Networking: a Key To Career Communication and Management Consulting Success

Now that job security with one organization is a relic of the past and companies are outsourcing training and other "nonessential" functions, the author suggests in his career communication classes that students develop the same inventive strategies to plan their employment futures that management consultants use to market themselves in the 21st century. The most important of these skills is networking: the use of person-to-person, print, and electronic communication tools to alert potential employers that, as candidates, they are the confident, cooperative, uniquely qualified experts that companies seek. In this article, he describes six principles of networking success, principles that apply equally to looking for a job and to finding management consulting work.