Networking politness in business appointments

Some days ago, one of my friends was visibly upset, he told me that it was his second time that had been dumped at a business appointment. He had planned the meeting, now for a second time, and asked some people to be at the restaurant and without any explanation his date didn't show up, neither she sent a message. How would you reacted?

Communication in this type of situations is really important, everyone can have a mishap, but there are some politeness rules that you should not forget to follow, it doesn't matter the environment you are, either business or social.

Rule 1: If you think that your date is not going to be interesting, don't make a commitment in the first place. Is possible that the person is really interested in asking you to go the meeting, have you being asked to those presentations of vacation share times? Did anyone want you to buy an insurance? Maybe you understand my point. You shall say no to this type of commitments, but if you have given your word and accepted the appointment, you have to be there. Then you will find a way to retract or not buy the product, but you have to be there.

Rule 2: If you have an alibi, like you have a flat tire, or a minor accident, then take a little time and tell your contact that you will be late. There are some cultures around the world that don't accept delays, like the Germans. Latins are really flexible on times, but an hour delay its considered disrespectful.

Rule 3: If you have canceled a first appointment, a second one is seen like a totally lack of interest. If a customer cancels you on the first time, and you are interested in the selling, you will be tempted to ask for a second date, but if your customer misses the second appointment, then you should consider that maybe he will be not as good customer as you think, probably he is not into the product, maybe he is a "bad payer" or maybe he is just a not commiter. Don't give your suppliers this idea, always take your phone and take care of the situation. Leave behind a professional image.

Remember the courtesy and networking are fundamental pillars to personal relations, job or social. Consider always the people you are interacting with, when you have to cancel a date. Can you share some experience on this matter?

In Memoriam Networking

This post is dedicated to Alfredo Moreno Ricart, an excellent friend and peer since my college studies.

Death is something we know eventually come, but we don't expect to receive this type of news from someone that young. I heard first from the chat our generation has since several months ago. On the social networks the thankful notes and friendship tokens were plenty. The first reaction of my college friends were from disbelief, then we start asking tor confirmations and at the end we started to express our condolences.

As a group of managers, the proposals about the different things we could do to express our admiration keep flowing. We propose to organize a Mass at Monterrey, go to the memorial in Reynosa, and send an obituary to a newspaper.

While writing the message to Alfredo make us remember the best times we had with him. We share some photos and memories. Thanks to Elena coordination and the comments of the people at the chat we could made the publishing.

Personally I want to share that my last contact with Alfredo was related to a post that I publish back in April, "Petworking". I send him an inbox asking him to share me some of this Zoo pictures. He answered me back and I like to share with you the last words he send me, so you can imagine the great human being he was.

"Goodbye's are part of life, sometimes it's necessary to say goodbye and leave a memory about us before leaving, "

When a friend leaves

Paty, my friend, get a job promotion and now she is working abroad. This week we had a farewell meal and share one of this moments with her. Networking in this occasions is important as well as the ones that stayed as for the ones that leave.

When you know a person that will work abroad you may have a lot of questions on how you will maintain contact or how you'll be keeping your friendship. Good news, social networks allow us to stay in touch and be aware of the people that we care about.

With all this changes for sure your friend will be busy, but you can stay in touch, giving likes to her facebook or instagram status, you may follow her Twitter comments or look out her pines at Pinterest. After the first month rush, her life will take order and you may give her some advice on where or what places she can visit. Give her time, don't get angry if at the beginning she doesn't keep in touch, probably is getting her life arranged.

If you are the one that makes changes, tell your friends about the stress you are having because the mayor change in your life. Ask them for a little patience if you aren't aware about their lives as you may do it before and take some time every day to speak with at least one or two friends, they probably be thankful about your time share and get some attention from your friends.

Make the most from this new experience, make it fun, if you are new on the place where you live, become a life watcher... learn by observation the culture, times, interaction, social rules and courtesy, and then share them to your social network, maybe it will be easier that you feel some sympathy and closeness, by learning how to make new friends.

Networking at moments of truth

Have you experienced a bad attitude when you ask for some information? The past week one of our candidates left visibly upset after having interaction at one of our service points. We couldn't help him at that moment, and the next day I have to take care about the situation. The conflict management is one tough but excellent opportunity to do Networking:

First: Get all the evidence and information about the client you are about to contact. The most information on when he arrived, from where, by which mean he attended our service point, what information he was seeking, everything that can help to give your potential customer information.

Second: You have to plan a strategy, if the information is about your products, maybe you have just to translate the message to be appealing to the candidate and then explain him the information.

Third: Do the contact, by phone or asking for a personal meeting. I wouldn't recommend to send an email, because your customer is angry and now it's your opportunity to repair the damage. Maybe ask him for a 15 minutes call so he can explain his doubts.

Fourth: Before you ask him about why it made him upset, tell him that you noticed there where some aspects of the information given that kept without an answer, and that the call is to explain a little bit more the information.

Our candidate wasn't that much upset, and he showed a little surprised and thankful for the follow up. He told me that there were some questions that haven't been answered and gave me some recommendations on how to train people to avoid this type of incidents on the future.

And you, have you had some of this moments of truth solved in a different way?

Vacation Networking

Have you ever spoken with your taxi, bus or tour driver? I don´t mean conversations on take me to here or there, have you take some time asking things about the city you are visiting?

I went on vacations and had the opportunity to take a city tour. On the trip, the driver ask me to get for her some water bottles that will be handed in. She told me that I was really nice to her, I just thought it should be the famous Mexican hospitality, it wasn't a big deal.

When the tour ended, the driver get us to the hotel, and she decided to "return the favor" by explaining us how the city has been planed, and the logic behind the letters and numbers on each street, that allow us to move easier on the city center.

Consideration 1: Be kind with the personnel that serves you, it could be on benefit at some point. The people will feel the need to support you on the same way and in several occasions it will be of help for your visits to the places you haven't been before.

At the end of my trip, I ask for a taxi, and chat a little with the driver, he resulted to be foreigner and he liked to speak with his clients, he thought that inside an office he wasn't getting as much people contact. He came from an African country named Eritrea, maybe there are a lot of people that know this country, but in my case I didn't knew it. I struggled a little to understand where this country was placed, the economic activities, the commercial activities and the type of government it had.

Samuel was really kind to explain and tell me about his country. Furthermore, he also shared the reasons that take him into the United States. It was a really interesting conversation, I haven't met somebody from this world region and I promised him to share this information as soon it was posted. This gave me the opportunity to know a little bit about Eritrea, because I had reviewed it on wikipedia.

Consideration 2: Ask your driver for its origins, you never know the moment when you met global regions you never imagined.

Can you tell me some anecdotes of your international trips?

Earful Networking

It's been more than 30 years that I haven't had a "scold" for answer back. Have you had a call of attention lately?

Last week I met Fernando, my Blog's editor, I had a lot of questions about my post performance. He was trying to explain how I should interact, write and tell the story without being to much academic.

As a good student, I interrupt him constantly, instead of listening, I gave him my side of the story on how it was going to be a very difficult thing to do, telling him why I thing his ideas were not as good as he thought. The conversation lasted for a while, until he get angry, and I believe with reason, he stopped me... "Well are you going to listen to my advice? or should I leave you with your archaic ideas? I was on the impression that you were looking for advice but you are closed to it."

I felt as a cold bucket of ice went on me... I felt pretty bad, at the end he was helping me and I was not listening to his advice... I was placing walls between us. At some point he asked me: "How do you think this is going to help you?" and I answered I think with a post. :S

So making the most of this experience, and relating it to my Blog's theme this is my thinking about this experience:

1.- If you ask for support to an expert, do what he says, do not tell him how you can't do what he says, probably you will be wrong and your friend will tell you "I told you so" because he is an expert.

One of my questions with him was related to the number of people that was interacting at this space, and to say the truth its not that much people. I was just for quitting and stop writing. Then he asked me, Do you like what you do? yes... so you are going to quit because you are not sure about what the people think, of if they like this space or not? I really think that you were making this because it was fun for you.

2.- Your hobbies should be fun for you, this is a direct advice from Fernando, you do not have to think if there is someone else that likes or not what you are doing. If you like to write, do it and then deal with the people.

My third question was related to the social media security and the people that was trying to contact me outside the spaces prepared to do it. His next comment let me with no words...

3.- If you don't want that people in Internet, look at you, don't be in Internet, you will be trying to avoid the inevitable, that the people get in contact... so with a lot of caution but interact with people and live your life.

Tell me, have you had a similar experience? Do you have the opportunity to speak with an expert?

Specialized Shopping Networking

The past week I was on a road trip with my family and kids when suddenly we heard a loud noise, at first we thought that it was made by the car next to us, the type of an explosion maker. In a further distance I was listening to the claq, claq, claq sound that usually indicates a flat tire.

As soon as I stopped my dad, brother and sons take care of the situation and change the flat tire. Everyone collaborated on this matter, and my dad and brother seized the opportunity to teach my kids to do it. It's like the knowledge transference in a small community, the elder teach the younger.

Once I can get in the road again, I have to quote in different places my new tire. This duty took me about 3 days and a lot of phone calls. I couldn't understand why a tire cost that much. Those are things that I will never understand. Javier, my uncle, told me that I have to be careful where I buy my tire, because I could be tricked, so that if the tire cost a little bit more I should buy it at a company that gave me some type of warranty. This is another type of knowledge transference.

Then I remember that my friend Karla told me that when in trouble, I will have to place my need to the "universe" so it can move some strings and eventually the right answer will arise. So I start by telling my case and suddenly Lily, other good friend of mine, listened to me and told me, Do you remember Luis? He works for a tire company and all our friends, including me, have bought some tires from him, why don't you ask him?

So I did and Luis was really kind, he also get me some type of "discount" and ask for the tire and send it to a near address. The same day I was buying from him my tire, he was doing the same job for other of our friends, Yamin.

So with this in mind, I share with you the networking comment:

1.- Family is very important on the knowledge transfer, give the elders the opportunity to teach the new generations, this is a networking privilege that its worth to remember.

2.- Asking the "universe" for help, this means telling others what you need, may help you to get access or contacts that may help you on your needs and may have a good advice.

3.- Be helpful with your friends and offer your services, that may lead you to get some others on the future. If you are specialist at some theme, share it, you may get a lot of projection.