Author Bio

My name is Kendra Zankl, I am a 4th-year Recreation and Leisure student at Brock University. In Fall 2022, I was enrolled in Dr. Corliss Bean’s ‘Recreation and Leisure Services Field Experience’ course and completed my placement with Canadian Girls Baseball. Canadian Girls Baseball is a nationally reaching organization dedicated to empowering girls through sport. They offer a variety of programming to girl-identifying youth with the aim of fostering safe and fun environments, improving leadership and teamwork skills, and bolstering confidence. While working with this organization, I helped plan a program, promote the program to the prospective participants, and researched possible funding opportunities to sustain and expand their programming. In the following blog written as part of my coursework for Dr. Bean’s class, I reflect on the importance of networking and communication through my placement experience.

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What is Networking?

Networking is referred to as “the process of making connections and building relationships” (Columbia, 2022). Essentially, every new person you meet can build your repertoire of connections in personal, educational, or professional contexts. Networking typically involves an exchange of information, ideas, and even contact information. Genuine connections take time, effort, and mutual understanding, so it is always a good idea to start early and stay consistent! In a survey from 2016, up to 85% of all job positions were found and filled through networking (Adler, LinkedIn).

Why Does Networking Matter?

Connections are opportunities. For every connection or relationship established, you open the door for a plethora of new connection opportunities. For example, you could be at your university’s career fair and connect well with someone running a booth for a specific company. Once that connection is made, you can meet people with potential connections to your ideal job position through that initial meeting. Just one relationship can open the door to many opportunities and further connections. The same goes for every aspect of life, even outside of work. For instance, making a connection with university alumni can open doors for university connections and pathways, just as making connections with like-minded people can lead to becoming part of influential public circles and fostering lifelong friendships.

Networking and Communication

Before you can network effectively, you must first understand how to communicate effectively. Brock University defines effective communication as the ability to effectively convey and receive information, through multiple forms of communication (e.g., verbal, non-verbal, and written), to a variety of audiences and in a variety of settings and situations. To simplify, this entails being able to connect and communicate with those around you through speech, text, body language, and more.

I have had the opportunity to develop my communication skills through my placement with Canadian Girls Baseball. The first skill I developed was written communication. Prior to this practicum, I had average communication skills, both verbal and written, without any concrete plans for improvement. I have always struggled with verbal communication as I have a speech impediment that makes it difficult for me to share my thoughts and opinions in front of a crowd, so improving my written communication skills was a necessary event. I formulated social media posts to promote our program we had planned, reaching out to a variety of online groups to spread the word, as well as communicating with an outreach coordinator through email. By writing consistent and frequent emails, I was able to get practice in communicating clearly, both formally and informally, through written means.

Another skill I developed was active listening. Sometimes people can exhibit passive engagement and listening where they’re hearing the words but not devoting their full attention to them. As a result, information is not always fully understood or processed. I had to kick this habit during my placement as it was up to me to take in brief directions, fully understand them, and use them to complete my own tasks. I learned to block out distractions while in meetings or receiving information, including background noise, my cell phone, or any other extenuating factors that would prevent me from being totally present in the conversation. This helped me retain more information than I had done in the past, and I had to ask fewer clarifying questions as I understood the instructions more clearly the first time around. I also had to be able to look deeper into previous social media posts, read the comments, and see what worked and what didn’t in terms of promotion to take that information and apply it to my own posts I was writing.

Lastly, I got a lot of practice being concise when communicating. As the practicum went on, and I was sending more emails and writing more posts, I learned that concise, clear messaging was best received by both myself and the individuals I was reaching out to. I got into the practice of removing unnecessary text from my emails and posts, keeping enough detail to keep them interesting and engaging but ensuring everything present was necessary and adding value to the post/communication.

In sum, networking is the basis of every great opportunity. It allows you to make meaningful and mutually beneficial connections in your field, create new professional and personal relationships, and improve your communication skills. During my placement with Canadian Girls Baseball, I was able to finetune my communication skills through continual practice with my supervisor and community members, experience recreation in a professional setting, and make connections in my field and within the community that I can take with me into my future career.

References
Adler, L. (2016, February 29). New survey reveals 85% of all jobs are filled via networking. LinkedIn. Retrieved October 21, 2022, from https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/new-survey-reveals-85-all-jobs-filled-via-networking-lou-adler/

Indeed Editorial Team. (2021, September 7). Why is networking important? (with benefits and tips). Indeed Career Guide. Retrieved October 20, 2022, from https://ca.indeed.com/career-advice/finding-a-job/why-is-networking-important

Vest, A. (2014, July 28). How to network the right way: Eight tips. Forbes. Retrieved October 20, 2022, from https://www.forbes.com/sites/theyec/2014/07/28/how-to-network-the-right-way-eight-tips/?sh=51b5084c6d47

What is networking, and why do you need to do it? Columbia University Center for Career Education. (2022). Retrieved October 20, 2022, from https://www.careereducation.columbia.edu/resources/what-networking-and-why-do-you-need-do-it