Job Connections Start as Social Connections

Indeed, we do. Fireman herself is where she is today because of an easy social setting.

She was at a conference a few years back, chatting with people who worked at New York University.

They hit it off. Then they invited her to skip out on a few sessions and join them at the pool. There, she met their boss, executive director for NYU's career center.

The boss and Fireman were in the pool when they started chatting about what Fireman did before her current job. Fireman told her how much she loved training.

After a while conversing about their backgrounds and experiences, the director asked Fireman to do a training session at the career center. "That's what launched the business. We were in the pool together," Fireman said.

So maybe that's all it takes to find our career path. Hanging out. Well, if only it were that easy. It scares most of us because of that old fear-of-rejection thing. (S ee also: Campbell's bad date. )

Diane Darling, founder of Effective Networking Inc. and author of "The Networking Survival Guide," is a self-proclaimed introvert. She admits to playing solitaire on her Palm during intermission at the Boston Symphony recently.

"I completely understand the pain of introverts," she said. Which is why she feels it is her mission to teach people that networking can be fun and easy. And that they should realize they are networking in essentially every conversation they have.

But many people balk at the thought of networking because they think they have to sell themselves just to the higher-ups. That's not always the case. And in fact, it may not even be smart because then the person is using untested skills on someone who needs to make the final decision, not the first one.

Start small, Darling says. She likes to talk to people in airports about their roller bags. It gets a conversation going, and she never knows where it will end up.

People often find clients, work and contacts through things that have nothing to do with their jobs, she said. "People who let themselves be something other than their profession," she said, find they are networking without realizing it.

Volunteerism is how Darling got her start. Years ago, she was helping to put together an organization for women in technology. One of the women at the event noted that Darling was a great networker.

"I was insulted. I didn't think I was networking because I was so authentic," Darling said. But she thought about it and ended up giving a workshop to 30 of the women about how she networked.

You guessed it: Someone in the group later wanted to hire her.

Fireman also has seen how volunteering at events in the D.C. area has helped people land jobs. "I'm a big believer in: If you live and breathe the space, something's going to happen."

She recently held a networking event at a club after work, where a hip-hop artist performed. She's not sure if anyone got a job or contract out of it yet, but two people who went to the networking event are now dating.

And so it may be that networking works both ways: Campbell's friend jokes that he should look for a date at Monster.com.

Join Amy from 11 a.m. to noon on Tuesday to discuss your life at work at washingtonpost.com. You can e-mail her with your column ideas at lifeatwork@washpost.com.