Book excerpt: Shows how the networking-averse can succeed by working with the very traits that make them hate traditional networking Written by a proud introvert who is also an enthusiastic networker Includes field-tested tips and techniques for virtually any situation Are you the kind of person who would rather get a root canal than face a group of strangers? Does the phrase working a room make you want to retreat to yours? Does traditional networking advice seem like its in a foreign language? Devora Zack, an avowed introvert and a successful consultant who speaks to thousands of people every year, feels your pain. She found that most networking advice books assume that to succeed you have to become an outgoing, extraverted person. Or at least learn how to fake it. Not at all. There is another way. This book shatters stereotypes about people who dislike networking. Theyre not shy or misanthropic. Rather, they tend to be reflective - they think before they talk. They focus intensely on a few things rather than broadly on a lot of things. And they need time alone to recharge. Because theyve been told networking is all about small talk, big numbers and constant contact, they assume its not for them. But it is! Zack politely examines and then smashes to tiny fragments the dusty old rules of standard networking advice. She shows how the very traits that ordinarily make people networking-averse can be harnessed to forge an approach that is just as effective as more traditional approaches, if not better. And she applies it to all kinds of situations, not just formal networking events. After all, as she says, life is just one big networking opportunity - a notion readers can now embrace. Networking enables you to accomplish the things that are important to you. But you cant adopt a style that goes against who you are - and you dont have to. I have never met a person who did not benefit tremendously from learning how to network - on his or her own terms, Zack writes. You do not succeed by denying your natural temperament; you succeed by working with your strengths.