Our guidance how ensure your relationships work for you; keeping them warm.

The Career Tools measure of how well you’re keeping up with your relationships is simple. If you were to move, and your contact were to move, would you still be able to reach them?

If the answer is no – you don’t have a frequent enough interaction to get warning that they’d be moving, or you don’t have the kind of contact information which would follow their move, or the kind of network that would find them after they’ve moved, your relationships are not working for you.

What to do?

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Examples of what to say when you’re ‘staying in touch’.

The ‘How To Build Your Network’ cast is Wendii’s Most Important Cast. When asked why, she said, because everything we ever say always comes back to having a strong network. Whether it’s a new job, or how to do something, or support for your idea, having relationships within and without your organization is essential to your success.

We often get asked though, ‘what do I say?’. And in this cast, we’re going to give you some examples, so you know exactly what to say.

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This guidance completes our discussion on how to handle your lunch hour.

This may not make sense to a lot of folks, us talking about how to eat lunch. But the fact is, we all do it almost every day at work. If you do take a full hour, that's roughly 10% or maybe even 15% of your day as a manager or professional. That's a huge part of everyone's day. But, for many of us, our approach to it is rooted in how we had lunch at home as kids, or in school. That makes no sense for the busy professional today.

Suppose your boss takes a 45 minute lunch break most days between 1230 and 115. Should you eat then too, or eat at a different time? Should we eat a big meal, or a small one? I'm so busy…should I work through lunch, at my desk?

In a way, lunch at work is like email: we learned how to eat before we became professionals, and we learned how to communicate before we started doing email. And in both cases we probably have some bad habits worth pruning.

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This guidance describes how to handle your lunch hour.

This may not make sense to a lot of folks, us talking about how to eat lunch. But the fact is, we all do it almost every day at work. If you do take a full hour, that's roughly 10% or maybe even 15% of your day as a manager or professional. That's a huge part of everyone's day. But, for many of us, our approach to it is rooted in how we had lunch at home as kids, or in school. That makes no sense for the busy professional today.

Suppose your boss takes a 45 minute lunch break most days between 1230 and 115. Should you eat then too, or eat at a different time? Should we eat a big meal, or a small one? I'm so busy…should I work through lunch, at my desk?

In a way, lunch at work is like email: we learned how to eat before we became professionals, and we learned how to communicate before we started doing email. And in both cases we probably have some bad habits worth pruning.

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This cast gives a guide balancing your professional countenance with your community relationships.

A few weeks ago on our Facebook page, we asked: what are you doing to use your professional skills to improve your community? Many people posted about the projects they were involved with from working with children to marketing for non-profits.

We absolutely support all your efforts to improve your communities. And, there are some cautions about your behaviors which prevent problems in both your professional and your community efforts.

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This cast concludes our discussion on a framework for looking at where you need to develop internal relationships.

In our Build A Network cast, we told you that more relationships were better and to develop relationships with people indiscriminately. That guidance still stands. But whether you’re new in your organization, or you recognize that you don’t have the depth of relationships you need, the whole organization is a big target. This cast will help you narrow down where you want to direct your energies.

Equally, this cast will help you assess how good your network is. We’re going to give you a framework to put your current relationships in. Once you’ve done that, the gaps will be clear – and so will the relationships you need to develop.

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This cast gives a framework for looking at where you need to develop internal relationships.

In our Build A Network cast, we told you that more relationships were better and to develop relationships with people indiscriminately. That guidance still stands. But whether you’re new in your organization, or you recognize that you don’t have the depth of relationships you need, the whole organization is a big target. This cast will help you narrow down where you want to direct your energies.

Equally, this cast will help you assess how good your network is. We’re going to give you a framework to put your current relationships in. Once you’ve done that, the gaps will be clear – and so will the relationships you need to develop.

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This cast helps you word your request to your network for help with looking for a new opportunity.

Recently we were asked how a member should let his network know that he was looking for a new position. In his case, the company he worked for was about to announce a Chapter 7 bankruptcy and so would cease to exist in the near future. Some of you will be in similar situations where it's easy to be candid. Others will need to keep your search confidential. In either case, we're going to tell you what to do and what to say.

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This cast gives our guidance on developing your career using your network.

It seems like in every cast we record, we talk about the importance of building your network. We talk about how your network can help you with problems, get you a mentor and help you find a new job. We've told you how to build your network by being indiscriminate and adding everyone, and then, importantly, KEEPING IN TOUCH with them.

But how can you develop your career on a day-to-day basis by using your network? This cast tells you how.

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This cast concludes our conversation on LinkedIn and what it means for Managers.

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