Australians to Learn the Value of Networking

Australians to Learn the Value of Networking

Learning Seat and BConsulted announce partnership

Online training and compliance management centre, Learning Seat today encouraged Australians to use the upcoming Christmas party season to help improve career prospects.

The company today announced that it had signed BConsulted, Australia’s leading business relationship consultancy, to provide six modules to Learning Seat’s course library.

These six modules are based on the P.E.O.P.L.E development program:

• P = Prepare: Take control of your outcomes and lay the foundations of how to effectively prepare yourself for success at a networking event.
• E = Evolve: Learn anchoring techniques to change your attitude, thereby raising your levels of self-confidence
• O = Observe: 10 techniques on what to be aware of when observing yourself and others during networking event
• P = Prioritise: 10 techniques to help you maximise your time at a networking event so that you can get the most out of the experience and effectively build rapport with prospects and clients.
• L = Listen: Tools you need to actively listen, by focusing on strategies to better recall names, initiate a structured conversation, recap key points, ‘listen’ to body language, and keep your perspective.
• E = Evaluate: Techniques to help you evaluate your networking efforts and assess if it was a worthwhile networking event for you.

Michael Solomon, chief executive officer of Learning Seat emphasised the importance of relationship-building and networking.

“Relationship-building and networking is one of the most underrated aspects of building your value as an employee both in your company and in your industry.

“The relationships made with colleagues help boost productivity and the relationships built with industry peers help enhance your knowledge in the industry.

“There is truth to the statement; it’s about who you know that counts.”

Each year companies spend millions of dollars on association memberships, functions and hospitality events. They rely heavily on networking for new business generation, as well as for managing relationships with existing clients.

Research at institutions such as Harvard and M.I.T. has consistently shown that employees’ personal networks are in many cases the single biggest factor impacting their productivity and ability to contribute to the company.

Julia Palmer, business relationship specialist and managing director of BConsulted said that networking and career development went hand-in-hand.

“The ability to network effectively and develop relationships is the foundation for a successful business, career and/or professional relationship. “Skills that may sound simple such as how to approach a group of people, starting the right conversations and knowing how to excuse yourself from a conversation can actually be quite daunting and can have pretty unexpected implications.”

Mr. Solomon added: “With the Christmas party season just around the corner, I hope the addition of these networking courses will help our customers use Christmas parties to help build relationships with both internal and external industry colleagues.

“At Learning Seat, we are dedicated to providing our customers with the best and most essential skills required to best benefit an employees position in a business and this includes networking and relationship building.” For more information, visit http://www.learningseat.com.