Chapter 6 Blog

 

Chapter 6 Blog:

        Networking is important for anyone trying to build their digital portfolio. Building connections is so important. Doing this helps you build on each other, collaborate, or helping to promote one another. A good way for someone to start with networking is to pay attention to who to follow. Most people follow others who are similar to them. Looking at people who are similar to you will help you build what your presence should look like. Do not copy someone, but make it appealing to specific people, allowing them to connect and share interests with you. 

    After that, you could try "nurturing" your networking. This is when you can start socially connecting with others that you are similar with and keeping things confidential. "The Connected Educator" suggests that "...an individual cannot maintain a stable social relationship with more than 150 people at one time," (Beach, Hall 95). Keeping social connections at a minimum is more beneficial to one, rather than having a bunch that may not be that strong. This helps to build a healthy community, which includes people with a shared history or background, feeling safe and secure when it comes to sharing ideas, and people being engaged with one another consistently. However, sometimes, depending on the profession or community, we tend to have roles. In some communities, they may be given and in others, they may be self-assigned. The roles given could be classified into four different types, linking, lurking, learning, and leading, which are pretty self-explanatory when it comes to how people may react in interactive settings. 

    However, the most important part of networking is everyone's overall communication. If people feel more engaged and included in a work setting, it will make them want to enhance their skills further. Building trust, putting others first, creating passion, and making others feel heard are some of the key components to successful networking within your field. 

    Networking will be one of the most important skills in my future. I am still unsure exactly what I want to do in my future, but my major in communications in itself gives away that building cooperative relationships with others in my field will be one of the main goals. I would say the best way to get started for me is to connect with people on LinkedIn who are studying similar subjects or even people who attend Stockton. 

    My focus in my major is media production, which would require teamwork with others in a workspace to create a specific form of media, especially since certain people have specialties with different kinds of equipment. For example, let's say we were all working together in a work setting to create a short film. There are plenty of different roles when it comes to content creation. One person is in charge of directing, and another is in charge of filming. Certain people would also be in charge of other things such as converting, editing, or even audio. Everyone has a separate part in this creation, but the goal is to take the different roles and bring them together to create something as a whole. Building communication allows everything to fit together. People are going to have separate thoughts and points of view on things when it comes to being a team, but in the end, it will get resolved by commitment and agreements to have the best possible end result. Networking and teamwork are about filling in those gaps that create the differences in our thinking and how we want things to be done.