The #LinkedIn company we keep

The world is indeed a small place. Ever get the feeling everyone worth knowing knows everyone else in one way or another?

And the benefit of having high quality connections is that they are able to address your abilities and needs and connect you with other high quality connections. Like seeks like kind.

I have written in the past of the privilege of connecting to others on LinkedIn: their unique relationship to you and yours to them, a 50-50 proposition.

Each side gives to the other in a very rich way: willingly offering more than they theoretically expect to receive back, reciprocally, and somehow when enough of this happens the world is in perfect equilibrium, and great things do result.

Be sure that keeping great company satiated is a full time effort. In our fast-paced and seemingly unwieldy world, concentrating on being there for the “right” people is a noble use of precious time; dropping the “wrong” people is sometimes necessary, adding new “right” people is also a way to continue to grow the circle. But it comes with the responsibility of feeding and nurturing the elastic circle continuously.

Nurturing? LinkedIn provides that of course: sharing materials worth reading, providing thought leadership to help others feed their food chain, making the right introductions, and offering assistance when needed, even if not requested outright.

Which presumes we all have incredibly compelling profiles.

Use LinkedIn well. It will serve you even better.