When it comes to building a business or network it can be useful to arrange people on a series of concentric circles.
The inner ring, ok, the “inner circle,” is comprised of people with whom we are the most intimate and honest. These people know our secrets, and love us anyway. With these folks we can share our hopes, dreams and disappointments. Our politics, assessments, and opinions. We can ask inner circle people for help and favors even as we look for ways to help them achieve their own aspirations. There is reciprocal care, concern, regard and support. There is no “right” number of people comprising the inner circle. Too many and we may not be able to fully reciprocate and support them all; too few and life can be lonely and more difficult. Rather than work toward some number, seek to grow the quality of the inner circle. Attract and hold on to those who have integrity, ambition, proficiency and compatible values.
As we progress to outer rings, our relationships are less intimate. Consequently, the farther from “core” a person is, the less likely we are to trust, to make requests, to disclose confidential information. At the outer edges are people who are acquaintances. We might transact with them, stay in light touch, but they tend not to have a deep, reciprocal relationships with us.
Why is this useful? One application is job hunting. One client wanted to advance to the next level in her profession. She had been thwarted in past attempts. In formulating a campaign strategy, I asked two questions:
1. Who do you know that could have a positive influence on the hiring decision?
2. Where do they fall on your map of concentric circles?
For example, she knew an influential senior VP, but just barely. In other words, the VP was outer circle. It seemed unlikely that this executive would offer much help, so why even ask? It might waste future political capital. There was another VP who was a strong supporter. She jumped at the chance to help my client, loudly singing her praises. We carried this thinking through and wound up with six influential people who were close enough to her inner circle that they were willing to lend support. Ultimately, she got the job.
One important note in this happy story: my client invested months or years in cultivating these people before asking for their support. She gladly helped them, stayed in touch, acted with integrity, acknowledged them, and spoke well of them. Hence, when the time came to ask for their help, they were glad to support her case.
Another application involves customers. Take a stab at situating your clients on the grid of concentric circles. Almost certainly you have customers who transact with you in a mostly impersonal, mutual use relationship. In other words, they are in an outer circle. If you raised your price, they might ditch you. On the other hand, your best customers probably know you or some of your people really well, care about them, and would feel personal pain at the prospect of losing you as a resource partner. These inner circle clients are the ones to cultivate, nurture and hang on to. You have to screw up pretty badly to lose their business. But you can never take them for granted. You must continue to search for ways to help them. Meanwhile, you might investigate the value of firing some of those outer circle clients. They can be royal pains!
Where somone falls on the circles is not an objective matter. It is invented based on observations, interactions, and experiences. Your first impression of someone you meet at a networking event may be tepid, so you initially place him on an outer ring. But the next time you encounter the person, he remembers you, passes along a referral, and demonstrates greater depth than you initially experienced. Consequently, this person might jump in a few circles. This is a simple illustration of how we continuously make assessments, and then revise those assessments over time as new data surfaces. But at least the circle map provides an orientation and framework for who you might approach and how you might approach them.
What do your circles look like? Are you intentionally working on ways to add to your circles? What steps could you take to attract higher quality people to your inner circles? Where do you fit in the circle maps of others?