We have all heard the phrase “it’s not what you know, but who you know.”
In the military this applies to being close to your detailer in order to try and maybe have a teeny tiny bit of an advantage when it comes to orders. In the civilian world it is what makes getting a job slightly easier in tough times. Trust me when I say I know how frustrating that can be. I have a Master’s degree and it was still a contact I knew almost 10 years ago that helped me get my current job.
I happened to run into a teacher I use to sub for out to dinner about 6 months before I separated from the Navy. I mentioned that I was looking at getting back into the education field and gave her my number to hold onto for when she needed a sub again. Lucky for me I had a good reputation at the school and when a job opening came up for something completely new to me she tossed out my name. Keeping in touch, even just via social media, can create a web of contacts you can pull up whenever you need it as long as you remember to keep things positive and professional.
But it shouldn’t just apply to the work force. Networking, creating and nurturing connections you make in life, can come in handy in more ways that just that.
My mother has said she never met someone who could go anywhere in the world and run into a person they know like I can. When I was in the Navy I was on deployment for Christmas and we made a port call for the holiday in Bahrain. As soon as I knew what my duty days would be I sent off an OPSEC-safe email to a Sailor I knew from back in the states. This Sailor was doing a 6 month deployment in Bahrain and I knew he had nice housing arrangements that could accommodate me and a few friends for an evening off ship where we could actually be barefoot if we wanted for a couple wonderful hours. Had I cut ties with everyone I knew back home as soon as they were deployed or PCS-ed I would have been stuck on the ship eating mystery meat again instead of having one of the most memorable Christmas Eve’s I’ve ever had.
And Lord knows in the military community we relocate so often that it would be wonderful to reach out to someone that has been there before and find a good hair dresser, child care provider, relator or wine store. Keeping in touch with people is easier these days than ever before. When my father was in the Navy we still had to keep an actually address book where we crossed out addresses every time the neighbors moved and we had to hope the long distance bill wasn’t going to break the bank if we were talking to old friends. Now all we have to do is send a quick text, find a person on Facebook or search Instagram to feel like we still are a part of our friend’s lives. It means that our network grows and grows no matter how many times the military moves us.
Keeping that network strong means always having a friend to call when you’re visiting or PCSing somewhere new. It means having an emergency contact you can add to the student pick-up roster for when kid one is throwing up at home but kid two needs to be retrieved from school still. It means knowing what great Military Spouse events are going on around the country where you have the ability to meet fellow spouses of all genders, sexualities and nationalities that might make help you find a slice of home across the globe from where you are actually living at the time. And for me, it meant that I could attend a Military Spouse event in DC and a fellow writer could ping my phone in order to give me directions to the closest Starbucks before I lost my mind in city traffic.
Networking may be a term that you associate with the business world, but I promise you that if you start looking at it through the filter of making personal connections that can benefit you at any point in your life you just might begin to see how useful it can actually be. Don’t let the old connotation of networking push you away from seeing the silver lining to having a full contact list. You never know when a friend might need a great recipe for a potluck and you happen to know someone that makes the best pepperoni bread around. Or maybe you mention that you have a business idea in your head but you’re not sure how to get starting. Someone you know might be a fantastic example of military spouse entrepreneurship and can pass along their business advisors card to get you moving in the right direction. A friend or business connection might not help you at this moment, but who knows when that might be the exact number you need to help someone else.