Firewalls and Friendships: Building a Balanced Professional Network

Many people really struggle with intentional career networking. It can seem scary or pointless or overwhelming, so they end up falling back on default networking, only maintaining professional relationships with those in their immediate circle of influence. Others are very intentional with their networking but end up being takers and not givers, offending those in their network. Still others are worried about asking for anything from their network for fear of seeming like a taker. Being a genuine person in the corporate world is a tricky business.

I’m going to use basic IT systems networking concepts to illustrate career networking concepts in a way that DevOps folks can easily visualize. I will share my experiences with authentic career networking through the lens of systems networking, the good and the bad. Sometimes it has worked out favorably for me, a well balanced ingress and egress! And other times it has left me feeling super crappy and used, egress only sharing. All of it has been educational and has shown me how to be a better network-friend, a well-balanced router and have healthy firewalls. I want to share it all with you in hopes of seeing more authenticity and generosity in our shared work world.