Your Network’s Not Weak Enough

I have a professional super-power. 

It’s not that I’m smarter than other people (though I’m no dummy). Or that I work harder (though I do work compulsively hard). Or that I’m not afraid of risk or failure (though that doesn’t hurt). 

It’s how many Michaels I know. 

Huh? You may say.

There was an article in the Wall Street Journal a couple of months ago that laid out how you could calculate how many people you know by counting how many Michaels you know. Michaels make up about 1% of the population. So if you know six Michaels, you probably know 600 people. Which is about the average.

I know 81 Michaels. (I counted them from my contacts.) 

By the article’s math, I should know 8,100 people. 

And while I’m certainly not close with 8,100 people, the article goes on to cite research, both from the 1970s and more recently from LinkedIn, that weak ties (like my 8,100 acquaintances) can be more helpful than close ties (friends, close work colleagues, family members) in finding new professional opportunities. 

I’m not saying to discount your inner circles. Those close ties are extremely beneficial to your career (especially if you’re a woman). Yet, the point remains: the more people you know, the more opportunities for things to happen. More opportunities for someone to think of you for a job or a board or an RFP. Or to connect you to a co-founder for that business you’re dreaming up. 

I had this work for me in a couple of ways when founding Ellevest. One was finding Ellevest’s Chief Investment Officer, Dr. Sylvia Kwan, whom I found through a loose connection. I had talked to any number of candidates in New York, but none had the right mix of experience, creativity, risk tolerance (to join a company that was barely even a PowerPoint yet), a resonance with Ellevest’s mission, and a passion for investing for positive impact. I was beginning to think such a person didn’t exist … 

Until I took a break from a conference I was attending and idly began to look at who some of my connections in the space were connected to. I clicked on Sylvia’s profile, and the rest is Ellevest history. 

It’s also worked well IRL to help me find another member of Ellevest’s founding team. It started when I sat next to Arthur Levitt (the former Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission) on a flight. I recognized him immediately and introduced myself. We had a nice chat; and sometime later he told me he had someone he’d like for me to meet. 

So Arthur Levitt (connection #1) introduced me to a former partner at Goldman Sachs (connection #2). Who introduced me to an entrepreneur (connection #3) … who introduced me to a venture capitalist (#4) … who introduced me to another entrepreneur (#5) … who introduced me to the then-CEO of General Assembly (#6) … who connected me to a younger entrepreneur looking for a new role (#7) … who introduced me to the head of a consulting firm (#8) … who introduced me to a soon-to-be-member of the Ellevest founding team. 

None of these folks were close friends, and some I'm no longer in touch with. But each of these loose connections was important in the journey of founding Ellevest. 

This is why I'm pretty open to meeting others, and why I joke that the only person I regret meeting is my ex-husband. (Except that’s not true either, because if I hadn’t met my ex-husband, I never would have had the series of experiences that led to my meeting my forever-husband.)

This is also why I say that networking is the #1 unwritten rule of success — for work and life. So my advice: Play in traffic. Introduce yourself to people. Make it your business to get to know a lot of people and to keep in touch with them. And be open to serendipity. It’s a lot easier than being smarter than everyone else and a lot more fun than working harder than everyone else.

Plan for more in 2024. Make your next connection today. Ellevest’s team of all-women financial advisors and financial planners can help you build women up while you build your wealth. 

• Make 2024 the year you start investing. Use the code GOBIG at checkout to get $24 in your online investment account and one month free of Ellevest.

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