How does the Rainbow Theory work? You must build up a vibrant beautiful rainbow of connections, that represent all of the phases and aspects of your life. At the end of that Rainbow, is a pot of gold. How do you find that Pot of Gold? Get together in the real world with your online connections. Make times to meet your friends, family, connections for coffee or breakfast or drinks. When you get together in the real world with your online connections, you are exploring the pot of gold. Finding opportunity where only potential existed before.
So, how do we balance Quantity vs. Quality as we build out our network? Your strategy should be – Connect to everybody you know, or want to get to know better. 10% of your network should be Phat. people you don’t know, but might be interested in getting to know better. As your connections expand, the Phat factor is going to increase. Make the effort to get to know your connections and your Phat factor will decrease. Each year you should cut some Phat and give your network some room to expand with fresh Phat. You get the idea, make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other is gold.
There are no easy answers to the question of quantity vs. quality. What I can tell you is that nobody can limit the potential of your network like you can. If you add more connections, you create more opportunity or more potential. In the end, you must convert that potential into kinetic. You must put in the time and energy to get to know your network and understand the resources available to you. Apply the Rainbow Theory to your network, build a great big beautiful rainbow and find the pot of gold waiting for you – then share it with everybody you know.
I enjoyed your thoughts. This past weekend at my family reunion, I had a very spirited conversation about online networking (both professional and social), and what impact it would have on “human interaction” as we know it today. My relatives are from my parent’s generation who grew up in the 60′s and 70′s.
One was skeptical about the upside to online networks. She felt that as a society, we can not replace traditional relationship-building with a superficial “Quantity”-oriented approach. My other cousin felt that the sometimes superficial nature of online networks was really no different than networking in the real world today, and that online networking is simply the natural extension of traditional in-person networking. Neither is wildly excited about online networking.
I share your view that it is valuable if used as a TOOL to build real, human connections. Your blog here highlights this point, and is helpful in instructing users how to make the most of it.
Just like the telephone transformed communication, so too will online networking. With the telephone, people did not stop meeting in person. The older generation should curb their anxiety about the down-fall of human interaction, and embrace the upsides to having both “quantity” AND “quality” in their networks, both in-person, and online.
Noam – I agree with you. It is critical to use the tools for them to be effective. My experience has been that the skeptics are not using the tools properly or engaging in conversations (they are simply lurking). Glad to see you are engaging your family/friends in the discussion!