Relationships at Work: How to Authentically Network Within Your Company (Pt. 1)

Welcome to Readers, the podcast for the lifelong learner. Join us on our weekly dose of wisdom where we talk about the real-life lessons and applications of books. Enjoy! Welcome back to Readers, everyone. It has been a long, long time since our last episode, and unfortunately I've had to put the podcast on hiatus for a little bit because of my first semester of college. However, we are now back and ready to be much more regular with releases. So as you may have noticed since our last release, we are moving towards a lot more author interviews. So today we will be interviewing a very special guest, speaker, career coach, executive at AT&T, and the author of Relationships at Work: How to Authentically Network Within Your Company. Rachel Simon, welcome to the podcast. Would you like to introduce yourself?

Yes. Thank you so much for having me. And I know one thing we have in common is Hook 'Em Horns. Because I am a UT alum as well. A few years in between when I went and when you were there now, but we still have it in common. I am Rachel and I'm an executive at AT&T, which is one of the world's biggest companies. It's a telecommunication company, fiber, mobility, et cetera, for those of you not familiar. I've been with AT&T for 30 years and I've had just a beautiful career that has been very fulfilling. I've added a lot of value to the company, but the company's added a lot of value to me as well. I'm a wife to my husband, Jason, and the mom of two young adults that are in college as well.

Fantastic. So as an executive at AT&T, as well as a speaker and coach, you have quite literally written the book on building authentic relationships at work. Right. And as someone passionate about the world of organizational psychology like myself, I find your work really fascinating. A lot of times when I ask people who are working in high corporate settings or competitive environments such as yourself, a lot of them tend to find a lot of fulfillment in their relationships. But often people tend to keep their personal lives and their work lives separate. And from what I've seen, your book kind of blends the two. So without further ado, let's dive into part 1, which will be tips or chapters 1 through 6. Now, this book starts from the very beginning. One of the hardest parts about working a new job, an internship, or doing anything really is starting, right? And your first tip, introducing yourself when you're new, starts with a really great quote that I actually have written down here. Uh, "The comfort zone is a beautiful place, but nothing ever grows there." Now this is pretty cool. I mean, I thought this was really inspiring when you, when you wrote this, and I think it makes a lot of sense because going out of your comfort zone when you start a new job or when you embark on a new adventure is vital to, you you know, growing and meeting new people. And one of the first steps that you take out of your comfort zone when you start a new job is sending emails to the whole team. Now, can you talk a little bit about the reason behind that, what impact it has had on your professional and personal life, and why others should do it as well?

Sure. Yeah. Isn't that such a great quote about the comfort zone?

It is.

I love that one. And I remember that because sometimes we do get comfortable and we don't want to move on. We don't want to take on a new role, but that's how we grow. So yeah, so where did this tip come from? Well, early on in my career, I switched jobs with, with quite some frequency within AT&T, took on different laterals. Sometimes it was promotions, etc. And every time that I would start over in a new role, it would take me a while to figure out who does what. Oh, you do this, you do that. Okay, I get it now. And usually I would meet people too late, that I would meet them and say, oh, I wish I had met you 6 months ago when I was really stuck on that problem, or now I understand how our teams might interact. And then I realized, you know what, as I take on jobs with greater and greater responsibility, I'm expected to hit the ground running even faster. Is there a quicker way to realize who does what and to start to build those relationships? And I realized all I have to do is ask. And so now whenever I take on a new role, the very first thing that I do is I ask my boss, I ask my peers, I ask my team if I'm a supervisor. I'll say, who do I need to have a relationship with to be successful? It's as simple as that. And then I get a list of 6, 8, 10, 12 names, whatever it is, and I'll send a note. I'll title it Introduction, and I'll say, hi, you know, I, I'm new to this role. I understand our teams work closely together. I took over from my predecessor Debbie, whatever the case may be. Do you mind if I schedule 20 minutes for us to connect? Would just love to introduce myself, understand what you do. And I'm so glad that I take the time to do that upfront because then when there's a crisis, and there's always going to be a crisis, or I kind of consider it like a rainy day fund because it's going to rain. I already have that relationship. And when we need to dive into something, we've already met, we already know each other, we already know about each other's families, etc. So I do that from the outset and it really pays dividends when you have those relationships up front.

Yeah. And one of the things you met building on that email strategy in the next tip, you actually talk a lot about following up with those contacts, right? Because a lot of times We meet people at networking events or, you know, get-togethers and get their names, their numbers, their business cards and whatnot. But you can't really have a rainy day fund if you don't know that person and have followed up with them and they have a connection to you, right? So people often don't tend to follow up with their connections after they meet them the first time. And you give some examples of emails you sent out to colleagues, but I wanted to ask if you could expand on your strategy of following up with these newly made connections, because it's easy to meet somebody for the first time and, you know, say the typical, hey, Hey, here's my name, here's my job and what I like to do and whatnot, a few things about myself. But how do you really follow up with that person?

I am a massive introvert and people are always shocked to hear that because they mistake being friendly and cheerful, and I'm both, but they mistake that with being an extrovert and that's not it at all. It's where you draw your energy from. And so the big happy hours, the big ballrooms full of people, the big sessions titled networking sessions, I hate those things. I really hate those things. So how have I cultivated my network? It's literally been one person at a time. It's not been a happy hour at a time. It's not been a ballroom at a time. It's one person at a time. And so exactly like what you just said, one thing that makes me unique is that I will follow up with the contacts I make. So if I meet someone at a meeting and it seems like we have a connection or something in common or something we may be working on might overlap, I will follow up. I will send them a note and I'll say, hey, it was so great to meet you. I'm so glad Debbie introduced us. I'm so glad that, that Sal, you know, mentioned your name. Mind if I schedule some time for us to get some coffee? Mind if I schedule some time for us to chat? And so I will follow up anytime anyone introduces me. If they introduce me in the elevator, in the lobby, oh, okay, you're, you're, you're Joe. I've heard your name a million times. I'd love to get to know you a little bit better. I'm going to schedule some time. So those are the ways that I've built my network. Again, not happy hour at a time, even though I've, you know, had to do those. And I have a couple tips that I think we'll talk about later down the road about how to survive those kind of events. But when I have somebody that I have something in common with that I meet at a meeting, at a committee, at a, you know, like I said, at the elevator, the lobby, I will follow up.

Yeah. And, and you touched a little bit on those coffee times or those coffee chats that you had mentioned, and that's exactly what your next tip, tip 3, is about. And that's actually one of my favorites. Not just because I like coffee, but I think it makes a lot of sense. And this tip is a lot about arranging a lunch or a coffee, whether that's virtual or in person, but really just something that can turn a one-time meeting or a follow-up meeting into a ritual almost. And you bring up a story about asking your team to eat lunch together on your first week, which ended up turning into a ritual and, and made your coworkers into true friends. I mean, some of these people even ended up coming to your wedding, right? So from what your book says, these lunches don't just seem casual all the time, they seem very intentional, they seem planned. And as much as they're fun and I'm sure you enjoy having them, I love the idea, but I want to ask you how you turn such a casual interaction into a tool to create real depth in a professional relationship. What do you discuss? Do you keep it more personal? Do you keep it professional? Casual? Serious?

Yeah, so I go to lunch or coffee with someone just about every single day, just about every single day. And when people ask me how I have time for that, well, it, it's just something I build into my day. It's something that's important to me. I've already said I haven't built my network ballroom by ballroom. It's literally been one cup of coffee at a time. And so the story that you're hitting upon when people say, how did you start going to lunch? Well, it actually started by necessity because the first years of my career I worked in call centers and it wasn't the culture of the call center to go to lunch with anybody. We all took turns as managers going out to lunch, and I would just go through the drive-through and get something. And then about, let's see, 2 or 3 years into my career, I was at a headquarters-type environment, and I was clueless in this role. Clueless with a capital C. I had no idea how to do my role. I had done these supervisory call center roles, and now I was doing more of a policy headquarters-type job. And I found myself in my peers cubicles, we had cubicles back then, I found myself in the cubicles all the time asking questions. And I realized, I think I'm being really annoying. They're trying to work and I feel like I'm popping in all the time to ask questions. And then I realized, hmm, wonder if I could be a little bit sneaky about this and do it over lunch. And so I sent a note to the team, to all of my peers, and I said, hey, you know, I'm gonna go grab a bite to eat, it's a beautiful day. Anybody wants to meet by the elevator at 11:30, let's do it. And I was surprised that almost everybody did. And we all enjoyed it, and it just became kind of a ritual. And for the most part, a lot of people brought their lunch, and we would just kind of go outside and eat on the patio, which was really interesting in the Texas heat because I love the heat, and I made them eat outside still, and they would be sweltering in the, in the heat. Um, but it became an opportunity to not only get to know people personally and we chit-chat about our family and our vacation plans, but also I would ask them, what are you working on? And What obstacles are you hitting? And I was able to synthesize it with the kind of things that I'm working on. So that's how it all started. It was because I was clueless in my role. I didn't want to be annoying and in their cubicles every day, but I had this dedicated time every hour where I can ask questions about the kind of things I'm working on, see what they're working on, and get some advice. So that's how it started. And I realized that I was onto something, that it's really easy to communicate with someone when you're breaking bread, when you're, when you're having coffee together. And it just became something I incorporated when I move to my next job.

That's really cool. I didn't actually even know that. That's really interesting.

Yeah.

And this is really— one of my favorite parts about this book, I think, is because it goes in a very intentional order, right? How do you start a relationship from the ground? And then how do you build that deeper and deeper and deeper? And the fourth tip, which is building a relationship even deeper than these daily coffee chats and talking about things like that, is actually connecting over something other than work. And you mentioned that although talking or meeting over coffee is great, shared hobbies or activities can initiate even more depth. And one thing— this is something I've definitely found as well, whether that's from, you know, my high school basketball days or even from this first semester of college— is that people tend to open up a lot more when they're doing something or talking about something that they enjoy. And to emphasize this point, you bring up employee groups and your— or yeah, employee groups and your experience joining a club in college. Now, you mentioned your positive experience joining employee groups and stepping outside of your comfort zone to attend such events. And additionally, you also talk about your experience being a facilitator of such events. Now, I want to ask you, can you share a little bit about your experience being a participant and how that experience has shaped how you facilitate such events yourself?

Yeah, so the story that I, that I tell in the book, back in my UT days when I was a Longhorn, my first semester there I floundered. There was 50,000 students there. I was from out of state. I didn't know anybody. I didn't know how to meet people. I wasn't, I wasn't drowning, but I wasn't thriving either. I was just, I was just kind of there. And then my second semester I decided to join an organization and I joined a professional women's business organization. And so it took this big school of 50,000 and it, it shrunk it down to 100 people of people that I had something in common with. And that just made all the difference to my college experience that suddenly I had something in common with these women and we went on our journey together. And I think of it the same way inside the workplace as well. A big company like AT&T, for many of you that are listening, if you work for a big corporation, you probably have employee groups, or your resource groups, affinity groups, something where people have it in common, something in common. It could be a veterans group, it could be a faith-based group, etc. But even if you don't have something like that, it can be a book club, it could be a walking club. Here in my organization right now, we started a walking club that every 9:30, every day at 9:30, if you're interested, meet at the elevators and by 9:31 we leave. So we don't wait for anybody and just gives us an opportunity to walk and chat and get to know each other even better. So it's, it's really an opportunity to take your big company your big school, whatever it is, and shrink it down into something a little bit more manageable.

Sure, that makes a lot of sense. And, you know, although, although all of these things are great, right, talking and meeting over coffee, shared hobbies, activities, and everything is great, but I've all— I've been— I was thinking about this the whole time, and you brought it up in tip 5. I can introduce myself, I can follow up with people, drink coffee, find things in common, and more, but This doesn't all just come with asking, right? It takes the other person being interested in you as well as, as well as you being interested in them in order for them to invest in a meaningful relationship. Right now, the big question that arises is how do you become someone that others want to meet, network, and build a relationship with? You mentioned that one of the reasons people look forward to working with you is because you're easy to work with. You always have your work done on time, you answer emails promptly, and you're a good team player. Right? And this is easy to say, but it's very difficult to do. Even you mentioned that this was not always the case early on in your career. The biggest change you mentioned that you made to grow in this ability was, as you put it, networking within your network. And this is one of the biggest topics that you talk about within this chapter. Can you explain a little bit about what this concept means to you and how it's helped you become someone people look forward to working with?

Yeah. Isn't that so simple? When people say, Rachel, what's your secret to success? I've given it a lot of thought because I've been asked so many times, and it's so unrelevatory to say, I'm just easy to work with. When people hear that I'm going to be on their team or on their committee or on their project, I think their eyes light up. I say, oh yeah, yeah, Rachel, she's pretty good. She, she knows her stuff. She comes prepared. She, she'll do what she says she's going to do. She has a nice personality. And I hate to say that that is so groundbreaking, but we oftentimes work with a lot of people that Don't do that. Even in school, you probably come across people like that. If it's a team— if it's a teamwork and they don't do what they're supposed to do. I'm diverging here for a second, but my daughter who's in college, she told me something that made me laugh so hard. She said, when I die, I want my group project members to be my pallbearers so they can let me down one last time. I thought that was funny. So, yeah. So be the kind of person that is easy to work with. And so I, I transition that story into my tip of networking through your network, that we all know someone who knows someone. We all do. It's kind of like that Kevin Bacon game where you can associate him with any actor or actress in Hollywood with 6 degrees of separation. Same thing with your school, your classes, your company. And so if there's somebody that I need to work with that I have no idea anybody over there, I'll just ask my network. I'll say, hey, do you know anybody working on this real estate project? Do you know anybody working on this finance, um, project? Project, etc. And within 6 degrees of separation, I'll get to the right, to the right person. But again, you have to be the kind of person that people want to make introductions for, that you, you know, if they're putting their reputation behind you, it could even be a referral for a job or something like that. Make sure that you're the kind of person that people want to work with and will follow through.

Yeah, I think that's one of the biggest strengths about being a part of such a big community or a company or an organization. And as somebody who went to a very small high school such as myself, I mean, now I'm at UT, right, with over 50,000 students, like you mentioned. This has really been one of my biggest culture shocks as well, right? How less catered to I am now than I was back in high school. From a school where the kids, the teachers all knew my name, to a place where I'm defined by my initials and a set of 5 numbers that, you know, it's a little bit, it's a little bit cold. And this is what you talk about a little bit in your 6th tip. You mentioned that bringing this aspect of personalization brings a touch of warmth to a relationship. And I think this is really appropriate because, you know, the Christmas and this New Year's just passed and it's crazy to think we're in 2025, but every year we receive these, you know, these holiday cards or these New Year cards and they're like, wow, this is what your family looks like this year. You know, but everybody gets the same one. Uh, most people enjoy getting such holiday cards from family and friends, but you know, like I just said, at the end of the day, every card is the same. Uh, and although it may not be possible to send personalized cards or emails to every single friend, family member, and co-worker on every holiday, you mentioned the importance of writing a small note with important cards or emails, adding a sticker or a joke to the message, basically personalizing it and making people feel recognized. Now, this emphasis on personalization really resonates with me, especially in a world where a lot of these interactions often feel transactional, right? But I want to ask you, how does one incorporate this aspect of personalization into such interactions or holiday cards or letters to really create those genuine connections without feeling overwhelmed? After all, I mean, it's not possible to personalize every card you send to every person.

No, and you don't have to. So the, the tip is about sending holiday greetings. Now remember, it doesn't say winter holiday greetings, so it doesn't have to be just Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, whatever the case may be. It could also be a Mother's Day greeting. It could be a happy graduation, happy birthday. And so you don't have to personalize it to the nth degree. In other words, when I send out my, um, New Year's cards, I typically say the same thing to most people, not all people, but here's what I'm up to these days. I surely appreciate our friendship, and I'm grateful for the help you've provided me. A little bit of a variation on it, but I don't have to come up with a whole new paragraph every time that I'm reaching out to someone. It's the same sentiment. I might add a little bit of personality of, gosh, we survived that project working on it in 2024. Or I'm really looking forward to doing XYZ in 2025. So I might personalize it like that, but I don't overthink it. If I overthink it, that's where I would get paralyzed and then I wouldn't do it. But don't let good be the opposite of perfect. Sometimes it's just good, you know, to, to get them done.

Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing that. I, I think that's a very important thing to remember because, you know, a lot of times people want to, you know, make others feel special and recognize them. They also don't want to feel overwhelmed, but I think you find a really good happy medium in the book, and I highly recommend reading it just because of the fact that you have a lot of these really good examples and emails and, you know, personal recommendations that you've wrote in there. And I think that can be very useful to a lot of people who face very similar issues.

Yeah, and it makes you feel good if it's personalized a little bit. For instance, when it's your birthday, there's like a good, better, best. Right? It's, it's, it's good if you get a text from someone that says happy birthday. That's wonderful that they thought of you, right? It's even better if they say, hey, happy birthday. I've really, you know, enjoyed our time we spent together. And best would be happy birthday. You know, you've meant so much, especially that advice you gave me XYZ. Right? So there's like even a good, better, best. How would it make you feel? Because when, when done properly, networking makes people feel really good. And the, the goal is to, to make people feel good.

For sure. I'm definitely going to remember that. And you know what, in the next episode that we record together, I'm going to let you know what progress I've made on these lessons.

Oh, I'm excited about that.

That's good. But as for today, this chapter marks the end of part 1. And today we've learned the value of a lot of things. We've learned the value of taking the first step to introduce yourself, to follow up on initial conversations. We've also learned the importance of creating rituals to meet with people, whether that's over coffee, lunch, or even a Zoom meeting. Uh, we discussed how to be the kind of people people want to network with, as well as networking within your network, utilizing such a big community that you may be part of to, you know, meet new people and, and gain new strengths. And finally, we discussed the value of personalization and making people feel seen, because at the end of the day, you know, there's 8 billion people on this planet, but every single one of them wants to be seen. So I just want to thank you so much for your time, Miss Simon. I really enjoyed our conversation.

Thank you, I did too. You're very talented at asking questions, so very—

I appreciate it. And, and a big thank you to all of our listeners who are somehow still here after my long break. Uh, we'll see you next time, and until then, keep on growing, keep on changing, and keep on learning. We'll see you next time.