Lesson Overview

One of the most important ways to put NetWeaving into action is by hosting meetings to introduce two or more people to each other.  These meetings can either be done in-person with you, the NetWeaver, physically hosting the meeting and acting as moderator/facilitator, or the introduction can be made virtually online, but still with you as the moderator/facilitator.

The 5-step method explained in the previous lesson illustrates that often these hosting meetings are a follow up to a one-on-one meeting held earlier with someone you have recently met and now you are ‘hosting’ a meeting to introduce that person to someone whom you know and who you believe the other person would benefit meeting.

It’s helpful at the start of the meeting, to set the tone by providing a brief overview of the NetWeaving concept. One good way is to print out a copy of The NetWeaver’s Creed for each person and just quickly review the key points. Click here to Download.

Strategic Meetings:  Most meetings you host will be strategic, meaning that you already have in mind how the two people may be able to help each other, or what they have in common.

Non-Strategic Meetings:  Other times, the meeting might be non-strategic, meaning you aren’t sure what the two people have in common or how they might be able to help each other, but you consider both of them to be interesting and successful people, and who are both givers, not takers, and you believe that they would really enjoy meeting each other.  Some of the fun and mutually beneficial meetings you ever set up will be this kind.

Hosting an in-person meeting is usually more powerful than a virtual one, but in today’s rapid pace world, getting three people together can be real work.  If you are a consultant, speaker, trainer, or personal or business coach, ‘hosting’ meetings in-person are still very powerful.

As was pointed out before in the 5-Step lesson, the major disappointment that Bob experienced over the 20+ years during which he had been speaking and writing on the power of hosting ‘in-person’ meetings resulted from how few people were actually holding this type of meeting.  Realistically though, especially when it involved connecting and hosting a meeting for two highly-connected people, the major barriers that stood in the way involved:

1. the time and effort involved in setting up the meeting,
2. coordinating the schedules of 3 (or more) time-strapped people;
3. the logistics involved with the location, etc.

With Zoom, as well as with Google Meet, WebEx and other online tools, which now allow ‘virtual’ face-to-face introductions and connections, these barriers have been almost completely eliminated, at least for short ‘face-to-face’ introductions. These can then be followed up by lengthier ‘virtual meetings’, or actual ‘in-person’ meetings, to which both parties subsequently enthusiastically want to make happen.  In today’s world, ANY serious NetWeaver can set up at least a few virtual ‘hosting’ meetings each month.

Assume you are on the phone with someone, and as you’re focused on the above “who do I know?” question you say, “Jane, as you and I were talking, I just thought of someone whom you really need to meet. 

Why don’t you send me your bio and some information on your company, and I’ll have the person I have in mind do the same, and I’ll send theirs to you. Then, after you review his or her bio and information, and assuming you both would like to meet, I’d like to host a meeting and serve as the moderator/facilitator. 

We could certainly meet in-person, but if both of your schedules are very crammed, I’m sure we can find a half hour or an hour for me to set up and host a ‘virtual’ meeting online.  Would that be alright with you assuming this is someone you would really like to meet?