The importance of networking

For today, and also tomorrow, my challenge is to write a bit shorter posts. Tomorrow I need to keep it short because the day will be shorter than usual for me since I will travel to Stockholm in the afternoon. I will meet up with my father that will travel up from my birth-town Kalmar. We found some new relatives that we are going to visit. We are a tiny family so I am of course curious to expand my family network.

I know this is supposed to be a work related blog but since I started to tell you about my weekend plans I would also like to tell you that I spent last evening doing something important, also related to networking. I have signed up for a volunteering project where I will be a mentor for a teenager for one year. I had four hours of training last night including some real cases to discuss. Now I just need to be matched with my young person which will be female like me. I think mentor.se is a great organization and I am eager to see where this will lead.

Yesterday, as well as today, has been overwhelmingly busy at work. If you read my 1-20 morning from Tuesday´s post I can tell you that that was a "version light". Today I felt, just like yesterday, that I am not getting anywhere. And time is just flying! Luckily this is one of those extraordinary busy weeks and I am trying to tell myself, when I feel insufficient, that I can only do my best.

When it is chaotic it is extra important to switch environment for a while to give the brain a break. Today I went to have lunch with the other Executive Assistants in GTT and after that we viewed some conference facilities. Even though I had so much work that I felt I would have needed to skip it I decided to go. Those kinds of activities are also important! And it gave a chance to meet with the other ladies. I am very happy with our great network of 11 SVP assistants. I always feel there is someone to turn to.

The networking part is something I really enjoy in this profession. I network a lot all the time so I get enough chances to improve my skills! It is part of the job to keep good relations and to know who to turn to in all the various situations that constantly come up. A new welcoming network is EUMA, European Management Assistants, which I would like to take the opportunity to highlight here. I went with a colleague to EUMA West´s Christmas dinner last year and immediately liked the friendly and professional atmosphere. I decided to join just recently and was also able to take part of the 8 June seminar day in Malmö, arranged exemplary by EUMA South. I am now looking forward to expand my network even more. I definitely think good networking skills is a huge success factor for us assistants! Thumbs up for EUMA!