Networking is a life skill learned by Americans from age one on. This is not the case in other countries. For example in most of Europe, networking is not that popular and people have trouble understanding the concept.

As a French person, my experience with networking started in 2002 when I came to New York to start a new business and discovered this new world. I didn’t know anything about networking; not even what the word meant. I was surprised that everywhere I went, each time I was met someone they tended to give me their business card in the first few seconds. I was wondering why I should need their business cards when I hardly knew them?

Then I discovered the networking events. I still remember the very first networking event that I attended in New York, which I discovered the event on the Internet. I arrived in a crowded bar, very noisy, took my nametag, and looked around. I was so intimidated that I left in less than two minutes and said, “Ok, this networking thing is definitely not for me.”

“Looking back, this is quite funny when you consider that I now run Biba4Network, a business that organizes and facilitates networking and helps other entrepreneurs grow their businesses using networking effectively.
My clients even call me “The Connection Queen“.

After the first networking event I attended, I decided to explore more and understand why it was so popular and what I could get out of it for my business. In France, some companies started organizing events in the last 2 to 3 years but they are mainly social events in a bar, which seem to draw people more for fun than to do business.

So the question is often: “How do you get business in France if you don’t have networking?” Cold calling is one way.

For example I had a telemarketing company for 7 years in Paris, where small companies were using my services to cold call potential prospects from their own data base or from list they were buying. Or companies hire sales people who cold call. Word of mouth is also a lucrative way to establish a client base in France. But the French mentality is more “I can take but I don’t want to give you anything” – if somebody have a contact they just don’t want to share it and as you know in networking you have to give first before you can get any referrals.

I remember few years ago, I was organizing, as a volunteer, a short films festival in NYC to promote French artists on behalf of a French association in Paris I first contacted all the French associations in NYC to get sponsors, get a place to host the events and everything needed for this event. Each and every associations told me the same thing, “we may have contacts but we will keep them for ourselves, why should we help you?’ Well I finally organized this event successfully with the help of my American clients who became sponsors and gave me contacts and attended the event.

You see the difference! The Americans were more than happy to help me (and remember I was not paid to do it) to organize and participate to this cultural event, but the French, even some very well establish organizations in NYC, just saw me as competition.Word of mouth works in France, but to refer your name to somebody else, they need to know you very well over a long time and see what they will get out of the relationship. They just don’t do anything for free; if they don’t see their interest first they won’t help you. That is true for most people.

But here in the US, you meet people at networking events, exchange your contact, give them contacts or referrals if you see that you can help them and it is a reciprocal game. That is why I really liked the concept when I arrived in NYC and decided to start my own business related to networking.

So for the last 6 years that I have been teaching people how to use networking to grow their businesses, 98% of my clients are Americans. French people come to me for networking advise only after they spent a year or two doing what they used to do in France, realized that they are going nowhere, either they are looking for a job or trying to start a business, and only then they finally turn to this “networking thing” that everybody is talking about.

That is how I finally educated some of them who took my training, “Power of Newtworking Secrets” who are now very happy to attend my events and others, and see an immediate result using my strategies on how to use networking effectively.

(c) 2008 Biba F. Pédron