The Secret to Building a Strong, Reliable Professional Network

Note: This article was originally published as the cover story of FORUM Magazine in spring 2024. The editors of FORUM Magazine think it’s always a good time for this type of inspiration…especially in a new year. Enjoy!

If you can’t call in chits from your network, you don’t have a network. I am always amazed by the people who know people, but don’t really know them.

They circulate at parties, scour LinkedIn and do a good job of presenting themselves, follow up and delude themselves that they are doing a good job of networking. But, a lot of people truly suck at it. And if you are going to leverage your network as you “empower by proximity,” it’s time for a crash course in how this really works.

Not long ago, I got a call from the chair of a women’s leadership event that I was going to headline as keynote speaker In Philadelphia. Her company wanted some of Philly’s most powerful women to come to the event.

“Do you mind doing the inviting?” she asked. This woman was a very senior executive at a major corporation.

“Don’t you know these women?” I asked, a little surprised. Someone at her level would most certainly have mingled with these people at events.

“Well, I’ve met them and e-mailed them, but I don’t really know them,” she said. “Not enough to ask for a favor.”

So, I invited four of the women because I knew them. I knew them because, when I met them, we talked about our dogs. Yes, there you have it. Dogs.

I never talk to people I network with about their jobs because everybody else is doing that. They don’t remember it. I don’t talk about leadership or job titles or their companies or articles in the Wall Street Journal. Not at all. It’s dogs, cats, occasionally children and sometimes the Royal Family.

Most people just want a genuine connection with somebody because most networking feels transparent and transactional. My goal is to always build a network of friends, and as those relationships fill my life with love, fun and friendship, I also get a good dose of mentoring.

Build a network you can leverage by betting on your greatest asset: You.

Fifteen years ago, I was invited to speak to a gathering of 80 of the most powerful women in American business.

It was a terribly intimidating group, but an incredible opportunity for networking. I totally freaked out about what to pack, making a chart of every clothing change I would need. This was not my tribe. They were Neiman’s, Saks, and Lord & Taylor. I was all Stein-Mart (may it R.I.P.!), Macy’s, and sometimes eBay.

But, once my bag was packed, I leaned into the moment.

My greatest strength and weakness is that I am incapable of faking it. If I am lying, you know it. I get away with nothing. I’ve always felt like a bit of a misfit, but when I interviewed successful women leaders for my books, I found out that they feel like misfits, too! That is so liberating and empowering! All most people really want is to feel like they belong. What I now know is that all of those super-women were just as panicked about their wardrobes as I was.

We see intimidating, successful, impeccably dressed people and forget that, on the inside, they are yelling at themselves because they gained 20 pounds, beating themselves up because they have let someone in their family down, or dogging themselves with impostor syndrome while they work.

I’ve always been an unpolished, somewhat dorky human being, but I am genuine, trustworthy, and well-intentioned. People will either like me or they won’t, but they will always deal with the real me.

That gives other misfits permission to drop their guards and feel comfortable.

When I spoke to that executive women’s group, I attended their team-building events. I took pictures of them with other people, so I could forward the images. I showed them pictures of me kayaking with my dog in Florida. We talked so much about not much at all, then started talking about bad dates and divorces, and then somehow the topic turned to bad sex. I have no idea who started it, but after that, we were all inseparable.

That was the day that the “Cool Table” was born.

Fourteen super-women and me, who had nothing in common with any of them other than I was also a misfit. We’d email and text and make plans for all future conferences.

They referred me for speaking events over and over again, increasing my keynote business 30 percent the year we met. In return, I gave them the best executive coaching they could ever get – for free.

Those women went to the mat for me over and over and over again because they knew me. Not some fake, presentable version who shows up at a cocktail party wearing very appropriate attire, shakes a hand and recites a stupid elevator speech. From the beginning, I gave them the unpolished, somewhat nerdy but highly approachable version of Fawn Germer.

The executive director of that group once said, “Why are all of these people friends with you?”

“I dunno,” I answered. “I think maybe they don’t have any friends.”

There are a lot of executives who don’t.

We’ve been friends through so much. The women got even bigger jobs, or got fired. They got married, or divorced. They moved away, or moved home. We went through a lot of change. During Covid, we Zoomed every two weeks.

We never, ever talk shop. We’re just friends.

People help their friends. Professional contacts may help you a little, but if influential people know, trust and love you, they will stop everything to help you.