Three years of fake networking vs six months of real conversations

I spent three years going to every mixer and handing out business cards in Austin. Got maybe two leads total. Then I just started asking people genuine questions about their work over coffee, and in six months I landed three solid job offers. Has anyone else ditched the schmooze for actual chats?

2 comments

2 Comments

clairepark1mo ago

That tracks with my experience too. Those structured events always felt like everyone was performing rather than actually connecting. Real conversations just have a different weight to them, don't they.

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jade2711mo ago

Wonder if we somehow seek out those performative spaces because they're safer, like we're protecting ourselves from the messiness of a real connection that might actually ask something of us. Real conversations demand you show up without a script, and that's honestly pretty scary when you get caught off guard by how much it can hit you. Maybe the intentional awkwardness of unstructured time is exactly what we need to stop hiding behind the curated version of ourselves.