Forwarding Is the New Networking

Michael Schrage recently wrote a post on this site about the importance of forwarding information as a way to enhance network relationships. He’s right about this, although the title — “The Disadvantage of Twitter and Facebook” — is misleading (and inaccurate, since people retweet things all the time — but sadly, editors know that anything with Facebook and Twitter in the title gets a lot of page views and retweets). Forwarding is the new networking. The fact that you can’t do it easily on Facebook is about as relevant as the inability to do it over the telephone or the Dictaphone.

OK, it’s not really the new networking, since it’s been going on for more than a decade now. Smart networkers saw early on that forwarded email content was a way to nurture network relationships.

In 2005, Rob Cross, Sue Cantrell, and I found evidence of it in some research we did on knowledge workers in four companies. The highest performers in those companies (as identified by their performance ratings) were disproportionately good networkers. They had more people in their networks, were more likely to be sought out by others, and were more likely to exchange valued information with their network members — all compared to average performance workers. They consciously cultivated their networks — and not by handing out business cards at “networking events” or by issuing LinkedIn invitations. They offered information and other items of value to their networks.

Some of the high performers we interviewed specifically mentioned that they did large amounts of selective forwarding. That is, when they saw an online item that they knew would be interesting or useful to a member of their network, they forwarded it. It’s a way of saying, “I know what you’re interested in, and I’m thinking about you.”

Of course, you can go too far with forwarding — as both a forwarder and a recipient of forwards. Here are a couple of things to avoid:

Don’t be a mass forwarder. Many of the people who commented on Michael’s post said they got too many indiscriminate forwards. I would guess that most of those are sent to lists, not individuals. Forwarding to a list (or retweeting to a list of followers, BTW) cheapens the networking value of the act. It’s the online equivalent of finding a credit card offer from Capital One in your mailbox.

Don’t forward items you believe are humorous to a large list. Why? Because it’s a good way to offend someone — chances are good that someone won’t find it funny at all. And some people don’t like to waste work time on jokes, cartoons, funny videos, and so forth.

Being a recipient of forwarded information can be rewarding socially, but it’s not a substitute for a personal information strategy. A number of years ago a GE executive told me, “I only read articles that other people forward to me.” That seemed a haphazard way to acquire the content you need to do your job effectively.

When we found in the above-mentioned research that the best performers were the best networkers, I wondered which way the causal arrow went. Did their high performance help their networking, or did their conscientious networking help their performance? I always suspected that it was the latter.