The day I crashed a networking event

If you have been looking for work lately you’ll probably know how important networking is said to be. You might also know how awkward an experience this often is. I remember a few conferences I have been to when I was still doing university research where I didn’t know anyone and found it quite difficult to make the first step towards a stranger, who probably felt as forlorn as myself. Everyone wearing suits didn’t help the situation since most academics are not used to dressing formally, so they are uncomfortable to begin with.

I can only imagine that it is a bit like when a lad tries to chat up a lassie in a bar and needs to come up with a good opening line - which is the easier part. Because keeping the conversation going is the actual hard part which can’t really be prepared for since you never know how the lassie is going to respond to the advances. Except that the analogy isn’t quite right, because at a designated networking event people are supposed to talk to strangers and expect to be approached by strangers. And people are extra nice about it.

I had found out about this particular event on Twitter. It was organised by SETN, the Scottish Environmental Technology Network, and it sounded like a smallish, laid-back networking event for environmental technology businesses, some of them quite young and small. I had emailed the organiser to ask politely if I could attend - just out of interest, and just representing myself. They were very nice about it, and when I showed up at the venue, a conference room in Edinburgh’s King James Hotel, I received a badge with my name and - instead of a company name - “Independent” on it. According to the participant list, I was the only attendant who didn’t represent anything other than herself. Which also meant that I was the only job hunter present. Which was scary but great. Great because I remember three large career fairs I went to at conferences in Boston, Baltimore and Chicago, where postdocs and graduating students formed long lines at the recruiters’ booths. This was suboptimal for everyone: Candidates were under pressure timewise and because they had to try hard to stand out and impress, and the staff of the recruiting companies were overwhelmed as well. Candidates basically just ended up standing in line to hand their resumes over in person - proper informal interviews were hardly possible. And it was a bit scary because being “Independent”, all I had to offer was my labor and my sparkling personality.

About 13 delegates had short presentations prepared - five slides, 30 seconds for each slide. Some struggled a bit with the strict format but that added to the entertainment. They introduced themselves, their organisation, their products and services. One business I found particularly interesting used worms to treat wastewater. They usually concluded with a fun fact about themselves so we learned that one delegate was also a recreational competiton-winning sheep breeder, and another one a yacht instructor without a yacht.

When the presentations were over, people in the audience who hadn’t spoken yet were invited to quickly introduce themselves to make the subsequent active networking part more effective. A few people did, and I thought what the heck, I’m out of my comfort zone already, so if I crash a networking event with 40 potential future employers I might as well do it properly. So I stood up and said something along the lines:

My name is Maike Waldmann, I’m a scientist - chemistry mainly, and I last worked at Princeton University. I then took a gap year to travel around the world, but I liked Scotland best, so I moved here. I came here to this event mostly out of curiosity and for my interest in everything green. But if you need any scientific advice or want to offer me a position as a scientific adviser please come and talk to me.

See what I did there? I nonchalantly mentioned the big P word, told everyone how great their country is (it is!!), and half-jokingly mentioned the kind of job I am looking for. And it turned out that people weren’t repelled by my shameless sales pitch - far from it. People approached me to offer career advice, new leads as for who to contact or which organisation or websites to look up. I even talked to Tanya and Colin from SETN about working in their labs in Glasgow on a voluntary basis to get a foot in the door and make more connections. And finally, there were free drinks and food, and the salmon risotto was amazing. And I had my picture drawn by Janine from Too Cute To Handle, who did a lovely and quite flattering job.

I am only sorry I didn’t get around to talk to the worms guy.