Never Eat Alone, Expanded and Updated: And Other Secrets to Success, One Relationship at a Time

by Keith Ferrazzi

Their social-media-driven upbringing will make them savants

In a hyper-connected marketplace, cooperation is gaining ground on competition. The game has changed.

Our achievements grow according to the size of our dreams and the degree to which we are in touch with our mission.

The most simple version of the plan is separated into three distinct parts: The first part is devoted to the development of the goals that will help you fulfill your mission. The second part is devoted to connecting those goals to the people, places, and things that will help you get the job done. And the third part helps you determine the best way to reach out to the people who will help you to accomplish your goals. This means choosing a medium to connect, but, more important, it means finding a way to lead with generosity.

Moreover, you can apply the worksheet to every aspect of your life: to expand your network of friends, further your education, find a lifelong partner, and search for spiritual guidance.

The choice isn’t between success and failure; it’s between choosing risk and striving for greatness, or risking nothing and being certain of mediocrity.

People are highly opinionated, well informed, and armed with the Internet.

Our culture demands more of us these days. It demands that we treat one another with respect, that every relationship be seen in mutually beneficial terms.

an inner truth about the skill of reaching out to others: Those who are best at it don’t network—they make friends.

Spectacular achievement is always preceded by spectacular preparation. —Robert H. Schuller

I highly recommend you budget some time and money for conferences, and to visit cities where you can schedule a few days or even just an overnight during which you host a cocktail party or schedule a bunch of meetings.

Or set up a weekly accountability group of three to four people who set goals together and share quick personal and professional updates. Have everyone commit to three months, and then rebuild the group as people come and go each quarter. Once a month, ask group members to bring a friend to introduce to the group.

While e-mail is one perfectly acceptable way to follow up, there are other methods to consider. A handwritten thank-you note these days can particularly capture a person’s attention. When’s the last time you received a handwritten letter?

Smart salespeople—in fact, smart employees and business owners of all stripes—spend 80 percent of their time building strong relationships with the people they do business with. The slickest PowerPoint presentation can’t compete with the development of real affection and trust in capturing the hearts and minds of other people. Those who use conferences properly have a huge leg up at your average industry gathering. While others quietly sit taking notes, content to sip their free bottled water, these men and women are setting up one-on-one meetings, organizing dinners, and, in general, making each conference an opportunity to meet people who could change their lives.

created was a unit of conference commandos, prepared in advance with information on who they were

When sessions open up for questions, try and be among the first people to put your hand in the air. A really well-formed and insightful question is a mini-opportunity to get seen by the entire audience. Be sure to introduce yourself, tell people what company you work for, what you do, and then ask a question that leaves the audience buzzing.

In two minutes, you need to look deeply into the other person’s eyes and heart, listen intently, ask questions that go beyond just business, and reveal a little about yourself in a way that introduces some vulnerability (yes, vulnerability; it’s contagious!) into the interaction. All these things

When in a new city, I generally ask people to give me a list of a few of the hottest (and most established) restaurants. I like to call ahead and ask to speak with the owner (though the maître d’ will do) and tell them that I go out regularly, sometimes in large parties, and I’m looking for a new place to entertain, a lot! If you don’t go out as often as I do, find one or two restaurants that you enjoy and frequent them when you do go out. Become a regular. Make a point of meeting the staff. When you’re entertaining for work, bring others there. When you have to cater an event, use them. Once you get to know the owner, it’ll become like your very own restaurant—a place that has the patina of exclusivity and cachet a private club imparts with all the warmth and comfort of your own home.

How can you reach out? Join your local chamber of commerce. Local executives, businesspeople, and entrepreneurs generally populate the chamber. In every community, there are plenty of young politicos looking to climb the political ladder. Early on, before their rise to prominence, you can engender a lot of loyalty and trust by supporting their goals and chipping in when they decide to run for office.

For years, since I was back at Deloitte, I’ve called on journalists at different magazines, taking them to dinners and pumping them full of good story ideas. I

Connect to them in social media, listen to what they’re saying, and over time, weigh in. Once you know what would truly interest them, upgrade communications with a value-added email ping. Don’t worry if you don’t get a response; in a month, send another. Watch

Those who had built businesses and climbed the corporate ladder with amazing speed were those who could confidently make conversation with anyone in any situation. Investors, customers, and bosses posed no more of a threat than colleagues, secretaries, and friends. In front of an audience, at a dinner, or in a cab, these people knew how to talk.

Instead, we should take the initiative in creating the impression we want to give. People are wowed by social decisiveness when it’s offered with compassion and warmth. How another person perceives you is determined by a number of things you do before you utter your first word.

Every person’s Johari Window can be more or less open depending on the circumstances. And different professions—from those that demand a lot of interpersonal skills, like sales, to those that, like accounting, are generally more solitary—attract people whose windows share similar tendencies. A computer programmer’s window, for example, may not open wide unless he or she is around peers. A strong marketing person’s window, on the other hand, tends to be open regardless of the environment. The key is knowing that in conducting small talk, we should be aware of the different styles at play and adapt to the person we’re talking with.

“There are so many wonderful people here tonight; I’d feel remiss if I didn’t at least try to get to know a few more of them. Would you excuse me for a second?” People generally understand, and appreciate the honesty. There’s also always the drink option. I’ll say: “I’m going to get another drink. Would you like one?” If they say no, I don’t have an obligation to come back. If they say yes, I’ll be sure to enter into another conversation on my way to the bar. When I return with a drink, I’ll say, “I just ran into some people you should meet. Come on over.”

In order to establish a lasting connection, small talk needs to end on an invitation to continue the relationship. Be complimentary and establish a verbal agreement to meet again, even if it’s not business. “You really seem to know your wines. I’ve enjoyed tapping your wisdom; we should get together sometime to talk about wine. We can both bring one of our more interesting bottles.”

“The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated.” You should be governed by the idea that one should seek first to understand, then to be understood. We’re often so worried about what we’re going to say next that we don’t hear what’s being said to us now.

Ask questions that demonstrate (sincerely) that you believe the other person’s opinion is particularly worth seeking out. Focus on his triumphs. Laugh at his jokes. And always, always, remember the other person’s name. Nothing is sweeter to someone’s ears than his own name. At the moment of introduction, I visually attach a person’s name to his face. Seconds later, I’ll repeat his name to make sure I got it, and then again periodically throughout the conversation.

The most successful relationship builders are, indeed, a nifty amalgam of financial guru, sex therapist, and all-around do-gooder.

The only way to get people to do anything is to recognize their importance and thereby make them feel important. Every person’s deepest lifelong desire is to be significant and to be recognized.

“Keith,” he said, “there are three things in this world that engender deep emotional bonds between people. They are health, wealth, and children.” There are a lot of things we can do for other people: give good advice, help them wash their car, or help them move. But health, wealth, and children affect us in ways other acts of kindness do not.

Becoming front and center in someone’s mental Rolodex is contingent on one invaluable little concept: repetition.

Most people are delighted, and their curiosity piqued, when someone they don’t know all that well sends them a note, however short.

Another time-saver is to pay close attention to when you place your phone calls. There are times, amusingly enough, when I call in order not to get through. Sometimes you don’t have time for an in-depth conversation; you just want to drop a line and say hello. I try to take mental notes of people’s phone habits, and if I want to simply leave a message, I’ll call when I know they’re not around. Calling their office really early or late usually does the trick.

To build trust online, beyond that limited circle of people you can touch personally, you need to find a way to reveal your humanity in bits and bytes, and to do it so well that you could connect to someone if you were transmitting to them from outer space.

The clarity, efficiency, and effectiveness with which you communicate who you are and why it’s relevant is the lynchpin for expanding your recognition, increasing your influence, and attracting attention.

Every Headline Is a Pitch Again, if you believe your content has value for people (and that should be your first rule of content), generosity means thinking carefully about how to make that value immediately clear. Otherwise, people will pass it by.

The better prompt would be this: What’s got your attention? There’s a subtle utility in that shift, and once you make it, you’ll start seeing your content get shared and commented on. So you’re not posting, “At the movies,” you’re posting, “I saw the new Will Ferrell movie—it was hilarious. Must see!”

Even better is when you can also provide them with a link if they want to go deeper. Give them an article, a film trailer, a restaurant review. Something that allows for more communication than 140 characters, introduces them to something new, and gives them an action.

What’s at work here? Roizen shaped her own serendipity by: • Being open to opportunities delivered by chance. • Creating a network so broad that it was an incubator of the unexpected. • Planting herself firmly at the geographic center of the technology community. • Becoming a highly visible leader in associations and philanthropic organizations, giving rise to the kinds of situations where the most fruitful, generous relationships are borne—where information flows free and people trust one another enough to help one another.

Master the art of serendipity and you’ll open crucial channels to rich flows of knowledge and opportunities. Your first step is to constantly ask yourself: How can I foster juxtapositions of really smart people who would normally never have the opportunity to talk to one another but if they did would create amazing value?

But our virtual lives aren’t the only story. Don’t discount the value of true physical proximity in making your own luck.

If, like many people, you’re not in a position to uproot yourself to a city that never sleeps, travel is an incredible way to open yourself to new experiences and insights. I always notice that I have a burst of creativity when I get back from my trips to Guatemala, where I spend some time working directly with village kids and some time powwowing with local entrepreneurs, officials, and local activists.

Consider putting location-based social media on the serendipity beat. I’ve had more than one spontaneous meeting because I tweeted my location and someone said, “Hey, I’m three blocks away, let’s have coffee.” I’m often asked to advise new social technology start-ups, and the power of companies like Foursquare and Here on Biz to create this kind of unplanned interaction is clear.

Your goal as you move through the world should be to create a force field inside of which people feel safe to play by different rules. Model the traits that support serendipity—curiosity, generosity, passion, and humility. Create social opportunities, like the dinners I described earlier, that allow others to build trust.

people he meets—to be 30 percent of his job description. The future is dynamic and not fully in your control. Celebrate that fact instead of fighting it, and life gets a lot more interesting. Keep your eyes open, be humble and generous, and save time and attention for the spontaneous, the quirky, and the left field.

By fantasizing, using the magic potion, and including a group of people to riff without rules, we were able to use our creativity to find a way forward.

Yes...And...

I’ve never met a journalist with a gatekeeper. Moreover, I’ve never had my calls go unreturned after leaving a message that said, “I’ve got the inside scoop on how the gaming industry is going to revolutionize marketing. I’ve appreciated your work for a long time now; I believe you are the right person to break this story.” I’ve been leaving those kinds of messages on reporters’ voice mail for years, and reporters are hugely appreciative. Most of the time, the story doesn’t even involve my company or me. I’m just building the credibility I’ll need when the day comes to make my own pitch.

“Create a story about your company and the ideas it embodies that readers will care about. That’s your content. Then share it. Have you ever picked up the phone and actually talked to a reporter about why you think what you do is so special?

same process we used to figure out how to make YaYa interesting to the marketplace can be applied to making you interesting to your network and beyond. A unique point of view is one of the only ways to ensure that today, tomorrow, and a year from now you’ll have a job.