This is a rebroadcast of Episode 46.

Synopsis

In this episode, Dr. Misner talks about strategic alliances and the need to gradually enhance relationships. Each member of a BNI group will contribute to your success. No one person in your chapter is likely to turn your business around, but together, over a long time, they can make a difference.

* Don’t give up if there’s no immediate payoff.

* Successful networking is a series of small actions.

* By working with multiple people over a long period of time, you build your business.

Sponsored by Networking Now.

Complete Transcription of BNI Podcast Episode 046 –

Priscilla Rice:

Hello everybody and welcome back to the Official BNI Podcast brought to you by networkingnow.com, the leading site on the net for networking downloadables. I am Priscilla Rice and I’m coming from Live Oak Recording Studio which is in Berkeley, California. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and Chairman of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. How are you, Ivan?

Ivan Misner:

I’m doing great, Priscilla, and I am talking to you from BNI headquarters in southern California.

Priscilla:

That’s nice. Is it raining there today?

Ivan:

It is but it’s usually beautiful and sunny here.

Priscilla:

Well, tell us what you are going to talk about today, Ivan.

Ivan:

I am going to talk about strategic alliances and how a series of small actions over time can really yield big results. I was recently speaking to a friend of mine who’s a partner in an international consulting and training company. In a conversation we discovered we had a mutual acquaintance who’s a best-selling author and fairly well known speaker, this mutual acquaintance of ours.

In our discussion, we found out that he had contacted each of us individually to see if there were any possibilities of some sort of strategic alliance with our companies. We were both open to that possibility, but we really couldn’t see any immediate or dramatic ways that our companies could link up with this guy at that particular moment for any specific projects.

We were both kind of amused in talking to each other. We discovered and figured out that there was no big deal that we could do right then and there, and we were pretty much dropped from his radar. There was no response to e-mails or any other attempts to connect from him after that. They were subtle things. We would send an e-mail and it would take months practically to get any kind of response. We got the sense that he was looking for one big alliance that would help his company just soar to the next level.

That realization started a conversation with him and I, this consultant, that night about the difference in the relationship between the two of us and this third-party who wanted to have a connection with us. Ironically, we had the same type of phone call. This consultant and I had the same kind of phone call 18 months earlier. We came to the same conclusion that there was nothing on a grand scale that we could do together at that moment.

But the difference was the rest of the story. He and I agreed to stay in touch and we did. We connected several times over the year. We met in person on several occasions. During that time, we found some really simple ways that we can help each other. We gradually enhanced the relationship. This is a sharp contrast to the third party that we had talked to individually. When this person didn’t see any big payoff, we became kind of persona nongrata to him.

The other reason is that the two of us found ways to help each other gradually,