Networking at conferences

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You're coming across as clueless and entitled. Building relationships and contributing to your field is not "glad handling" and lots of working parents invest the time in it. Lots of scientists do as well. You didn't. Fine.
But nothing is going to work unless you figure out what you have to offer -- what's your brand beyond "I'm good at my job!", how to develop that, and who might hire you because of it. Otherwise, you will invest time and money in the wrong direction.

NP but I think OP is coming across as depressed and panicking.

OP, try to maintain calm and perspective. Nothing has happened yet but it’s good that you are considering your options should something happen. I agree with applying for jobs. Also try to brainstorm on what your skills are and how they can be applied. I’m not a scientist, I have no idea if there are headhunters or recruiters you should reach out to and whether that has any value.

I think internet searches and thinking and posting here and Reddit and asking around is part of information gathering. Are there associations or other professional organizations you are part of? Do you have a friend who has a cousin in a similar field that can offer pointers?

Let everyone know you are job searching is one tip I keep hearing again and again. Perhaps that will help uncover whether you know someone who knows someone who knows someone. Think beyond your professional connections - are you involved in your community or with you kids’ soccer team or something? You never know where the connections are going to come from.

Good luck - you’re not the only one in this situation, there are likely people out there who have been through it before and can offer advice.

[Anonymous]

People that are good at networking and do it naturally have no idea what it's like for people who are not/do not.

[Anonymous]

I don’t know that you’d get a great payout from conferences unless you are really good at networking. I find them useful, but mostly in a context where you have something beside “I’m looking for a job” to share and/or some relationships with people at the conference to either help make introductions or to further build that relationship.

It’s possible you might have more luck at those smaller meetings ups; even if others don’t have the jobs themselves, they may have connections to others in your general field.

I’m sorry. And good luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:People that are good at networking and do it naturally have no idea what it's like for people who are not/do not.

It's a skill like any other. Some people are good naturally, others develop it. All you have to do to be fine at is it to be friendly, curious about other people and their work, and able to draw connections between things and people you know and things other people are interested in. And even if you can just do those first two, that's not bad.

[Anonymous]

Network on Bluesky.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People that are good at networking and do it naturally have no idea what it's like for people who are not/do not.

It's a skill like any other. Some people are good naturally, others develop it. All you have to do to be fine at is it to be friendly, curious about other people and their work, and able to draw connections between things and people you know and things other people are interested in. And even if you can just do those first two, that's not bad.

Respectfully disagree.
Many people are friendly and curious and can practice that skill at the grocery store. Networking is a currency and the underlying feeling is that you want something from the other person (a job). The job, the money, the dependence is what is utterly detestable? ignominious? I can't think of the word-- to certain personality types. If you don't know, you can't know, and that's okay. Just don't be so glib and understand that there are personalities like this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:People that are good at networking and do it naturally have no idea what it's like for people who are not/do not.

It's a skill like any other. Some people are good naturally, others develop it. All you have to do to be fine at is it to be friendly, curious about other people and their work, and able to draw connections between things and people you know and things other people are interested in. And even if you can just do those first two, that's not bad.

Respectfully disagree.
Many people are friendly and curious and can practice that skill at the grocery store. Networking is a currency and the underlying feeling is that you want something from the other person (a job). The job, the money, the dependence is what is utterly detestable? ignominious? I can't think of the word-- to certain personality types. If you don't know, you can't know, and that's okay. Just don't be so glib and understand that there are personalities like this.

Well, yeah, if you go into networking from the perspective of you looking for a job from someone, that's not going to feel good. Go in looking to be useful and trying to build relationships and it'll be a lot better. If you wait to do until you're desperate and meeting strangers and need a job now, well, that was a choice. But that's not what most networking is.

[Anonymous]

Pivot to patent examining?

[Anonymous]

The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No one pays retail for those conferences. Submit a paper. There's a reason the acceptance rate is so high.

Depending on the conferene, an accepted presentation may mean free admission. If not, at most places, getting a paper accepted = your employer will pay for you entry fee, since you need to present.

Okay? My day to day job does not involve work conducive to a paper, so I just whip up a white paper on “folding widgets in a stressful environment “? Still kind of a lot of effort to go to conf, are people really mostly doing that?

Read the program or proceedings from last year's conference and you can get an idea of the rigor. A lot of conferences have a mix like some do presenatations or run a symposium, and other formats are submitted a paper that jsut gets filed in the proceedings or there's a poster session. The latter often has a really high acceptance rate, so look at those from last year to get an idea of the caliber.

An easy way if you aren't doing research is to do a "meta" paper on existing research on the topic and summarize that, perhaps empirically. That's a cop-out (ok, it does have some value) I see some people do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

I am very personable, always talking to people I meet about what they do and have a genuine curiosity about peoples work.

i have always been someone trying to connect people who may find it helpful to each other, to give people what advice i can. but as a fed employee its not like i can direct business or refer people to jobs, so i'm not "valuable" to people in that way. further, by nature of where i live, I NEVER run into someone in my line of work except at my office or a conference -- and like i said my office is very niche and people rarely leave to other jobs.

sending random people i've met links to an article i read? that is so gauche. maybe if we concretely talked about something it was a resource, but the whole "i saw this and thought of you" is pretty https://x.com/craponlinkedin?lang=en ...

but the long and short of it, is that no one is paying for themselves to go to conferences..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

I am very personable, always talking to people I meet about what they do and have a genuine curiosity about peoples work.

i have always been someone trying to connect people who may find it helpful to each other, to give people what advice i can. but as a fed employee its not like i can direct business or refer people to jobs, so i'm not "valuable" to people in that way. further, by nature of where i live, I NEVER run into someone in my line of work except at my office or a conference -- and like i said my office is very niche and people rarely leave to other jobs.

sending random people i've met links to an article i read? that is so gauche. maybe if we concretely talked about something it was a resource, but the whole "i saw this and thought of you" is pretty https://x.com/craponlinkedin?lang=en ...

but the long and short of it, is that no one is paying for themselves to go to conferences..

There’s a reason why you’re stuck in fed, and I made 500k last year, at a job I networked into. If you’re just going to negative Nancy everything, we can’t help you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

I am very personable, always talking to people I meet about what they do and have a genuine curiosity about peoples work.

i have always been someone trying to connect people who may find it helpful to each other, to give people what advice i can. but as a fed employee its not like i can direct business or refer people to jobs, so i'm not "valuable" to people in that way. further, by nature of where i live, I NEVER run into someone in my line of work except at my office or a conference -- and like i said my office is very niche and people rarely leave to other jobs.

sending random people i've met links to an article i read? that is so gauche. maybe if we concretely talked about something it was a resource, but the whole "i saw this and thought of you" is pretty https://x.com/craponlinkedin?lang=en ...

but the long and short of it, is that no one is paying for themselves to go to conferences..

There’s a reason why you’re stuck in fed, and I made 500k last year, at a job I networked into. If you’re just going to negative Nancy everything, we can’t help you.

Okay? I was very happy as Fed, I love my agencies mission and make the world a better place. But politics have decided that the work I do is not valuable, so now I'm trying to pivot. I explained the limitations of my current situation.

Did you really email people random articles to get your job? I'm guessing it's different interactions than that...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

I am very personable, always talking to people I meet about what they do and have a genuine curiosity about peoples work.

i have always been someone trying to connect people who may find it helpful to each other, to give people what advice i can. but as a fed employee its not like i can direct business or refer people to jobs, so i'm not "valuable" to people in that way. further, by nature of where i live, I NEVER run into someone in my line of work except at my office or a conference -- and like i said my office is very niche and people rarely leave to other jobs.

sending random people i've met links to an article i read? that is so gauche. maybe if we concretely talked about something it was a resource, but the whole "i saw this and thought of you" is pretty https://x.com/craponlinkedin?lang=en ...

but the long and short of it, is that no one is paying for themselves to go to conferences..

There’s a reason why you’re stuck in fed, and I made 500k last year, at a job I networked into. If you’re just going to negative Nancy everything, we can’t help you.

Are you a scientist? That is an amazing salary for that kind of role btw!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The key to networking is to be a valuable resource to someone else. Not to land a job. Change your frame of reference OP. Reach out, hey i thought of you when i read this, here’s the link, etc etc. It is not a personality trait. It’s an intention. A discipline.

I am very personable, always talking to people I meet about what they do and have a genuine curiosity about peoples work.

i have always been someone trying to connect people who may find it helpful to each other, to give people what advice i can. but as a fed employee its not like i can direct business or refer people to jobs, so i'm not "valuable" to people in that way. further, by nature of where i live, I NEVER run into someone in my line of work except at my office or a conference -- and like i said my office is very niche and people rarely leave to other jobs.

sending random people i've met links to an article i read? that is so gauche. maybe if we concretely talked about something it was a resource, but the whole "i saw this and thought of you" is pretty https://x.com/craponlinkedin?lang=en ...

but the long and short of it, is that no one is paying for themselves to go to conferences..

There’s a reason why you’re stuck in fed, and I made 500k last year, at a job I networked into. If you’re just going to negative Nancy everything, we can’t help you.

Okay? I was very happy as Fed, I love my agencies mission and make the world a better place. But politics have decided that the work I do is not valuable, so now I'm trying to pivot. I explained the limitations of my current situation.

Did you really email people random articles to get your job? I'm guessing it's different interactions than that...

You sound inept at networking tbh.
Yes, I have sent articles.. not random ones, specific ones, to colleagues who I know would appreciate and like them because we happened to be talking about AI two months ago
To others I sent Hey, How’s your youngest doing in college
To others I sent, Hey, there’s someone I met at a conference, young graduate, looking to break into marketing, can i point them to you
To others I sent, it was great meeting you, let’s do coffee soon, I want to hear more about your new gig