Just realized a quick chat at a Denver coffee shop shifted my whole approach to partnerships

I was grabbing a coffee before a move and got talking to another owner who said, 'Stop treating your network like a rolodex and start treating it like a garden.' He meant you have to check in and help people even when you don't need a truck. Has anyone else had a simple piece of advice completely change how you connect?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_derek1mo ago

Totally get that. I started just texting people a cool article they'd like, no strings attached, and it changed everything.

ivanprice17d ago

That sounds nice in theory but it's not how the world works. I tried the no strings attached thing for a year and my social circle got smaller. People just took the articles and never gave back. A network needs some give and take to stay alive. If you don't keep a little score, you end up doing all the giving. It feels like a chore because it is one, but it's a necessary one.

rose_bailey401mo ago

Love the garden idea but that rolodex comparison feels a bit off to me. A rolodex is just a list, but a good network was never really that. It was always about the people. The shift for me was seeing every check in as its own thing, not just future help for me. It stopped being a chore when I stopped keeping score.