Review: Never Eat Alone

Never Eat Alone by Keith Ferrazzi was first published in 2005. I read it to discuss with my NAPO-LA book group, and found its advice about networking to be straightforward and applicable to any business or personal situation. The author is kind of a connections addict. He loves making connections and networking with people and has found it to be one of the most influential strategies for advancing in business and life. I liked the book's tone and organization, though it's hard to adjust to the bald fact that it's pretty much always who you know rather than what you know. Ferrazzi wants to empower you to learn how to get to know the people who can help you on your path through life.

I got the most out of the chapter on conferences. Ferrazzi argues that conferences are less about the content of the sessions or workshops or keynotes and much more valuable for getting face time with and getting to know people. Conferences do offer concentrated people-meeting arena, and it pays to go in having done some research on the other attendees and making a point of meeting and talking with those who you find fascinating or relevant to your fields of interest.

There were a lot of good take-aways from the book, and even though it was published before the Facebook/Twitter/social networking explosion, the principles still apply. Following up, being interesting, taking an interest in other people, being willing to ask for help as well as give help are all timeless concepts and well worth reminding ourselves about.