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Comment by rattray | Hacker News Reader

"Shameless" really does seem to me the best word to describe the most important aspect of networking. Or at least, the hardest part - once you've read How to Win Friends and Influence People, it's still really tough to approach strangers or ask acquaintances for introductions.

Carnegie doesn't teach you how to get over that. The only thing I can think of that might is Theater; acting or improv classes. But I'd be very curious to hear how others have overcome social inhibitions and learned to go for it.

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One piece of advice that helped me immensely at events: pretend (internally, mind you), that you're the host of the event. If your objective ends up being "make sure everyone is enjoying themselves", it becomes easier to see (people who are in an approachable state) and (not be the guy to ruin a good conversation).

Maybe this is a "low-hanging fruit" of conversing, but better than nothing.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned Toastmasters. It's an org designed to help you with your communication skills from on the spot talking about random things to full blown prepared speeches. I'm naturally comfortable speaking to random people and in large settings, but when I joined my companies Toastmasters club it helped me take my skills to the next level. And it was a great way to meet other people both in our company but in other company's as I did competitions and other events.

Back when I was in college in a Christian organization we would pair up and go share the gospel with other students on campus.

One technique that worked surprisingly well for me was that one of the pair would pick the person that the other would have to go up to and try to converse with.

Somehow that created the feeling of a dare that I could get into, even though if I had been considering talking to the person on my own, I would have talked myself out of it.

A friend of mine is the best salesman I know. He attributes his success to griwing up as a Jehovah's Witness, with mandatory door to door proselytizing every weekend. Rejection doesn't phase him in the slightest.

Yeah, the biggest part to becoming a salesman is being able to absorb the constant rejection and not have it impact your next attempt.

That's the same reason why there are so many sales organizations in Salt Lake City. Nothing trains you to get over rejection like trying to sell religion door to door.

I've been intrigued as to why Mormons have such an seemingly disproportionate "success" rate, and ended up doing a bit of research on the matter. It really seems like it comes down to facing failure repeatedly. And most of them get the experience when they're around college age as well. I've been trying to figure out how we could build something secular into normal primary education that would achieve the same result.

It's already done at many schools for fundraisers. Things like having the kids sell chocolates or magazine subscriptions. Also girl scouts with their cookies.

Much of the time it's the parents doing the pushing, and the kids in tow for the "do it for the children" factor. The kids probably don't really know what's going on, and don't have to take direct responsibility for any of it.

People buy that stuff just to help out kids though. Going door to door selling a 'magical candy bar' that can radically change someone's life for eternity would be much harder. I guess part of that is also conviction in what you are selling.

The only thing I can think of that might is Theater; acting or improv classes.

Actually I think you nailed it. For me it was both giving briefings to executives and leaders, which ended up driving me to have the confidence to try my hand at stand-up comedy. If you want to bathe in fire of getting over talking to people cold there is no better way.

While I still feel this exact kind of "making the approach" inhibition from time to time, I think the way I've gotten over it is to build up a history of cases where I just sucked it up and did it and was able to look back and realize that hey, it wasn't so bad! Oh, going with a friend really really really helps too! One of you makes the approach but just having the friendly face to fall back will enable a soft landing.

That being said, starting out in less challenging settings is definitely the way to go (ex: if you don't like loud bars, don't practice getting better at approaching at loud bars! Try programming meetups or interest meetups where the ambiance is more natural to you are likely to have things in common with the people there).

The emotional side of the equation is to have a history of success that you can draw on for courage. The rational side is to know and repeat to yourself that it's a numbers game just like dating. At "networking" type of settings, I personally expect to meet one interesting person with whom I'll have a sustained relationship with every 2 hours. There will be many friendly people along the way where we will mutually forget each other after 2 days, and that's just the way it is.

> going with a friend really really really helps too

My experience has been exactly the opposite. It is much better to not have a friend with you. Whether at a computer conference, backpacking through Europe, or trying to meet the opposite sex, starting alone has always been better for me.

Typical problems that comes up if you're with a friend:

- You're more likely to sit there talking only to your friend. This is the biggest problem.

- If you're brushed off by whoever you meet, it feels awkward to return to your friend, explain what happened, and try to resume your earlier conversation.

- If the person you meet suggests going for coffee or you get involved in long conversation, what do you do about your friend. Ignore him? Tell him to wait? Ask him to join you even if he's not interested in the person you met or topic you're discussing? You can end up looking rude in so many ways.

- If you're with a friend, you yourself become less approachable by others.

I agree with the rest of what you said, but it's funny that the "friend" part is 100% different for me.

So I think approaching groups with a friend is good for someone who is so frozen and so afraid that he/she would never be able to make an approach in the first place.

But I completely agree with the problems you listed when being attached to a friend at the hip and have suffered that collateral damage as well myself.

The rule is that if you want to approach groups then you should be a group. If you want to approach individuals then you should be alone. There's some truth to that, I think.

Find a common interest, something that you would enjoy doing alone and that you know the other people you are meeting with will enjoy as well.

Theater (or any other activities) might work if you are genuinely interested in it, but if it's just an excuse to meet other people maybe you won't enjoy it as much, and you will be less likely to stick with it.

Meetup is a great resource: find meeting groups for hackatons if you are a techie, running groups if you are a jock, language learning, cooking groups...

Acting and improv classes can help—you have to talk to people to do it—but it can also be a bit different. In both of those you're in a pretty specific role (even improv has a lot of training wheels at the start) and there are common forms; getting comfortable making crazy stuff up on stage in front of a bunch of strangers is still a bit different than selling to strangers in a professional or social capacity. The big thing you need to do—not care if you end up making yourself look stupid—is the same, but the contexts are different enough that to me they're pretty separate.

So for me it is just forcing myself to be social. Repeatedly. Still! It won't happen overnight, but after a while you hopefully will notice changes.

"But I'd be very curious to hear how others have overcome social inhibitions and learned to go for it."

Small steps. Your first event you know no one. Meet one person, and then next time you visit you have someone to at least say hello to, buy a drink for, or sit and talk/eat with.

It never gets easier for the socially awkward, but soon you build a network of people who "know you" and networking becomes a much more comfortable environment. You also find out, that others are just as anxiety ridden as you. You start to recognize "noobs" and see their anxiety... which is another good opportunity to help and network by initiating contact with this people.

Here's how you get over it: exposure to the thing you fear.

Theater, acting and improv are all awesome ways to get exposure to social pressure in a positive environment! I'd also recommend dance classes, particularly partner dances like salsa and tango.

Learning to talk to women helped me. I'm still not perfect but I used to have intense social anxiety in my late teens and early twenties. At age 26, a lot of people would describe me as confident and outgoing (it does take a lot of energy).

Exposure does two great things:

- Teaches you that rejection does not kill you. If ask a girl out or ask someone to invest in your company the right way, even if they say no they'll respect you more. If you ask the wrong way and it goes horribly, life goes on and you'll feel more self-respect for having tried. :)

- Gives you positive reference experiences. It takes time to get them, but they are truly the fruit of laboring at improving an anxiety. I still get nervous before first dates and I've gone on a lot of them. Recalling all the good ones I've had doesn't make the nerves go away, but it makes them wayy less intense. Same deal with ambitious engineering projects. I'm still nervous before them, but I've succeeded in spite of nerves before so I can definitely do it again.

Putting exposure into a wider context, there are a lot of therapeutic approaches to treating anxiety—all the successful ones have substantial exposure components. I went through CBT for anxiety but the cognitive component is mostly there to help you productively process experiences when doing the behavioral component, exposure. Another interesting modality is systematic desensitization [1]. I'm a huge nerd so I got a kick out of making exercises for myself (eg. go tell 5 girls that they look really cute today) that took me through a systematic desensitization process.

A random sidenote, once I got past my own insecurities I was able to pay more attention to whoever I was talking to. You start to notice their insecurities! Everyone's got em! Very attractive girls will be self conscious about their braces. Speaking specifically to professional networking, everyone is trying to impress each other but you don't have to let it affect you. I talked to a cousin of mine this christmas that has had extreme success. He sold a business for more than $40M in his twenties. I just chewed the fat with him and listened and he was trying to impress me, a definite tell for insecurity! My business doesn't make anywhere near that much. I can feed myself lol.

Getting out of your own head and over your insecurities is difficult but totally worth it. Keep at it!

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systematic_desensitization

Play the social card game Stranger Danger[1]!

[1] http://www.strangerdanger.biz/

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