Last week, a former client sent me a message.
“Former” because she reached her goal. She landed the job she actually wanted. Not through applications. Not through a recruiter. Through a conversation she almost didn’t have, with someone she thought was too senior to bother.
One message. One coffee chat. One door that opened everything.
She told me: “I knew networking mattered. I just didn’t know where to start.”
I hear that sentence almost every week. From smart, capable professionals who are ready for something new but stuck in a loop of applying, waiting, and refreshing their inbox.
If that sounds familiar, keep reading.
Why Networking Feels So Hard
The standard advice is: go to events, be visible, add people on LinkedIn.
It’s not wrong. It’s just incomplete.
Because it skips the part where you figure out what you actually want to say. And it skips the part where you’re staring at a blank message draft, cursor blinking, not knowing how to start without sounding desperate.
Networking isn’t one skill. It’s three distinct areas. Each one is genuinely complex. And most people try to do all three at once without realising they’re even different things.
Here’s what actually works.
Step 1: Get Clear on What You’re Bringing
Before you reach out to anyone, you need to know what you stand for professionally.
Not your job title. Not a list of skills from your CV. What you’re genuinely good at, what kind of work energises you, and what you want more of.
This is positioning. And it’s the hardest of the three steps, because it requires real honesty. Most professionals at a crossroads have a fuzzy answer here. They know their history, but they’re not yet sure what the next chapter should look like.
Here’s something most networking advice forgets: good networking is give, give, take. Before you think about what you want from a conversation, it’s worth asking what you can offer. And figuring that out is part of the work too. What do you know that others don’t? Where can you open a door for someone else? I explore this with clients every day, and the answer is almost never obvious at first. But finding it changes how you show up entirely.
Getting this clear changes everything. You stop over-explaining yourself. You know which opportunities are actually worth pursuing. And when someone asks “so, what are you looking for?” you have a real answer.
Step 2: Map What’s Already There
Most people think they don’t have a network. They do. They just haven’t looked at it properly.
Your network isn’t only your last team and a handful of LinkedIn connections. It’s former colleagues now in interesting roles. Classmates who are 15 years into their careers. People you met briefly, worked with once, or stayed in loose touch with. Second-degree connections who are one warm introduction away.
Mapping this is its own process. You’re figuring out where you have real access, where the gaps are, and who could genuinely influence your next move.
In my work with professionals across the DACH region, I’ve seen it again and again: once people map their network honestly, they find far more leverage than they expected. And then they can expand intentionally, not randomly, not desperately, but with a clear sense of what relationships they actually need.
Step 3: Reach Out Like a Human
This is where the freeze happens.
You know who you want to contact. You open a new message. You type something, delete it, type again. You close the tab. Three weeks pass.
What you’re missing isn’t courage. It’s a framework.
There’s a way to reach out that doesn’t feel like a pitch, doesn’t put people on the spot, and doesn’t require you to pretend you’re someone you’re not. It’s not about being charming. It’s about being clear, genuine, and specific.
When clients learn this, the fear mostly disappears. Because it stops being guesswork. It becomes a repeatable approach that actually fits who they are.
What Happens When You Get This Right
You learn faster. About your industry, about what the market actually values right now, about yourself.
You open doors that applications alone never reach. You stop feeling like someone waiting to be chosen, and start feeling like someone actively building what’s next.
That’s what structured networking did for the client I mentioned at the start. Her qualifications were always there. What changed was her clarity. About what she wanted, who she needed to talk to, and how to say it.
One conversation changed everything for her. It can for you too.
I’m Niv Nowbakht, a Business and Career Coach based in Berlin with over 11 years of experience, ICF certified, M.A. in Communication Sciences. I’ve worked with 900+ professionals in career transition across the DACH region, in German and English.
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30 minutes. No pitch. Just a clear look at where you are and what’s possible.
Niv Nowbakht is a Career and Leadership Coach based in Berlin. ICF-certified, with 11+ years of experience working with professionals navigating career transitions and leadership challenges across the DACH region, in German and English.
