3 networking tips for folks with limited social battery

The concept of networking fills me with dread as someone with a limited social battery. The concept of a work conference, which is the epitome of continuous and ongoing networking, is a conceptual nightmare. Yet I’ve learned how to love it, and [gasp] even start fostering connections.

[1] I look for the one point of connection, especially if that one point of connection is a shared passion.

I write from the lens of attending research conferences where passion and motivation drives research. You can always see the thing that prompted their research.

[2] Connect in the way that you would sustainably communicate, and that’s the way you find the people who are similar.

I used to push myself to attend event after event after event. The result is building a network of people who maintain connections through events, which was important to maintain but exhausting to maintain.

Since then I’ve reached out differently, in the format that I would usually communicate. I might reach out after a workshop, poster, encounter with a quick thank you and quick question/connection point and start my connections that way.

There’s a LOT of rejection or ignoring that comes out of this method, but it specifically selects for the people who do communicate this way, and MAINTAIN communication this way. People who are too busy sometimes never reply, or even reply unkindly (e.g., don’t waste my time with thank you notes). I’d rather receive that kind of rejection digitally than in-person, really.

Those who do communicate, will communicate with you this way. These are the people who maybe also didn’t have the bandwidth to chat too much longer after their poster, or at the rest of the conference, but will happily connect via Zoom or by email months later, recuperated from the social and sensory overwhelm of a conference.

[3] Academic pebbling

Pebbling draws from neurodivergent communication, describing sending memes and favourite things between each other as a form of affection and connection. Academic pebbling looks like sending journal articles, knowledge translation etc., with a “thought of you” and “how is this project going”?

So again, some people will HATE this, but you’ll find out soon enough. Sometimes you ask permission, and you see people’s eyes light up, finally finding someone who communicates similar to them.

I began redefining networking this way. I value these one-off conversations with people, getting tidbits of what they’ve learned through their research projects and this phase of their scientific life. It’s felt less alone. And then when the time is right, sometimes a project is born.

Final Words

For me, my social battery for in-person, live conversations is limited, which is a wild trait for a psychologist and therapist to have, given that that is most of my day. It also means that to actually do what I preach and preserve my social battery, I’ve had to be strategic about other ways of communicating.

Others might find asynchronous communicating even more exhausting than in-person or synchronous contact.

The takeaway from this isn’t “email is the way to network”, but rather, I think each type of person exists in academia. Just some forms of communication are more visible than others. The takeaway is perhaps instead “communicate the way that is sustainable for you” and after enough tries, you wILL find your people.

I hope you find your people.