusual amounts of integrity and mutuality to bring a person from ‘a contact to a connection or to a one-off transactional relationship’ but you do need integrity and mutuality to turn one-off transactional relationships into sustainable ones. Delivering on sustainability is about your legitimacy as a person and you can’t have legitimacy unless you also have integrity in yourself and mutuality in your dealings with others.

EXTERNALLY the programme is about practicing the right networking method. Like most successful networkers, some of their success is due to their personality and their natural interest and ability with people. More of it however is down to their method. As noted above, networking is not a social activity but rather a process in which you ‘contact, connect, involve and evolve’ a relationship which we turn into four disciplines; research, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship.

In research you begin with those who you suspect might be interested in your service. Each person is ‘rated and screened’ for their capacity to acquire your service (A-B) and their propensity to do business with you (1-2). Those that have both capacity and propensity become your A1’s. Those that have capacity but not propensity become your A2’s. It is the A2’s that you take on a cultivation journey by building their awareness, knowledge, interest, involvement and commitment to you and your organisation. In solicitation you ask for the business, both because you know your prospect has the capacity and because now they have the propensity to deal with you as well. Finally, in the stewardship phase and through a process of careful management, each one-off transactional relationship is evolved into a network of sustainable relationships.

Outline of the programme

                Following a briefing meeting, the programme is delivered in four two hour sessions with a number of follow up meetings one month, three months, six months and twelve months later. Each programme goes through the following process.

Session 1. Introduction

First period (45 mins): What is networking? What role does it play in the business process? What is required to build a network of sustainable business relationships? How many relationships can you manage in your network? What about social networks, how can they help or hinder? What is the right attitude to networking and the right method? The right attitude is one based on integrity and mutuality in dealing with others and the right method is one that follows the four steps; ‘research, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship’.

Break for coffee/discussion (15 mins).

Second period (45 mins). Introduce and outline the four steps in the process. Describe why each is important and different and how they come together in networking. Discuss Dunbar’s rule - why individuals are limited in their capacity to manage more than 150 sustainable relationships in their network - and how in auditing our existing network we distinguish between ‘contacts, connections, one-off transactional relationships and sustainable relationships’.

Learning objectives: That networking is not an event or a social activity – it is a professional business process. It is about your attitude on the one hand and applying the four steps on the other.

Preparation for next session: Participants are asked to audit their existing network and reflect on their attitudes to networking. Also, what is your current Dunbar number? (Refer to the attached notes on how to audit your existing network. Be sure and select one attitude that best describes your current attitude to networking).

Session 2. Research and Cultivation

First period (45 mins). Review the audit. What was your experience of auditing your network? Where you able to distinguish between ‘contacts, connections, one-off transactional relationships and sustainable relationships’? What is your current Dunbar number? Did your audit help you clarify your attitude to networking? Which of the five different attitudes to networking best describe your current attitude? Were you also able to identify limiting assumptions that were holding you back and equally liberating assumptions that might help you move forward?

Pause for coffee/discussion (15 mins).

Second period (45 mins). Doing research (identifying who to contact). What is research? What role does it play in the networking process and how do you measure its success? Research is about identifying a pool of potential prospects. These can come from a variety of sources: existing networks, traditional media, Internet searches and online networks. Through rating and screening your universe of contacts – both for their capacity for your service (A-B) and their propensity to do business with you (1-2) – you create a list of qualified prospects.

Doing Cultivation (making the connection). What is cultivation? What role does it play in the networking process and how do you measure its success? Cultivation is about consciously bringing your prospects on a relationship journey - building their awareness, increasing their knowledge, generating their interest in, involvement with and finally commitment to you and your organization. Building awareness and knowledge are actions you take; involvement and commitment are actions you want your prospects to take. You measure success in cultivation by how ‘prepared’ you and your prospects are for you to ask them for their business.

Learning objectives: That the key to research is ‘rating and screening’ your contacts. Know the difference between those you have a contact with, a connection with, a one-off transactional relationship with and a sustainable relationship with. For those that you need to cultivate, apply the five subs-stages and know that if you do this with the right attitude (with integrity and mutuality), the process will do much of the heavy lifting in your relationship building.

Preparation for next session. Research/identify twenty new people that you want to contact, connect and build a relationship with. (Refer to the attached notes on how to research and cultivate a business relationship).

Session 3. Solicitation and Stewardship

First period (45 mins). Review the exercise from last session. Using participant’s examples go through the five subs stages in the cultivation journey. How do you build awareness with your contacts? How do you increase their knowledge of you and your organisation? How do you create interest in you and your organisation? How do you generate involvement with and finally commitment to you and your organisation?

Pause for coffee/discussion (15 mins)

Second period (45 mins). Doing Solicitation (asking for the business)? What is solicitation? What role does it play in the networking process and how do you measure its success? What does it mean to ask for the business? When do you know you are ready? Is there a better way of asking for business? If you have done your research, rated and screened your prospects and cultivated your relationships you will have greatly increased your chances of soliciting a success. You do however have to ask for the business; don’t assume that just because someone has a need of your service and a propensity to do business with you that you are entitled. You measure success in solicitation by whether your prospect has agreed to conduct business with you.

Doing Stewardship (evolving the relationship). What is stewardship? What role does it play in the relationship process and how do you measure its success? For instance what role does stewardship play in moving people from a transactional to sustainable relationship mindset? You can research, cultivate and solicit in order to build one-off business relationships, but you need stewardship to turn them into something that is sustainable. You measure success in stewardship by your commitment to and exercise of a stewardship plan.

Learning objectives: That provided you have rated and screened your contacts and have cultivated your relationships, asking for the business (solicitation) will feel like a natural progression, but you must ask! The subsequent stewardship of your relationship is reliant on your commitment to a stewardship plan which is motivated by the question, ‘what can I do for my network’?

Preparation for next session: Take the twenty contacts and think about how you would not build a sustainable relationship with them. Think also about networking in your context – what sort of networking will work best for you? (Refer to the attached notes on how not to cultivate a sustainable business relationship. Also draft an outline of your ideal stewardship plan. Ask yourself, how would you like to be stewarded in a sustainable relationship?).

Session 4. Summary and Conclusions

First period (45 mins). Review the learning objectives. From session 1 - Networking is not an event or a social activity – it is a professional business process. It is about your attitude on the one hand and applying the four steps on the other. From session 2 - Research & Cultivation, rate and screen your prospects both for their capacity for your service (A-B) as well as their propensity to do business with you (1-2). Know the five subs-stages in cultivating a relationship – awareness, knowledge, interest, involvement and commitment too. Do this with integrity and mutuality and the process will do much of the heavy lifting in your relationship building. From session 3 – Solicitation & Stewardship, if you have done your research and have cultivated your relationships, asking for the business (solicitation) can feel like a natural progression, but you have to ask. Don’t assume you are entitled. Finally, stewardship doesn’t require skill, but it does require committing to a stewardship plan. Remember that successful stewardship starts from “what can I do for my network”?

Pause for coffee/discussion (15 mins)

Second period (45 mins). Where to now? Assuming you have a product, a project or a service that satisfies a market need, this programme, in addition to other marketing and business initiatives, describes a process you can follow to build and maintain a network of business relationships. If this requires a change in behavior, then allow time for this to occur. To help you in this regard we propose staying connected with you for 12 months; to meet again in one month’s time and again in three, six and twelve months. At each meeting we will review the process described here; i.e., audit your existing network and attitudes to networking while also going through the four steps in the networking process – research, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship.

Kingsley Aikins & Edward Kelly

 www.networking-matters.com

The fourth session in our networking programme focused on ‘Stewardship’. This followed three earlier sessions on Research, Cultivation and Solicitation (see our networking programme ). Stewardship is about evolving business relationships and requires a shift from a ‘transactional’ to ‘relationship’ mindset.  Think of the following, which of these five reasons best describe why people stopped doing business with a company;

Death                                                              :           - 1%

A move or relocation                                    :           - 2%

A relationship with someone in your firm  :           - 4%

Dissatisfaction with the product/service    :           - 14%

Attitude of indifference                                :           - 68%

            Is it a surprise that customers/clients will forgive poor product or service (-14%) before they will forgive being ignored (-68%)? Why is that? Well because it’s not enough to deliver on the product or service, you also have to deliver on the relationship.

Homework

Before discussing ‘what is stewardship’, I want to refer to the homework for today's session. Each participant was asked to write a stewardship plan for two of their existing clients. During the session the participants shared stories of their stewardship efforts and reflected on their strengths and weaknesses in this area. Some felt they stewarded their clients quite well. All agreed they could do it better by which they meant having an organisation wide Networking Plan. The CEO was embarrassed that they didn't currently have one or at last not one that is written down.

One of the participants wondered whether he was doing too much stewarding of one of his business relationship which seemed to have limited potential to evolve beyond the current level of business with the firm. This raised the question about how much time and energy you can devote to any particular client relationship? Kingsley mentioned he felt this was less an issue of stewardship and more a matter of rating and screening which we discussed in research and cultivation (steps one and two in the programme). It takes time to build and maintain a network of sustainable business relationships and more time is needed for those with the greatest capacity and propensity to do business with you and your firm.

What is stewardship?

There are two aspects to stewarding a business relationship. The first is about your internal attitude and the second your external action. Having the right attitude begins with asking the right questions, such as, ‘how can I perform on the relationship as well as the transaction’? For most businesses the problem is not in performing on the transaction but in understanding that there is a difference between performing on the transaction and in performing on the relationship.

So how do you perform in a business relationship? You start by showing gratitude. Have you told your clients how important their business is to your firm? What do you know about them that really matters to them and what effort have you made to show that? Have you asked your clients how they would like you to appreciate them?

The answers to these questions will help inform your stewardship plan, one that is relevant to what they want rather than what suits you. Do this with integrity and awareness. Do it also with mutuality, which is necessary to building long-term sustainable relationships, the kind of relationships that are built and maintained on trust.

Referrals

What are referrals and what have they to do with stewardship? When asked if any of the participants sought referrals from existing clients the answer was no. I had planned the homework for this fourth session to ask each participant to refer us to two of their contacts. This would of course help promote our networking programme but more importantly I wanted them to experience what it was like to ask for a referral, albeit in this case, I was doing the asking and they were doing the referring. As it turned they outflanked me by asking us to present to 50 of their top clients on ‘how to build and maintain a network of business relationships’.  Clearly they are happy to refer our networking programme to their clients and yet they don't seek referrals for themselves? Why is this?  Their answer was "I can think of any good reason why we don't do it".

So what is stopping them? One of the participants told a story of two friends, an advertising executive and a banker, who had played golf together for over 40 years. One particular day after they had retired, the advertising executive was feeling a little irate and turned to the banker and said, “you know in almost 35 years that we have known each other you never gave me any business”. Rather stunned the banker replied “but you never asked -  I didn’t know you wanted it’. (For those of you following these blogs you will note how important asking is in our Networking Programme).

So how do you ask for referrals? Well you don't ask for a referral you ask for advice. Remember when speaking to a client this is somebody who has invested in your firm, who is clearly happy with your service and with the kind of people you are. Meeting them face to face and seeking their advice on how to expand your business pays them a courtesy as well as providing them with an opportunity to assist you in any way they can. (As a note to self, we could do some work on an unblocking sequence of questions that could assist individuals prepare and participate in such a meeting).

Preparation for final session

            We agreed that we would meet again in two weeks time for the fifth and final two-hour session as part of which we would agree on a corporate Networking plan for the organization for the next 3 to 5 years. This would not be our plan handed down to them but rather a joint networking plan agreed with them.

In their case the Networking plan would be built around two ‘anchor events’ each year with three additional opportunities to connect with existing clients, through offering specific industry feedback tailored to each client’s needs. In addition, the Networking plan would include two lists that would be reviewed at each biweekly management meeting. The first list would focus on the ‘stewarding initiatives’ for existing clients and the second on ‘cultivation initiatives’ for new prospects.

Measuring our success

Finally, before we finished we asked the participants to comment on how they would assess the value of our networking programme to their organisation and over what timeframe? In answering, while they said they were already seeing some benefits, the true benefit of the programme would not be seen for another 9 to 12 months and then would ideally be in the following three areas:

a) an increase in business sales,

b) an improvement in the quality of their business relationships and

c) an increase in the number of prospects in their pipeline.

Thus we really can’t say for now whether the programme has been of value or not. To improve the chances that it will be, we have agreed to meet in one month’s time, after the final session, and then again in three months, six months and twelve months.

`           Why is it necessary to have four more meetings in addition to the five sessions we have already had? Because while each of the participants understands the common sense value of the programme they are also experienced enough to know that existing habits die slowly. As Samuel Johnson said, “the chains of habit are too weak to be felt before they are too strong to be broken”. Undoing the bad habits and replacing them with good ones takes time, although 9-12 months should be more than enough.

            From our perspective unless we can help the organisation increase its business sales, improve the quality of their business relationships and increase the number of prospects in their pipeline, then we are not adding enough value. We think we can help them achieve this through placing a Networking Plan at the centre of their business process. For now we are hopeful that in 12 months time this particular group of participants will be able to recommend us to others by pointing to the tangible benefits they have received.

Edward & Kingsley

In a previous blog we highlighted the importance of Dunbar's 150 and how we are limited to 150 or so interpersonal relationships in our network.  These are our strong ties, but what about our weak ties? In dialectical thinking any proposition contains aspects of its opposite so if you are thinking about what role ‘strong ties’ play in your network (Dunbar's 150) you must also think about what role ‘weak ties’ play as well.

According to dialectical theory a proposition is only stable if it contains its opposite which is self-contradictory. There is however a logic to this called Dialectic (Rowan, 2000) that goes back to the Greek philosophers and to Heraclitus who was found of talking about the “harmony of opposites”. Dialectics is a challenging way to think as you need to keep open the ‘spring doors’ of strong ties, on the one hand, and weak ties on the other.

The value of weak ties has a firm theoretical base in social theory. In 1973, Mark Granovetter published The Strength of Weak Ties which is one of the most cited papers in sociology. In answer to the question, how do people find jobs, Granovetter found that it wasn't through strong ties but rather through weak ties, i.e., it seemed pople did better with those they didn't know very well as opposed to those they did! Why was that? Well because those they knew tended to be ‘like them’, to share the same networks and to be exposed to the same opportunities. People they don't know so well had different networks and were exposed to different opportunities which they could introduce them to.

What implications does this have for our networking programme? Well perhaps the more important question is, can you live with the contradiction that both your strong and weak ties are important to your network?, i.e., that you need to maintain both a strong emotional connection with those you have built sustainable relationships with, through face-to-face networking, while also reaching out to new people, beyond your network, through both on-line and off-line networking.

This juxtaposition between online and off-line networking shows up as an important feature in our networking programme as numerous participants report on the value of online networking resulting in offline face to face meetings. Social networking sites are a fertile ground to contact and connect with new people and while this is good news for developing ‘weak ties’ there is also a risk that social networking sites will contact and connect you with people you already know or who are like you. Breaking free of these ‘echo chambers’ requires conscious effort, both on-line and off-line. More on this again..

Edward & Kingsley

www.networking-matters.com

References:

Granovetter, M.S. (1973). The Strength of Weak Ties, Amer. J. of Sociology, Vol. 78, Issue 6, May 1360-80.

Rowan, John (2000). Dialectical thinking and humanistic psychology'.  18-21 Practical Philosophy  3/2  July 2000.

THE LONG-TERM UNEMPLOYED MAY LACK NETWORKS MORE THAN TRAINING

The number of people who are long-term unemployed i.e.12 months or more, is likely to exceed  100,000 at the moment.  The evidence is that their chances of re-employment diminish the longer the period of unemployment. The traditional view of the difficulty with being unemployed for a long time is that skills become stale or irrelevant.

However, research in Denmark in 2007 suggested that a hugely important factor is that the long-term unemployed become increasingly isolated from the network of people that are in employment or are only recently unemployed. This matters because surveys showed that employers recruit largely through informal networks. The “I have the man for you” type of recommendation, emanating from linkages of people known to each other, counts for more in filling jobs than formal interviewing and screening carried out by recruitment and other agencies. The information about an individual from the network will contain all his social, family and work related characteristics. No formal approach to recruitment can do this so thoroughly or at such low cost.  

Networks are channels through which information is obtained, problems tackled and business conducted. Most people are almost unconsciously part of naturally grown networks. These centre on work, family, social connections, education and so on. Networks intertwine the social and business aspects of our lives. They carry all sorts of information which enable us to run our lives better and avoid pitfalls. Not least, these networks enable us to get work, whether that is a few hours doing somebody’s garden or linking up with someone in a high tech company which is looking for a full time person with skills that match your own.

But if you are unemployed, especially if you are among the long-term unemployed, your network is restricted. You are “out of the loop.” The natural networking environment provided by work is gone. Former colleagues tend to drop out of your network because you now have less in common and they may feel awkward or guilty because they still have a job. Long-term unemployed people may feel a sense of failure and thus do not mix readily with former colleagues. Isolation brings its own social difficulties, quite apart from the obstacle it poses to becoming re-employed.

Government schemes to “upskill” and “retrain” reach relatively few of the unemployed and, in any case, may be missing the importance of being left out of important networks as a key issue for the long-term unemployed.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that many of the unemployed see little point in new training. The lack of uptake of some FAS schemes tends to support this view.

In the current climate it is all too easy, if you are unemployed, to give up and say “There are no jobs.” But this is not really true. There is still turnover in the jobs market, albeit at a much lower level than in the boom. The key question, raised in the research in Denmark, is “Why do some people get jobs and others do not?”  The query is valid irrespective of whether the economy is growing or in recession. Long-term unemployment persists, even in the boom times, admittedly at a much reduced level. This clearly implies that there are unemployed people who are not able to re-enter the workforce, after some months of unemployment, even when times are good.

While lack of education and skills may present barriers to getting a job, the problem of obtaining full information about an employee, (or indeed employer) would still present problems, even if skill deficiencies were not an obstacle. The way in which people who are unemployed find a matching employer is not seamless. The unemployed may not know that there is an employer there who needs them. Even if they do discover this basic fact, they may know nothing else about what it is like to work for this employer. The job may look attractive on paper but working conditions and the general “atmosphere” of the workplace may not be conducive. How do they uncover the truth?

Equally the employer may know nothing about the applicant, other than that they look good on paper. But how motivated is he? What sort of social skills has he? Would he upset the balance in an existing smooth functioning team? Interviews, assessments, recruitment agencies, aptitude tests and recommendations from previous employers help to form such a judgement but how much can they be trusted?

The Danish researchers suggest that these avenues of investigation of potential employees by employers are not regarded as highly trustworthy. Based on their surveys, 61% of companies always or mostly used word of mouth through employees to announce new job vacancies. In 64% of cases employers regarded recommendations from their own employees as “decisive” or of “great importance” when filling posts. An oral recommendation from a former employer was also seen as carrying significant weight. However, recommendations from employment agencies, educational institutions and written testimonials from former employers were less highly regarded.  

The research also indicated that employers were extremely sensitive to the length of a candidate’s period of unemployment when hiring. All in the survey felt there were particular risks connected with hiring those with a long period of unemployment behind them.

On this evidence, the long-term unemployed are heavily dependent on their own contacts with the labour market if they are to get work. They need “word of mouth” recommendation from existing employees to overcome the perceived handicap of having been unemployed for a long time.

The research went on to look at how good the ties of the unemployed were with the labour market. It was found that 41% of the long-term unemployed live alone as compared to only 20% of employed people. Moreover, only 35% of the long-term unemployed lived with a partner who was employed as compared to 69% of those who were employed. Weak ties with the labour market among the long-term unemployed were also evident through the employment status of their friends. The survey showed that only 36% of the long-term unemployed had no unemployed friends as compared to 82% of those employed.

Networking is important in business but it would appear that it is vital for the long-term unemployed if they are to hope to re-enter the workforce. The long-term unemployed need to strengthen their links to people who are employed. There is little point in having networks based solely on people who are unemployed. Networks are cheap to establish and maintain. There are benefits to be gleaned by employed people from having links to those unemployed, if the social awkwardness can be put aside. We need to appreciate more the context in which unemployed people find themselves and not concentrate exclusively on training as a palliative.

Eunan King

King Research Ltd.

21 May 2010

In an earlier blog, I audited my then list of 163 contacts on LinkedIn and categorised them by ‘contacts, connections, one-off transactional relationships and sustainable relationships’. A contact is someone you know. A connection is someone who you know and who knows you. A one-off transactional relationship is someone you have exchanged something with - some business for instance and a sustainable relationship is someone with whom you have a trusting relationship. Of my initial 163 contacts on LinkedIn, 8 were categorised as contacts, 61 as connections, 45 as one-off transactional relationships and 49 as sustainable relationships.

I repeated this exercise today and of my now 320 contacts on LinkedIn, 62 are categorised as contacts, 73 as connections, 107 as one-off transactional relationships and 78 as sustainable relationships.

What is the point of doing this all again? There are a few reasons. Firstly, while all contacts are entered equally, they not of equal value to my network. Secondly, according to Dunbar's 150 we can only handle 150 interpersonal relationships in our network, the kind of trusting relationships referred to above. Thirdly, I not only want to know who they are but also what role they play in my network, isolating them in this way helps me to see that.

What is interesting from a Dunbar 150 perspective is that I have only 78 sustainable relationships in my network (24% of my contacts in Linkedin) and if I take out close family and friends that reduces to about 50. And while not all my sustainable relationships are captured on Linkedin, even if they were, it is likely I would have some spare capacity to build new trusting business relationships.

 What does this all mean in the context of networking? Well it highlights again that while ‘contacts, connections and one-off transactional relationships’ are important in my business pipeline the really heavy lifting in my network is done by my ‘sustainable relationships’. This is prompting me to do a further exercise to more fully account for the contribution they make to my network.

Here’s the main point though, while Social online networking is very useful in building contacts and making connections and perhaps even bringing some one-off transactional type relationships, it is very difficult to build a really trusting relationship on-line. Long-term sustainable relationships, built on trust, need to be built and maintained ‘face to face’. They have yet to find a way to convey, in an online environment, the kind of emotional exchange and information transfer that occurs in a ‘face to face’ meeting.

Edward Kelly & Kingsley Aikins

www.networking-matters.com

The third session in our networking programme focused on Solicitation which is step three in our four step networking process, research, cultivation, solicitation and stewardship (see our networking programme). Solicitation is about asking for the business, the TBQ (The Brutal Question) as we refer to it.

PART 1 – Homework exercises

Before addressing Solicitation however I want to discuss the feedback from the homework exercises which were completed in advance of this session. The homework requested each participant to make “two asks” from their existing prospect list. This did not necessarily mean asking for business. As in the research stage, asking could be ‘asking for information’ or in the cultivation stage ‘asking for advice’. The point is that “asking” is a key feature of the networking process and the ‘asking exercise’ was to prepare participants for our discussion on Solicitation and the “big ask”, i.e., asking for the business.

The response from each of the participants was heartening – they made their asks and were pleased with the outcomes. They all agreed that such outcomes would not have occurred if they hadn’t asked. This of course is obvious but before criticising what is common sense, ask yourself what asks are you not making that you could make? The participants also agreed and could see the link between previous cultivation intiatives and their current readiness to make a more substantial ask. Kingsley for instance highlighted how he had once asked for a sizeable piece of business after taking 23 cultivation initiatives over a 2 ½ year period – all of which he documented.  The point is that depending on the size of your network and the point that each relationships is at in your network, you will be taking different  cultivation initiatives.

One of the participants, the CEO, said what he liked about the asking exercise was that he now felt he had two selves -  the self that was taking the action and making the ask another self that was sitting on his shoulder reminding him of the power of the process. Needless to say we could not have expressed it any better ourselves. Building business relationships is a process, one that can’t be rushed or faked, but is nonetheless a process that can be learned and practiced.

Some further comments and feedback…..

The first participant (a director) actually made three asks and all had positive outcomes. In each case he moved the prospect along the relationship journey which goes from a state of unawareness to awareness to familiarity to trust. The second participant (the CEO) also made two successful asks. In the first instance the company called him to say that there was no budget to match the proposal but that they were still interested in talking about it. The CEO, being experienced, recognised the client was saying that he liked what was being proposed but was also flagging that price would be an issue.

The third participant (the Chairman) took a slightly different approach. He is perhaps the most experienced in the group and while very good at connecting others had previously not asked others to connect him. He was surprised with the outcome (knowing him and his integrity - we weren’t). In both cases the people he was introduced too where pleased to meet with him and are likely to engage him in future business. Again the simple rule applies – you don’t get if you don’t ask. The fourth participant (also a director) made two asks and was equally pleased with the outcomes. She reported that one was likely to lead to business now and the other was very promising. Both arose from persistence and from knowing the difference between hounding someone and nudging them along the relationship journey.

This also brings me to a point of interest on the connection between online and offline networking. Of the eight or so asks made in this exercise, three had a strong online/offline connection. In the case of the first one, one of the directors had connected with an old colleague on Linkedin who had moved to a new organisation and who had posted a business request on Linkedin. He immediately replied and followed up with a face to face meeting. From there he quickly positioned himself as the supplier of first choice.

In the case of the second one, the Chairman was invited to connect on Linkedin with a CEO he had known many years ago. The Chairman subsequently followed with a face to face meeting in which he discussed his varied business interests including his Chairmanship role in this company. This in turn led to a request for more information and a meeting in which the company presented and ultimately appear likely to win business. This is a good illustration of the value of weak connections, i.e, a weak connection turning into a strong one through online/offline networking.

In the third case, the female director of the company was at a loss to think of a way of connecting with a particular prospect. She had already sent emails and left telephone messages but was cognizant of not being too persistence or annoying. She decided to invite the contact to connect on Linkedin to which the prospect replied apologetically which in turn led to a ‘face to face’ meeting and to the business coming her way. Again this not only illustrates the importance of the online/offline connection but also the value of the process – i.e., that cultivating a business relationship is a journey that takes time, patience and persistence.

PART 2 – Note on Solicitation

Much of this third session was taken up with the homework exercises although Kingsley did spend time passing on some insights into his experience with the TBQ – The Brutual Question. Needless to say you don’t ask for any substantial piece of business on email. It must be done ‘face to face’ and in a context where you know from Steps 1 & 2 (Research and Cultivation) that your prospect is ready for you to ask for their business. A few preparation hints that might help;

-          Be well dressed – i.e., be the best dressed person you meet that day

-          Bring very little with you to the meeting – i.e., just the document which outlines the ‘ask’ you are going to make

-          Stand in the waiting room – don’t sit

-          When the meeting begins – focus on their needs not yours,

-      When the time is right, ask for the business by beginning,

o   “ John, I would like you to consider our proposal to manage your networking business for €10,000”…or whatever..

-      Then stop talking, listen and sit with the uncomfortable silence. And remember, “the next person who speaks losses the business”

-      If the answer is yes, Voila. If they say “NO” perhaps it is “Not now”..you need to find out.

-      You do this by;-

o  reflecting back what they are saying and

o  asking probing and incisive questions

An additional exercises for this session was to list five key objections participants face when asking for business. No real surprises here but a useful exercise nonetheless. The main ones were ‘Price, Existing Relationships, Not ready to proceed just yet, etc’. Are these however the real reasons or are they just what people say in order to conclude the meeting?

We talked a bit about the process you could use to delve a bit further here. The main thing is not to be defensive - we are one of the best in the market, our prices are competitive - we know someone like you who went with the cheaper offering but then ultimately came back to us etc....

You are there, they have agreed to meet you. You know from your research they have a need of your service and through your cultivation you have a relationship with them. They will be happy to tell you more about why they don’t want to proceed if you ask them – here’s the asking again! When you ask though you need to bring your complete attention to them - a skill in itself and something we talked about devoting more time to later.

Finally, in preparation for the next session (Session 4 – Stewardship), we asked each participant to write a stewardship plan for two existing clients. Again the emphasis here is on the relationship not on the transaction. Such a plan starts by asking, ‘what can I give to this relationship’ and or ‘what can I do to evolve this relationship’? ‘How grateful have I been for their business’? ‘Have I thanked them and told them how important their business is to me and our company’?

A note on our own reflections

Both of us were heartened by this third session as we sensed the participants were beginning to see tangible benefits from the considerable time and effort they have allocated to the programme so far. (Tangible benefits are quite different from simply understanding the process and suspecting it is going to work). I am not sure how much time each person has spent so far but we have been with them for 3 sessions and a total of 7-8 hours over a 4 week period. In between, each homework exercise is probably taking twice as much time again. That’s a total of 21 hours. The exercises however are very much part of their business life, and like the programme itself are not something that is external to what they do.

We also note our investment in them having a positive outcome, by which we mean that they will say that the programme directly resulted in more business and better relationships for them and their organisation. This keeps us on our edge as we know that unless we can help them deliver such an outcome for themselves our Networking Programme is of little value.

As a final note we also noted how quickly the two hour sessions pass while in the company of good questions and a group willing to explore how they can improve on what they already do well. This reminded me of something Nancy Klein quoted in her book More Time to Think that for a programme such as ours to work it requires four things:

-          You need people who want to learn

-          You need something worth teaching them

-          You need profound respect for their intelligence

-          And you need to be sure they speak more than you do.

We have no doubt about the first three and we are working hard on the fourth.

Edward & Kingsley

www.networking-matters.com

The second session in our Networking Programme focused on Cultivation which is step two in our four step process, research, cultivation, solicitation and. Cultivation is about bringing a prospect on a relationship journey which goes from a state of unawareness to awareness to familiarity to trust. So how do you do that?

Homework

In advance of the second session we asked each participant to prepare a list of ten prospects. Each was to be ‘rated and screened’ for ‘capacity and propensity’ to do business. There was some confusion around this which made us reflect on how clear we were in preparing it. As it turned out it did not impact the outcome of the exercise although we still feel we could be clearer. Participants also felt that we spent too long going through each prospect on their list and suggested we just deal with a representative sample from each.

To recap, research is about filtering a universe of prospects into an active prospect list. This is done by rating and screening each prospect for their capacity and propensity to do business with you. Capacity here addresses the external question, ‘is your prospect in the market for your services’?  and propensity addresses the internal question, ‘what sort of relationship do you have with them’? Capacity is rated A-B and propensity 1-2.

Why is it important to rate and screen your prospects? Well because you have limited time and according to Dunbar’s rule you also have limited capacity to manage relationships as well. Also how you rate and screen your prospects will determine what cultivation initiatives you will subsequently take. For instance your A1’s have a high capacity and high propensity to do business with you, i.e., they are ready for you to ask for their business now. Your A2’s on the other hand have the same high capacity but a lower propensity so you need to build your relationships with them.

As noted above, cultivation is about bringing someone from a state of unawareness to awareness to familiarity to trust. Your prospect is ready to do business with you when they trust you, both in terms of your product or service and in you and your organisation. Building a relationship based on trust starts with the question, “what have I/we to give to this relationship”? This includes giving ourselves, our personalities, our knowledge, our insights, - list as follows:

What can I/We give?

-          Ourselves

-          advice

-          time

-          talent

-          insight

-          integrity

-          efficiency

-          fun

-          connections

-          global trends

-          experience

-          problem solving

-          attention

Each individual and each organization will have different things to give. Start with the quality of your “attention” i.e., the focusing your concentration on your prospect’s needs and interests. Be present to their requirements and not to yours. Show a consistent willingness to be of service to them. Once they know you care, once they believe you have their best interests at heart then they will begin to trust you. Further, once you know what you have to give, ask yourself the incisive question;

“If I knew what I had to give, what is the first step I would take in clutivating that relationship”?

The cultivation journey, from unawareness to trust, goes through a number of sub-stages in which you gradually develop your prospect’s awareness, knowledge, interest in, involvement with and commitment to you and your organization. Before someone will commit to you they need to know you and they need to have a relationship with you and your organization.

As in cultivating any relationship it is about getting to know the other person, their likes, dislikes and what is important to them, what they really care about. Do you know their vision of the world and does it align with organisation’s vision?

Homework for third session

The homework for the third session was for each participant to take a cultivation initiative on at least two of their prospects and report back on how they got on, both in terms of the outcome (what happened) and how they felt about the process (their own reflections). Why the reflections? Well because for some people the “what can I give” can feel a bit awkward within a business context. Business is about the transaction right! Yes, but who are you transacting with? Cultivating is about you taking their perspective, answering their questions and knowing what they want and what they care about.

Key reflections for us

The main feedback for us from this session was for us to be clearer about rating and screening. This part of the programme is really important so we need to get this right. We know how it works and we know it does work, we just need to communicate more clearly to others.

The main benefit for the participants from this session was their clarity around their lack of any networking plan for their organization. This raised another incisive question for them,

“If we knew we had no networking plan for our organisation, what is the first think we would do about it”?

In answering this question the organisation has committed to a number of out-reach events, and to our collective amusement, have asked us to speak at the first one.

Edward & Kingsley

www.networking-matters.com

Networking-matters blogsite  

Networking-matters programme

Personal profile

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I was disappointed by Michael Lewis’s long article on Ireland When Irish Eyes Are Crying in the current (February, 2011) edition of Vanity Fair http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/03/michael-lewis-ireland-201103. It was followed by a shorter article in the Wall St Journal on 24^th February 2011 entitled Irish Remedy for Hard Times; Leaving.  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703803904576152422920009948.html

I wondered afterwards whether I was disappointed in what Lewis had said and how he said it or in what he didn’t say?  Or was it simply that it was old news to me and that I like many others in Ireland are moving on and adapting and in some cases thriving in the current environment? As I will describe below I am primarily disappointed in what he didn’t say and I am conscious of how that effects the ability of Vanity Fair readers to understand more fully what is going on in Ireland.

There is no denying the legacy of the problems in Ireland. The underpinning of our economy and society by loans from the EU and IMF bears witness to that. It is also unclear whether we can carry the weight of their repayments in the future. Will they have to be restructured? Lewis suggests that the country can’t afford the burden its Government has agreed it will carry, and many other commentators agree. A senior figure in financial services in Dublin suggests a more realistic approach is that we pay back a fixed portion of our GDP, enough to satisfy lenders, but not enough to overly burden the economy. That might be quietly agreeable to the IMF and the EU, but you wonder given recent announcements from President Sarkozy and Chancellor Merkel what pressure we will come from France and Germany as those discussions take place. There are undoubtedly difficult negotiations ahead.

There is also no denying how the leadership of the country has let us down; those in Government and politics, in the civil and regulatory services, in leadership in banking and business generally, in the church, in the professions, in the unions, i.e., the establishment in Ireland, the best educated, best paid and the most favoured in our society have done the most damage to the ordinary citizens to whom they have now passed on the financial burden.  As Lewis rightly points, in buying up the country from ourselves, using foreign money, we created a large part of this problem ourselves.

That is the story well told and those who were in charge at that time should be made accountable. We will have a change of Government shortly (it is election day to-day in fact) and perhaps some change in politics, the civil and regulatory services are being reformed, the Banks have effectively collapsed and been nationalised (with the exception of Bank of Ireland), the “I’ll join your board if you join mine” club mentality probably still exists in business and the church, the professions and the unions are hanging on but the cracks have appeared.

It seems to me that Lewis came to Ireland with a story in his mind and found what he was looking for. He had written a compelling piece on Greece and now with Ireland and Iceland it would make up a nice triumvirate of the weak. As my dad used to say, “all writing slants the way the writer leans” and Lewis leans into the “When Irish Eyes are Crying” view of the world. Catchy headline and perhaps not the author’s choice, nonetheless it reflects the tone of the article and may well suit the stereotypical image of Ireland for the audience who will read it.  

I like Lewis’s writings; I enjoyed Liar’s Poker (1989), Moneyball (2004) The Big Short (2009) and his most recent Vanity Fair article on Greece. Liar’s Poker was a rip-roaring read about the shenanigans in Salomon’s in the 1990’s, The Big Short a powerful expose of the cynical goings on Wall Street and the absolute incompetence of the rating agencies - the same guys who now reliably pontificate on Ireland’s credit worthiness - and the article on Greece was an entertaining and informative read about the problems facing Greece, a society and culture that gave us much of our modern philosophy and thinking on Government and society. But perhaps that is the problem, at least with these Vanity Fair articles; they are more about entertainment and information than they are about balanced critique. Why should I expect a balanced critique? Well because reality is more complex than Lewis suggests and there are things missing from his analysis which impact the reader’s ability to come to an informed understanding of the problem.

Lewis rightly asks “where’s the rage” but then doesn’t answer his own question? Was he hoping to find us like the Greeks out on the streets demanding change? Why has that not happened? Well maybe it will still happen. Maybe it should happen. Who knows, perhaps the Irish have just not got it yet. Perhaps years of being lead by colonial overlords, either the British or the Roman Church have made us overly compliant. I imagine that is part of it.

THERE IS HOWEVER ANOTHER VIEW and that is that the people of Ireland are taking a broadly mature response to the crisis which is in direct proportion to their immature response to the bubble. In this view we had a big party, we drank too much and we stayed out to late from which we now have an almighty hangover. The party started in the late 1990’s and we should have gone home in 2003 or 2004. Between 2004 and 2007 things really got out of control. And just when we would have liked to have some control over our interest rates and manage the money supply we experienced the disadvantage of being member of a centralised currency. Had we controlled our own rates we would likely have followed the British and the Australians and put our rates up. That would perhaps not have solved the problem but it would have helped.

It is also the case, not made by Lewis, that while the financial system in Ireland has been crippled, the economy has not and perhaps for that reason the social order has been maintained thus far. Maybe this is why we are different to Iceland and Greece. The vast majority of people in Ireland (86% of the workforce) are getting up every day and going to work and in some sectors, such as technology, there are more vacancies than there are qualified people to fill them. Hence while many are leaving Ireland for Australia and Canada, some others are coming here. Also Inbound Tourism, which has had a few terrible years, is improving and car sales for January have taken a leap. Perhaps this is just pent up demand but even if it is, it is still some evidence of a change in confidence. The overall economy has also started to gain ground again albeit slowly.

There is also another pulse in Ireland that Lewis did not pick up on his short visit in November and that is the energy associated with renewal – nothing like the feeling you get after a hangover when you commit to all sorts of improvements in the way you live your life.

It’s like there are two economies in Ireland, the old economy dominated by banks and property, by government, civil service and the traditional media and the new economy dominated by export driven international multinationals, technology, and entrepreneurs and social media. The former are bound to Ireland as a place of 4 ½ million and make all the noise, the later have few boundaries physical or psychological and are quietly getting on with what they do well.

It is perhaps also worth remembering Ireland is a very open and competitive economy. We are currently rated the 2^nd most globalised economy after Singapore. http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/ireland-ranked-as-2nd-most-globalised-economy-in-the-world-2511772.html. Just as we suffered with the world downturn we will get a lift as the world economy recovers. To get a flavour of some of the other more astonishing aspects of Ireland’s economy not highlighted by Lewis, see Ireland by the numbers in this short video. .

To be fair, if I dropped into Ireland for a short visit in November 2010 and had spoken to the people that Lewis spoke too, saw the Government in crisis, the debt markets closing to our bond issues, the huge rise in unemployment which would be even higher if it were not for the Irish emigrating and the Eastern Europeans returning home, and had recently written a similar article on Greece, I too would have heard the noise and penned the kind of article that Lewis wrote. If I stayed a little longer however and talked to some other people I might have learned more about the other economy in Ireland. I might have better understood why Ireland has a trade surplus, why the economy has returned to growth, how it’s very openness can impact its recovery, why multinationals continue to invest here, why Dublin is becoming a social media hub with Google, Facebook, Linkedin and Twitter. I would have included all that Lewis included but I would have also added something more. Such an article might have given Vanity Fair readers a more complete understanding of Ireland’s current reality than the one they will currently get from reading Lewis’s article “Why Irish eyes are crying”.

Edward Kelly

Ekelly11@gmail.com