Networking That Works (Without Being Awkward or Cringe)

Today I want to talk about one of the biggest pain points I hear from folks in our community, which is networking. People get really worked up about networking and they treat it like it's cold calling or it's inauthentic or pushy, or they're really scared that people are going to judge them. All kinds of emotions come up around networking and that's really normal. In this episode, I want to break down a different approach that feels more authentic and feels more comfortable for those of us who really struggle with networking, frankly. So a couple of pain points I want to address in this Feeling uncomfortable or stuck when it comes to networking not knowing how to start a conversation without feeling weird or pushy Struggling to turn networking into actual job opportunities Difficulty maintaining connections without feeling like it's over asking or feeling like your networking is transactional. If any of these things feel true for you, you're in the right place. So stay tuned for this episode. Karina I'm Karina Klingman, scientist turned CEO of a talent strategy consulting firm. I've helped over 85 biotechs hire and develop thousands of amazing employees. So I know what works and what doesn't work when it comes to landing a job and then excelling in it. I created the Biotech Career Coach Podcast to give you simple, actionable, step by step strategies to help you land your dream biotech job, then move up the career ladder. If you are exploring career paths, looking to learn about biotech, or simply striving to be the type of person who makes an impact and gets promoted in the right place, all right. Most biotech professionals treat networking like cold calling and they are terrified of it. Most people don't enjoy cold calling, which is why most people are not salespeople and those of us in biotech overwhelmingly are not salespeople. So it feels very uncomfortable to start networking conversations with random people we don't know. However, some people are able to treat it like like actually building connections that just might happen possibly maybe someday in the future to lead to an opportunity. And those people tend to be a little bit more successful and feel more comfortable. So today I'm going to walk you through a networking system that actually works. For those of us who are not super comfortable with networking, it's not going to feel scammy, it's not going to feel awkward. You are going to learn a strategic and human approach that builds real relationships and gets you in front of hiring managers. Maybe not today, but in the future. The first thing I really want to emphasize is that networking is not an instant on, off switch. Like you're not networking so you don't get jobs. And then the next day you do some networking and bam, you get jobs. That's not how networking works. It's really playing the long game. And so I like to paint a picture of a piggy bank. If you drop your spare change in the piggy bank every single day, it doesn't feel like a lot at first. You might have a couple of pennies in there. If you deposit pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters in that piggy bank every single day in the future, that's a lot of money. So you're really banking toward that future network. And that's what networking is. You have to work at it every day, you have to maintain it, you have to cultivate it and nurture it, and then someday it's going to bloom into a really lovely flower. But that doesn't happen overnight. So I want to talk about that in terms of a mindset shift. People come into the community or into my coaching programs and they say they've been networking, they've been asking for jobs, and nobody's giving them jobs. Asking for jobs is not what networking is about. And in fact, that is a huge turnoff. I can't tell you how many messages I get every single day from random people around LinkedIn that don't introduce themselves in any meaningful way and just immediately ask me for a job. Because I happen to be a recruiter. So I'm a recruiter. I kind of expect that that's fine. However, I do know that they are also asking other people in their network in that same very transactional, kind of uncomfortable way. And I really would love to eliminate that. It's not great, it's not a good look and it's not gonna work for you. It is more important to build meaningful relationships and then later on, perhaps those meaningful relationships result in jobs. So I also want to take just a quick moment to acknowledge that most scientists, including me, are introverts. It kind of goes with the territory. I do meet a lot of great extroverted scientists and I am always in awe of them. But this is really hard for most people. So if I'm dumped into a room of people I don't know to network, I am not great at it. Networking is scary and it's hard. And for you introverts, I feel that. So I'm going to give you some introvert friendly techniques that I tend to use. Also, as scientists, we are extremely curious people and that is your networking superpower. So I would love to see people shift their mindset from trying to go get jobs through networking to instead just trying to learn about other people through networking. And what I find in our community, we have these great things called career chats. We bring in people just to talk about their careers and their winding paths. And I get such great questions from our community in those. I know you genuinely want to learn about other people and their jobs, and that's really interesting, right? If you see somebody in a job that maybe you'd like to do someday, don't you want to know how they got there? What was their path like? What are all the things that happened to them along the way? What's the good, the bad, the ugly? What drove them to make that decision? Do they like it? Do they regret it? All those things are genuine points of curiosity that you can leverage as data so that you can decide maybe you do want to follow in their footsteps, maybe you don't. But either way, if you have a conversation like that with somebody, you have made a genuine connection. And that genuine connection may eventually lead to a great opportunity. But before you start reaching out to perfect strangers on LinkedIn, think about who you already have in your network, who you already know. Maybe it was somebody who graduated from your school a few years ahead of you and now they're doing a cool job. Maybe it is somebody from your lab that has now gone and done something differently. Maybe it's a research associate that went into a totally different field. There are so many people that you know, and maybe you're not yet connected to them on LinkedIn. So make a list of those people, go track them down, connect on LinkedIn and ask them for a chat. And here is how you do that. I'm going to be providing all of these scripts in our community. So just listen. You don't have to take notes. I'm going to be throwing out a lot of scripts in this episode. Don't worry, I have them for you. Just join the free community and you can grab them. If I were reaching out to a former colleague, we're going to call her Amy. Here's how I would do it. I would go on LinkedIn, I would send that connection request with a note and I would say, hey, Amy, it's been a while. I'm so excited that you have a cool job at XYZ Company. I'd love to reconnect and learn about your transition. Can I buy you a virtual coffee? And that little short, sweet note is of genuine connection. You're reconnecting with no ask, except that you're just curious what's happened since you last were together. I want you to note that I offered to buy a virtual coffee. You're going to hear that over and over in this episode. I think that's a really nice touch. Most people will never take you up on actually buying the coffee, but offering means that you're giving something. It's not just that you're asking for their time, you're also offering to host them for a coffee. It's the same as if you ran into a friend and you're like, hey, can I buy you a coffee? Let's catch up. It feels very nice. It feels very genuine and personal. And if they take you up on the networking conversation, make the offer again. Say something like, what's your favorite coffee shop? And you know, send them a Starbucks gift certificate. If they say yes, nine times out of 10, they're going to say, don't worry about it. I'd love to just catch up. Sometimes you might have to shell out $10 to buy that virtual coffee. And it is worth way more than $10, I promise you that. So make the offer. It feels very genuine and, and expect that maybe 1 in 10 people are going to ask you to buy that coffee for them, and that's okay. One of our community members has had a lot of great success using this networking strategy to then continue to build momentum in networking. So during the coffee chats that he was having with his former colleagues and friends, each time he asked for a referral to somebody else. So let's say they were talking about a really cool career path that one of his former colleagues went into. He might end the call with, this was so great. Is there anyone else that you think I should talk to about this career path and wait for and get the warm introduction to that other person? This is one way to grow your network really authentically without feeling scammy. And those warm introductions to brand new people that you've never met feel really good and genuine. So I urge you to take advantage of that little strategy. I think that's genius. All right, so what if you are on the job trail and you're applying for jobs? Here is a company targeted networking strategy that you can use to grow your network within a company, especially companies that you're targeting for potential roles. Now, this is best used before you need it. So again, this is not something where you flip a switch and then immediately you have offers to help you get employed at that company. In an ideal world, you would have built this network about six to nine months before you need it. However, we don't live in an ideal world, so feel free to use the strategy anytime. And once you're securely employed, you're in your new role always. Just think about your next steps. It doesn't hurt to jump onto LinkedIn a couple of times a week and continue networking in this way to build your network into new companies so that next time you're on the job market, or if you're thinking that, okay, maybe my next step is this other company or this type of company, you've already built out a really good network that you have in your corner before you need it. So here is the strategy. Instead of just randomly connecting with people across the industry, you're going to build a targeted list of companies and then systematically connect with people at each one. And the people you're going to connect with are going to be the colleagues that you would work with in that company. So these would be people at the same level as you, maybe a level or two higher and a level or two lower. You're not going to be targeting the founder of the company or the C suite. You're going to be targeting people around the job that you'd be doing and also ideally around the function you'd be doing. So a great example is if you are an analytical development scientist, you may connect with senior scientists, scientists, principal scientists, research associates, and sort of keep your sphere to those people you'd rub shoulders with in that role. Now, in terms of function, you might look for people in analytical process development, even R and D people in commercialization and cmc. Those individuals are people that you would directly interact with in that analytical development role. So think about the people, the other functions that you'd work with, and then look for folks that are at that level in those functions and make a list of those folks. Then what you're going to do is reach out to those people with a really simple networking strategy. We're going to reach out in this example to someone named Joe, and he is a process development scientist at AbbVie. So the strategy is to find common ground, compliment them, and ask for that coffee chat. So I might say something like, hey, Joe, I see you also did a PhD in molecular biology and now you're in process development. I'm considering a shift like that myself and I'm curious if I could buy you a virtual coffee to learn about how that went for you. That little script is really wildly successful because people love to help other people. So you're Asking for a favor. It's not a big favor, but to share his experience. And during that coffee chat, you are not going to ask for anything that has to do with any jobs. You are just going to learn. You're going to ask everything about his job, his experience, the pluses and minuses, all the things he navigated to get there. And you can also ask about the company as well. So you can seed questions in there about how AbbVie's teams work cross functionally. You're currently an analytical scientist. Does he work with a lot of analytical scientists in his role? How does that work? The answer is going to be yes, but he's going to tell you how that works in that particular company. When you are all done with the call and you're signing off, first of all, ask for a referral for another person that you should speak with. And I would say thank you so much for sharing. This has been incredibly helpful. I'm actually really excited about AbbVie and I wasn't sure I would be because it's a bigger company than I've typically targeted. Maybe I'll start to look for jobs there and let you know if I see anything that sounds interesting. So you've just sort of planted a seed. You're not asking for anything, you're just thinking for the experience and then you're saying, I'm going to look. Let me see. Now here's the key. Later on, if you do find a role that looks great at Abbvie and you want to go and apply, you can then reach out to Joe and you can say, hey, I just wanted to thank you again for all of the great insight you gave me. I did get really excited about AbbVie after learning about it. So I found a job that looks great. I'm going to apply for XYZ position. Do you have any tips for me? So you're not asking for anything but tips at that point. And here is the kicker. Most companies offer a monetary reward for their employees referring people into jobs. So if Joe liked you and thinks you might be a good fit, Joe just might say, hey, I can actually refer you into that job. Let's see your resume. That is the strategy. So again, it's not overnight. It takes some time, ideally six to nine months or longer. I mean, if you had a coffee chat like that three years ago, you could still leverage it. But these sorts of really nice connections build over time and the referrals you get from these connections are great. So when you're talking to Joe, maybe You ask for a referral from a different company and say, it's been great to hear about your experience at AbbVie. Have you worked with anybody else in the past? That might be a great reference for me to learn about how this works in a different company, a smaller company, a larger company, whatever that is, and get that referral so that now you're networking into multiple companies at once. The bottom line here is to lead with curiosity and during these types of coffee chats, not to talk very much. Your goal is to let them talk for 80% of the time. And I'm going to actually talk about that at the end of the podcast and how we can accomplish that. Another great way to network is to volunteer, and there are so many great organizations around that connect biotech professionals. I think of Women in Bio as one that I've volunteered with in the past, but there are so many. So if you are attending some sort of a networking function, if you can actually start to volunteer for that group, you're going to find it a lot easier to network. And especially as an introvert. Here's the thing. When I was volunteering for Women in Bio, I was a committee chair. And so when I'd go to these events, people needed things from me and they were coming up to me and I had things to talk to them about that weren't weird and awkward, like they were actually business items that we had to handle for that committee. And then that gave me such a good, deep network of friends and peers that the networking events honestly weren't very intimidating anymore. Even though I didn't know a lot of people there, suddenly I was in demand. I was somebody that people needed things from. And so as an introvert, that is a lot easier for me to deal with. So my advice always for people who are really nervous about in person networking events is be a volunteer, jump on a committee, be an organizer. It really is incredibly effective. It gets you out of your bubble and it possibly is something you can use on your resume, depending on what you're volunteering for. These types of skills like project management, communications, all of these can be great things to go on your resume during maybe a career gap that you're experiencing. All right, I talked a little bit about allowing the other person to do most of the talking. This is key when you're having a networking call, a coffee chat, I call them. You want the other person to feel really special. And people enjoy talking about themselves. They love helping people, they love sharing their experience. So if you get that, yes to a Coffee chat, you need to know how to lead the conversation such that you are doing more listening and they are doing more talking and they will leave that conversation feeling like it went incredibly well and they were very helpful to you and they genuinely will have been. So if you are ready to have one of these chats, you must pre plan, really get out in front of it by writing down some questions for them. And again, if you jump into the community, I'm going to give you all of these outlines so that you can do this really quickly. I already talked about asking them about their career path, the pros and cons, all of that. Here's some other questions that you can ask. What surprised you most when moving from previous role to current role? If someone were starting in your role today, what would you tell them they'd be doing the most in the first 30 days? A follow up question to that is what is the most impactful thing they do in the first 30 days? If you were me targeting your role, what two skills would you double down on in the next six months? So these questions do a few things. First of all, they're specific so they're really easy for them to answer. They show you've done your homework and really care and they give the other person a chance to share their expertise, which again, people love to do. So your job is just to listen and take notes and follow up on the interesting threads. Following up on networking is something that people get really nervous about as well. And me too, I get it. You send out a note and you don't hear back and then you think like, oh, they hate me. That's not the case often just people are really busy so. So you can follow up if you've sent out a networking request that's gone unanswered. And often this happens because someone will accept your LinkedIn request but not reply to that note. And so you're thinking, okay, what do I do now? If that happens to you, simply give them a little nudge. So a simple little nudge might sound like, hi Sarah, I'm surfacing this in case it fell through the cracks. If email is easier, I'm happy to send you an email to follow up. And if you are connected with them on LinkedIn now, you do have their email address, so that's totally possible. Just short, light, no guilt trip, easy breezy. If you've had a coffee chat and you just want to keep that momentum going, keep in touch with them, you can just periodically send a quick little note with something interesting. So if you saw a press release from their company. That's a great way to keep that conversation alive. Google Alerts makes this really easy, so set a few alerts for companies where you're having these coffee chats. So any news that comes up, you can quickly just send out a little hey, saw the press release on XYZ. Congrats. Or I saw the LinkedIn announcement about XYZ. It sounds like you're making big moves. Just little touch points, Nothing big. Easy breezy again. And I just want to close by saying that the momentum here is big. If you do this daily, just a couple of little touch points, you're going to build a habit for networking and that habit is going to serve you really well in your career. And it means you're going to get a giant LinkedIn network of people that are willing to help you next time you need help. It might result in a job right now, but most likely it's going to result in more consistent job leads in the future. So little consistent actions are going to build that momentum. Try and track them however you like to track habits. I personally am a notion user, so that's where I would do it. But put a little tracker together and give yourself a little goal, an attainable goal, maybe five networking outreaches per day and those could include the follow ups and the little touch points if you see a press release or something like that. But try and get yourself out there. If you are on the job market, try and aim a little bit higher. If job seeking is your job right now, spend an hour a day working on building your network and aim to have two to three coffee chats per week with interesting people. That's really going to move the needle for you. I really hope this makes networking just a little bit less scary. And again, come grab the scripts from me. When you turn things around and you think of networking as actual human connection, it really gets a lot easier. So again, come into the community, grab the scripts and get support from people who are also doing this right now. Doing it together makes it a lot less scary. All right, I'll see you in there. Thanks so much for listening to the Biotech Career Coach Podcast by the Collaboratory Career Hub. Join our school community to get access to support resources and materials and be sure to connect with me on LinkedIn. When you connect with me on LinkedIn, you get instant access to my entire network of biotech folks, which is powerful for your career. 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