There's a story told of a Chinese Emperor many centuries ago who ordered his gardeners to build a lavish paradise garden. It took them three years. When he came to inspect it, the Emperor was not happy.
'I asked you to put a row of cedar trees down this path,' he said, pointing to where he wanted them.
'But Mighty Emperor,' they replied, 'Cedar trees take hundreds of years to grow.'
'Well, we'd better start now!' replied the Emperor.
The best time to plant a tree is many years ago. The second best time is NOW!
I teach some of the world's best professionals how to take their business networking to a higher level. Most of them have been doing it a while!
If you don't have the luxury of being able to call upon years of solid networking and a rolodex of great connections, then you'd better make a start. And NOW!
Professional, world class networkers play a long term game. They know that building a network is going to take time. They make business connections methodically and systematically. They work strategically to fill the gaps in their network. They sow now to reap in the future. They plant seeds in the spring because they know they'll need to eat in the summer.
Once you see networking like gardening or planting trees, you'll be taking that path to professional networking status. And if you want to make yourself even better with your business networking, listen to this incredible audio interview I recently did with Lynne Waymon, author of the brilliant book Make Your Contacts Count.
