The Importance of Networking as a Student
By: Soukayna Ikhiche
Tags: Business, Career Advice, Students, Networking Tips, Education

The Importance of Networking as a Student

What makes you stand out from the crowd is often the one thing you’re trying to hide or make go unnoticed

The first day I entered a classroom in my life — I had fallen into a puddle when leaving the bus at the entry of the primary school while wearing my first ever school white uniform. You might wonder what this has to do with the title of this article — but on top of being one of the most memorable moments of my childhood, it does relate perfectly.

What happened on that day, is that I entered the classroom with a giant brown stain on my clothing — and I still remember right now the feeling of disappointment and the unsuccessful attempt to hide it. I was 7 years old, I had moved from Morocco to Florence (Italy) recently and I spoke no word of Italian in a class of only Italian speakers — with a brown-spotted white uniform, not a good way to make new friends I’d say.

I don’t fully remember the complete day, and honestly, I won’t deny it was also because I didn’t understand a word of what everyone was saying. But one thing I remember is when I first walked in the classroom following the other kids, I knew everybody had noticed that on top of not speaking a word of Italian, I had decided to stand out in such a way. Following explanations and introductions, I remember us all playing a drawing game where we were put in groups and each group had to draw two kids from the class, while everyone else needed to guess who they were and their names. This was supposed to be an excellent way for us to get to know each other and memorize names faster. In a class of 30 children where we all drew like crap — and God forgive me for such a statement — the game turned out to be pretty much engaging.

What happened afterward is that a girl’s drawing had everyone have fingers pointed out at me and to the kid sitting in my group, as well. I remember reaching out to the drawing and then looking at him with a huge smile when realizing that he was the only red-haired one in the class, and how easy it had been for everyone to spot him up. In my case, my long hair in a ponytail or my big eyes weren’t what had caught the attention. I was the only one who had been drawn with a brown stain on her uniform instead of a white clean one on. It clearly appeared as obvious who the drawing was representing, and although it didn’t make me feel at ease at first, after a full day of drawing and painting in a typical primary school class, nobody really had a perfectly white uniform anymore.

Yet, I still had made enough impression to get my name remembered.

The truth is that looking back at such a small memory; it appears that the reality of the situation is very simple, and applies no matter the age or circumstances. The thing which makes you stand out from the crowd is often the one you’re trying to hide or make go unnoticed.

The first impression which I gave was the thing that made me stand out the most — and it was up to me to make sure I could use that attention in a way that would make me feel good and not feel excluded. After that first day impression, I would still raise my hand in class even if I didn’t know how to perfectly formulate the answer to a question, without being scared of being wrong. I would still try and embrace the reality of being the brown-uniform-stained little girl who didn’t speak a word of everyone else’s language and had no Italian accent at all as she spoke.

And that is probably the best trait we develop as kids — not thinking too much about things and simply taking action: This, is the first rule of socializing as a kid, the first step of networking in your professional adult life, and also the starting point to developing human connections in your personal life. Taking the risk to jump across the worries, limits, or barriers established in your mind and accepting the possibility of not sounding as perfect as you wanted to in the first place, yet still trying.

What happens as we grow up, is that this becomes more and more difficult since new factors enter into consideration, and this often tends to block us from taking the extra mile in building connections. Yet, do you realize the power of what could happen right now if you followed your first instinct of connecting to a person, asking someone about something of your interest, or attending an event you have heard about?

Talking from experience, I know that as students we often tend to think being fully immersed in classes and succeeding in exams will make us jump milestones and boost our professional careers — and trust me, I wouldn’t minimize how much school and education are important. Yet the biggest life-changing experiences you will meet in your life will be brought by the people you’ve engaged yourself in a conversation with, outside of the school walls.

Right now, we live in a society where the Internet gives us access to such a wide amount of information. Whatever subject you could be interested in, the job you want to achieve or passion to develop, there is an event about it, and a person who masters those skills you are aspiring to learn.

Use your power as a student, to not only seek for theory but develop a smart approach to practice. Consider this: you could have all the knowledge of the world, University degrees, and diplomas to prove it, but if you don’t communicate, share, learn and teach other people, it won’t be entirely valued or recognized. We learn the most when we teach, and we teach the best after we have been learning to teach someone else.

Don’t let things fool you — school will open the doors to interesting fields of knowledge and creativity, but you’ve got to make the right stops on the way and meet people who will contribute by bringing extra factors to your professional career.

The possibility to establish new connections virtually in our era, allows us to gain great visibility and acquire experience on things that tackle our interests. And what could be greater than saving time in making professional choices that could not satisfy you, by educating yourself about your interests first?

Whatever field you’re into right now, there is more of it out there. Get ready to go grab all of it. Let go of the idea that your school experience will set the pillars of your career, and embrace the idea that not every law, medicine, business, or art student has the same approach to the same courses.

Talk to people and collect experiences and ideas, those will often bring a quicker answer than anything else you could try, on top of developing your communication skills.

Allow your ideas, passions, and centers of interest to contribute to building your professional career, and invest in developing them as well — they make a part of who you are, and are what makes you stand out among every other person.