Networking Can Land You The Big One
Author: Thomas P. Meisenheimer

I like to fish Lake Okeechobee in South Florida. It’s a place where good net working can make the difference between landing a ten pound largemouth bass or giving it up to the fifteen foot alligator that usually watches me --- waiting to snap up the one that I let get away. Good networking in human relations can put some “keepers” in your live box for future reference too.

Woody Allen is quoted by Tom Peters in his book, In Search of Excellence, as saying, “Half of success is showing up! And by showing up in the right places you can help yourself personally and professionally. In fact, I am writing this article right now because of a woman I met three weeks ago at a Chamber “Business To Business” breakfast. She told me that this is a good way to get recognized and possibly begin to land some nice speaking engagements. She is Torre Blomgren, owner of Four Seasons Speakers & Trainers in Brookfield, Wisconsin. Torre is a great net worker. You can reach her at torre@speakersdirect.us

Networking is simple and happens almost anywhere. If you are unemployed there are groups of fellow job seekers that meet weekly to share leads and ideas. Your town Chamber office probably has a contact number.

One of the most successful network opportunities I ever had brought my company a ,000,000 order. And we could have lost it if we had been greedy and not shared it with our network, which just happened to be our main competitors. Let me explain.

I was National Sales Manager for one of the largest manufacturers of melamine dinnerware in the world. We were approached by a large fast food chain to produce 20,000,000 plates in conjunction with a movie that was to hit the theaters in ten months. The problem: We were not able to produce that many plates in that time frame. ENTER, OUR NETWORK! In this case, our competition. We knew that we would open the fast food chain to all our competition and if our quote was higher we might not get a future project. But we figured, “A bird in the hand….” So we called them one at a time, found out their manufacturing capabilities, introduced them to the chain and let them bid on the project as well. We ended up finding enough of our competitors to, together produce the total of 20,000,000 in the time frame required. Ironically, it was the biggest single sale of the year for each of us. And it all turned out fine for us in the long run, as the movie wasn’t that great and the chain never did another dinner plate project. But I still remember the beautiful car I bought with my bonus check!

My neatest network success was actually through a girl I was dating. I had started a sporting goods business with a friend and we were looking for a unique logo. Just happened that she was a close friend of a superb artist who designed our logo for the joy of doing something creative. That lighted logo on our store marquee attracted good customers for years. Never did marry that girl!

You can build a great network for just about any need you may ever have --- from a good banker to a person who happens to live next store to the star shortstop on the major league team near your city. You’ll never pay for box seat tickets again. Besides you will get to sit next to and hob-knob with the player’s wives. Remember you just don’t happen to be in the right place at the right time if you want to build a network for success. You’ve got to show up in the right places.

Those places are all over. Do more than go to church. Get on a committee.
Sign your kid up for Little League and tell them you’d consider being on the board.
Don’t go out to lunch alone. Join Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions, Optimists. You’ll get to eat lunch once a week with the movers and shakers of your community. And you’ll end up receiving much more than you’ll ever be asked to give.

I work for a charity that does a yearly golf outing. My son happened to take catching lesson from the bullpen catcher for a major league team. The bullpen guy’s best friend was the team’s star second baseman. Guess what? That player has golfed in three of our past outings. We pay for his golf, and he signs twenty baseballs that we auction off for 0 bucks a shot. A nice ROI.

When I changed occupations a few years ago and became a fundraiser, I kept my network going in the incentive business I had just left. I have kept in touch with my old competitors and now every year I can depend on them to send me their overruns and samples items --- cameras, bicycles, TV’s, wallets, luggage, grills, and tools. We use them for auction items at our fund raising events and they add thousands of dollars to our bottom line, which allows us to do good things for people with disabilities.

A blind squirrel will find a nut now and then, but if you actively look for chances to rub shoulders with people, you’ll be amazed at how success finds you. In the Broadway play, “Into The Woods,” there is a great line --- “Opportunity is not a lengthy visitor.” Life is short, so look for those opportunities to network with people who can help you – and you them.

I pride myself in knowing where I am smart and where I am really dumb. Networking and self-knowledge have given me a chance to let people know my strength, while, at the same time, finding people smarter than me. Building friendships with people who don’t know what I know but have expertise in areas I do not, helped both of us make our dreams come true. Humility is its own reward in networking!

Wherever you go to network, I suggest you do three things absolutely guaranteed to open the world to you. One, have a large stack of business cards. Secondly, as soon as you can after your introduced to a new person, say, “Tell me about your kids!” Then shut up and listen. Before long you’ll gain the reputation as the greatest guy in town and people will be coming to you for any service you offer. A fresh shirt, shinned shoes and good breath help too.

So get out there and start finding those free consultants for anything you want to accomplish. You just may land the biggest job of your life. And everyone will say you were just lucky. But you’ll know it was just good “net working!”

C 2004 Thomas P. Meisenheimer
All Rights Reserved

Thomas P. Meisenheimer
414-531-2844

You can e-mail me at tomeis@charter.net and I will send you my bio along with the list of talks and seminars I offer.







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Name: Thomas Philip Meisenheimer

Credentials:

B.A. Philosophy/English.
M.S. Business Management.
Theological Studies.
Advanced work in Educational Psychology & Vocational Rehabilitation.
700 hours of field work in Clinical Pastoral Education and Gestalt Therapy.
Has participated in the Anthony Robbins Firewalk.
Rotarian for twenty years.
Former Roman Catholic Priest.
Published author and columnist.
Member of Association of Fund Raising Professionals --- Milwaukee Chapter.
Awarded best trade show presentation by Warner Bros. for the celebration of Bug’s Bunny’s 50th Birthday.
Featured in INCENTIVE MAGAZINE.
Master’s thesis on Philanthropy won a national award.
Skied the American Birkebeiner on two occasions.

Professional Role:

Speaker, writer, consultant,

Favorite Quote:
“Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides & gravity, we shall harness --- for God --- the energies of love. And then, for the second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire.”
Theilhard de Chardin

Biography:
Thomas (Tom) Meisenheimer brings a varied and rich background to any podium. He is currently Director of Fund Development for Ranch Community Services, an agency enhancing the abilities of people with disabilities. He has also served as a Vice President and Executive Director for Development at a private college and a hospital foundation.

For seven years he was National Sales Manager for Brookpark Plastics, a Carlisle Company, serving major customers such as McDonalds, Anheuser Busch, Miller Brewery, General Mills, Coors, Philip Morris, R. J. Reynolds, Cruise America, etc. He has managed trade shows in every major US city.

He has started two companies, one a retail sporting goods store, as well as a toy company. He was Vice President of Marketing and New Product Development for the company that directed the sales of Super Grip Ball, one of America’s top selling games in the early nineties. He was presented, by Warner Bros., an award for the “Best Trade Show Promotion” for the celebration of Bug’s Bunny’s 50th Birthday. His games were licensed by MLB, NFL, NHL, NBA and Warner Bros., and were often picked as Games of the Year by The Chicago Tribune.

As a Roman Catholic Priest, Tom was the youngest priest in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee to have a book published. He served as a detention home chaplain, a writer for an international magazine for teens, and a parish priest. For four years he served as a camp director for a summer camp for homeless children. He left the active priesthood to marry, and is the father of two adolescent boys.

Tom has a passion for baseball and has coached and served on the board of his town’s Little League. He is currently a board member of West Bend Youth Baseball, Inc, a U10-14 select program. He is active in his Catholic parish in West Bend, WI where he resides with his wife, an elementary school teacher. His hobbies include tropical fish, biking, tennis, boating and frequent travel to his “second home” in South Florida. His oldest son is in college, having studied at the University of Grenoble and The Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale. His youngest son is a middle school student athlete. Besides his home in rural West Bend, Tom loves New York City and Paris, France.

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