Networks help us find resources, jobs and friends. And while networking in real life or online comes naturally to many of us, the challenge of being "un-networked" is real and potentially costly, according to Meg Garlinghouse, Head of Social Impact for the professional networking platform LinkedIn. The good news, Garlinghouse said, is that with some effort, we can reduce that roadblock. Garlinghouse spoke at a May 10 fundraising lunch for United Way of Greater Topeka.
Garlinghouse, who grew up in Topeka, returned home to talk with Topekans about using social media platforms to increase connections within communities and about the responsibility we all have to reach beyond our traditional networks to include voices less like ourselves.
People who grew up in households that valued and used professional networking have the advantage over those who lack those experiences, be it for social, racial or economic reasons. Young adults who grew up in poverty may not have had access to networks of employers, mentors and teachers that their more affluent peers did. They have not grown up watching how their parents and other influential adults access those networks. So even as they graduate high school and college, they still may lag behind in their understanding of and access to professional networking and its potential benefits.
Garlinghouse noticed this among her own network with the requests for one-to-one meetings. She was shocked to realize that the people reaching out to her for information were not very diverse.
This year, she decided to track who was reaching out and how they were contacting her. In January, she received 17 informational interview requests and this is what they looked like:
Garlinghouse says in a LinkedIn post that "LinkedIn’s vision is to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. The social impact team that I lead focuses specifically on those not born into opportunity and lack access to networks, or social capital. It has become increasingly clear to me that if you are not born into a family or community that has access to these network, the barriers to opportunity are often insurmountable."
Her personal solution is called +1. You can read more about it on LinkedIn. Read the coverage of Meg's presentation in the Topeka Capital-Journal.