Building One's Professional Network

How to Build Your Network
By Uzzi and Dunlap
Harvard Business Review
December 2005, p 53
A means by which to think-through and plan one’s professional network is presented in this article.  The key thoughts are:

• Sharing knowledge, not hording it, actually increases the value of it


• “The best way to have a good idea is to have a lot of ideas”—Linus Pauling;  individual success is tied to being able to think in an interdisciplinary manner; diverse network ties are therefore vital to being innovative and competitive


• Most personal networks are highly clustered around one’s friends and associates, with many in the network already knowing one another; this is the self-similarity principle


• Create a table of who you know, who introduced you, and who you introduced them to; this will show you whether you have diversity in your network, and who your network brokers [see below] are


• The proximity principle, which holds that people tend to populate their network with those that they spend the most time with, may be overcome by applying the shared activities principle, leading one to thoughtfully join community, voluntary, service, sports, boards, charitable organizations, etc., so as to expand the circles of networking


• Identify your brokers or superconnectors—those who tend to introduce you to many others—and nurture those very key relationships

Fund Event in January; Pricing in March

Hedge Fund Incubation and Seeding Conference
an FRA LLC conference
January 30-31, 2005
Harvard Club, NYC
FRA does a very good job with their events, and they always enable networking and dialogue.
www.frallc.com


Pricing Strategies and Tactics
Northwestern Kellogg
March 12-15, 2006
It was years ago since I attended this, but they did a great job with case studies and current examples. By the end of the session I think we all had a better philosophy and ruleset for pricing, but not necessarily a lot of useful frameworks.
execed.Kellogg.northwestern.edu

Principles of Leadership

7 Principles of Leadership
by Mark H. Willes
Marriott School Alumni Magazine
BYU
Fall 2005, p 22
These are timeless thoughts on how to lead, and good reminders for us all.

1. Leaders must lead. Don’t assume that the problem is poor followership or poor skills of the team. The problem is often solved by just replacing the leader.


2. Leaders focus. Simply focus on what you do best (and not just fixing what you do poorly.)


3. Leaders set high standards. Set the goal so high that you’ll have to do things differently to reach it.


4. Leaders empower others. Think globally but act locally. Let those close to the issues make their own decisions.


5. Leaders kindle passion. People will work for money but will only die for a cause.


6. Ethics: Little things matter a lot. Small slips will eventually magnify into large problems.


7. Always give more than expected. Meet the promise and then exceed it.