Commania's Blog

The Two Qs in networking

We’re down to our last academic year in UPM. The first semester is soon to end and the second semester is quite coming near. After that, we’re off to the real world, to the real field where the battle begins.

However, before we get into war, first we need to be trained. We need to be equipped with weapons that we will be using to defeat our enemies and to reign victorious in the end.

Althroughout my stay in this campus, I met different kinds of professors and instructors who placed us in practice battles. With everything that they have required us to do (of course much of them very difficult to accomplish), they shared to us the knowledge and practical applications we will be needing after we graduate. However, these are not enough.

When we start seeking for job, it’s certain that we would take a very close look at the contacts that we have. Thus, establishing our networks even from the very start we learned to really socialize (either because there is a need to as it is required or it just so happens) because of OrCom, greatly influences the path that we are going to take several months from now.

Good thing the new social media that we are exposed to made it easier for us to build our networks. However, does it follow that because we have numerous contacts, it would ensure us better jobs? Or would it be more logical to assume that it is not with the number but it is with the quality of contacts we keep to ourselves?

Organizations, on a larger context, should always be able to take into consideration this kind of argument. Would it be better for them to exhaust their efforts and budget in order to gain so many customers (loyal or unloyal)? Or to limit their power to focus on a targeted group of customers who would be assuming loyalty and quality on a long term basis?

The internet made connecting with other people a lot easier. However, it is in the discretion of the organization to limit or manage their use of new social media in order to gain potential customers and partners. It depends on their purposes, goals and objectives whether they have to value quality or quantity over the other.

But here is a point: Does it necessarily follow that when organizations focus themselves on specific groups of people, these customers are really the best? What if because they limit their quest for customers, they were not able to find better ones which could have been attained when they continued their effort to reach out?  Because of this, companies should take extra effort to study about their target market. They have to be able to adjust to the demands of a fast-changing generation today. We can never know, tomorrow a company might just need to focus more on specific customers than to cater the needs of so many.

But as for us today, collecting contacts may be never-ending. Every now and then we meet new faces and get a bunch of acquaintances. That’s just so natural because we are social beings and we are OrCom majors. And it is also on our discretion when to use these contacts to help us with our needs.

Here’s a tip: If you want your contacts to respond to your requests, favor, or what have you, also be there for them not just in times of need but for all the time. In other words, just be a friend to them– a true one.

😀 😀 😀