Social capital and why you should start building your network when you are young
Posted on June 30th, 2009 in Leadership |
A couple of weeks ago , when I attended a farewell event for the Headteacher of the school we had both worked in I met up with former colleague, Susan, whose research on the social capital of the people involved in that school I found fascinating. She has promised to send me a copy of her final report and I am looking forward to reading it.
In the meantime I was searching on Social Capital to get some background when I came across this article by Malcolm Gladwell from way back in 1999. I highly recommend you take 10 minutes or so to read the whole thing but there is one aspect that prompted this post.
The article is about a lady called Lois Weisberg who is someone who “knows everyone” and who in his book “The Tipping Point” Gladwell calls a “Connector”. But he sums up why Lois is so successful in this when he says
“When we say….. that Lois Weisberg is the kind of person who “knows everyone,” we mean it in precisely this way. It is not merely that she knows lots of people. It is that she belongs to lots of different worlds.”
So Lois is now elderly - born in 1925 that makes her 84 in my calculations so she has had time to build up her connections over the years but just as important she has built up those connections from those “different worlds”.
As I understand it Susan researched the social networks of the children in the school - their families, friends, neighbours, community supporters, teachers, churches etc At some point each of those children will develop their own wider networks - when they go to work, into further education , move to a new area, in sports activities and so on.
And that is how we build our social capital - through the networks we develop which come from the “worlds we inhabit”.
In 2009 when the ability to connect - in a meaningful as well as superficial way - using technology has been added to the traditional ways of building our networks I believe young people have even more opportunity to make connections for all sorts of reasons.
I have a couple of troubling thoughts on that though
1 Most young people don’t realise and understand the power of their networks to help them reach their goals early enough - which means for example that getting onto the job market is still approached mainly through the traditional job centre/employment agency/ job advert routes.
2 Some older people - who are probably still trying to work this out for themselves - undervalue and indeed try to block or restrict the very means that opens up those wider worlds.
Facebook and Bebo are merely the tools to build up the network and, in the scheme of things, are still relatively new. It will be interesting to see how the generation growing up with them make, develop and use their connections to build their social capital.
11 Responses
I agree with you and would add this. When we are looking for a job, or doing something like that where we are one one side of the river and we want to be on the other side, we are acutely aware (and anxious) about our lack of knowledge of the other side. And that’s what occupies our attn.
When we persuade people to network all the people they know on a big piece of flipchart, they often realise they have a rope bridge across the river. And once the panic lowers, they become more creative all round.
I’m not seeing youngsters use their networks to look for jobs - well anymore or less than they did. As you say it is not the network that is the issue for them, it is the situation that they are in - which falls into the wrong side of the river catagory - which prompt us to focus on the gap rather than the tools we have in hand.
Or as we say in Africa, it’s very hard to remember your goal is to get to the other side of the river when you are up to your armpits in crocodiles!
Wow - Jo - thank you so much for that contribution. I have wonderful pictures in my head to use when talking about career planning. The crocodile one especially!
In discussing this issue with my own kids, I really talk from the perspective of being excellent and memorable. It’s tough to think that an address book could mean a job some day, but they do quickly understand that certain people stand out as folks worth remembering. And facebook seems to be the portal of choice for the soft networking that does go on… need to find someone - search facebook first.
I like that Fred - excellent and memorable - the ideal starting point for selling yourself to a prospective employer. thanks for the comment
Great post and pointer, Jackie. Let me share my perspective. I don’t have a network of friends that extends back beyond 25 years ago. We moved a lot when I was a kid. I commuted a long way to high school, and lived in a non-residential area so very little there. And I went to college while working full time. And most of my career has been spent working with out of town clients.
My wife on the other hand has friends who’ve known each other since before elementary school. Two of them actually had side by side bassinets in the hospital. They grew up in a small town.
She uses social media to connect mostly with people she’s known forever. I use social media to connect with people who become friends, usually first in the virtual world, often later in the physical one.
The support power of both networks is real and important. But there is a richness to the long-standing relationships that I admire. I would advise young people to cultivate those relationships and keep them fresh as they move through life. I would also suggest that older people (me?) use the social networks and net to stay in touch and up to date. In the last years of my dad’s life, neither he nor the other members of his circle of college friends and wives could travel. Email became their main communication medium, offering an immediacy and energy that no physical mail could match.
This week I have been on the road training with a large retail company and it’s amazing how people still don’t see the value in networking. Some people called me a charmer until I explained to them that I am a believer in making both direct and random connections.
I actually think some of the social networks that young people are on aren’t helping to provide depth in terms of general connections, e.g. Facebook but if they could realise that there is power in such tools, e.g. Twitter I think it could deepen there whole professional experience.
I totally concur that it’s about building the networks while they are young. Something that should be taught in all universities, colleges and maybe even schools.
You make a great point about all generations Wally. More and more older folks use e-mail and it seems reasonable to think that they could use the social networking sites available to stay in touch easily. This might take a wee while to develop as a concept but it would be so much better than only finding out what happened to very old pals via the obit columns in the newspapers.
Thank you
Yes , Dave - I am with you on that. The value of creating and maintaining networks should be taught in schools, colleges and Universities for all sorts of reasons but none more obvious than now when the jobs market is so tough.
You keep on there being charming making random connections!
[...] week Jackie Cameron had a marvelous post her blog titled: “Social capital and why you should start building your network when you are young.” Definitions of “social capital” differ, but they all agree that there is value [...]
Jackie, This is excellent advice for old and (especially) young. When I was younger I was very idealistic and thought that people should rise or fall in business based on the quality of their ideas and work. While I suppose this is reality to some extent, without a network of people it’s very difficult to develop ideas, let alone have them noticed. We have so much to learn from each other. Every connection is an opportunity.
You make a very intesting point Brad - the ability to develop/test ideas with people in your network who you know and trust is invaluable ( I have done that many times) and in turn they may well turn out to be your best advocate - or a collaborator - or even a client!
thank you