How to Network With Busy People
Published on Dec 18, 2015
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Often the people we’d most like to network with are also the least accessible. Busy people are bombarded with endless emails, phone calls, social media connections, and more. Making contact with such people can be difficult because so many others are trying to do the same thing.
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Nevertheless, busy people can make very valuable contacts. They’re usually busy for a reason – lots of people want to connect with them, either for business or personal reasons.
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You must accept up front that a busy person simply cannot or will not give you a serious slice of their attention without a good reason. The mere fact that you contacted them is not a good enough reason to expect them to reply back.
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Don’t presume you’re entitled to a response just because you took some action and reached out to the busy person. Don’t presume you’re supposed to get a response just because you had an intuitive feeling to contact the person.
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Busy people may receive dozens, sometimes hundreds, of incoming communications per day, 365 days per year. They don’t have the capacity to treat every request as equally important, so they must triage. This usually means they’ll spend very little time processing communication from people they don’t already know.
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In your mind you may have a very good reason for contacting this person. You may have the noblest of intentions. But if you can’t see reality from the busy person’s perspective, you’ll probably make mistakes that will result in your being blown off.
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Busy people aren’t trying to be rude. They’re simply trying to be effective. They have to choose between spending an extra hour or two each day on email and phone calls vs. spending more time with their families, working on key projects, or just having a life. Would you willingly volunteer to spend an extra hour per day answering email if it wasn’t absolutely necessary – for the rest of your life with no end in sight?
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Busy people are sometimes criticized for blowing off a lot of communication. They often seem unresponsive to “reasonable” requests. I used to think such behavior was very rude when I was subjected to it, but then I was put in the position of experiencing it from the other side. When I realized I was spending hours each day answering emails – and having little to show for it in terms of inner fulfillment or outer results – I knew I had to be more selective..
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It can become overwhelming to keep up with every piece of communication when you are receiving dozens and sometimes hundreds of emails per day.
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What’s your limit? Could you handle 100 communications per day (36,500 per year)? How about 1,000 per day (365,000 per year)? Eventually you’ll hit your breaking point and need to pull back.
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A lot of people simply don’t understand the busy person’s perspective. Is it rude or inconsiderate to decline to spend 12 hours a day reading and responding to feedback, 365 days a year? I don’t know any busy people who think that would be a wise idea. Invariably they decide to blow off a lot of incoming communication. The only difference is what combination of people, technology, and processes they use for triage purposes. Some use filters. Some use assistants. Some hire bodyguards.
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If you can accept that busy people must triage in order to be effective and have a life, and you can respect them for setting priorities, you’ll have a much better shot at building a bridge with them.
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On the other hand, if you resent such people for being busy and not responding to your communiqués promptly, you’re not going to become a very good networker in general.
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If you want to get good at networking with busy people, you must accept and embrace the busy person’s reality instead of getting stuck in your own perspective and being unable to empathize.
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