Heidi Roizen began her career working for Tandem computers as an editor of the company newsletter. Her first real exposure to the benefits of professional networking occurred when she applied for the position.
Her friend in the company had the contact of the woman in charge of the hiring process and with Heidi’s out-going personality decided to phone the contact on a Saturday expecting to get her voicemail. There is no details what she expected to communicate over the voicemail, however when the contact answered the call unexpectedly, she managed to “build a relationship” with the contact and shortly was offered the job. One can assume during this conversation she focused on how she would be able to perform in her performance for the organization but also help the contact in filling the position as part of her role. Heidi has demonstrated throughout the whole case, she builds her relationships by “win-win” situations.
Her role in Tandem Computers presented a perfect training ground for Heidi to develop her networking skills. She saw a great opportunity in this role to get in contact with powerful people of the organization. She immediately saw the benefit of being the communicator between the CEO and the employees and took it upon herself to demonstrate her performance and consistency and to deliver on promises.Heidi saw performance as being able to get back to the person and do what you could to help them out and being responsive. This did not mean entirely the outcome would be completely successful, but to be able to respond and demonstrate that you sought all avenues for success would be performing.
Her definition of consistency meant that people react the same way every time. People in business who do one thing one day and something completely different the next day causes confusion. If a relationship is built on performance and consistency, few interactions can still maintain a very good relationship.All relationships are based on “win-win” situations. Heidi performs this very well during her time as a mentor capitalist.
A mentor capitalist is an active outside board member for start-ups that have received at least one round of venture capital backing who contributes her skills in strategic planning, building organization and marketing for an equity stake in the organization. She understood the fundamental idea of evaluating of the benefits to both parties before taking any action. This fundamental idea is similar to that of sales, whereby a successful salesman/woman would assess their product and evaluate the benefit to their leads before they make any contact. An unsuccessful salesman/woman would make contact with their entire network without prior making sure the product is the right one for them. Roizen took this approach due to a simple reason, she needs to be sold that it is a good idea first as if an entrepreneur cannot sell her, then it wouldn’t sell anyway.
One of the key success factors of Roizen was to spend time in responding to rejected plans during her time in SOFTBANK. She understood the importance of maintaining good relationships with the entrepreneurial community given that “you will never know where people will end up in the future.” This is successful as more often than not, people appreciate feedback. This gave Roizen a clear advantage over other venture capitalists as entrepreneurs would have a clear direction on how to revise their original ideas to one that would be successful and in-turn strengthening the relationships between Roizen and her powerful connections by delivering business plans which are worthwhile.
Heidi Roizen not only had a successful work ethic, but combined with a great personality made her one of the most successful networking people in Silicon Valley. Heidi has been described to be one degree of separation between herself and anyone in Silicon Valley. Heidi and her down-to-earth personality frequently hosted dinner parties at her home offering the perfect platform for her to get to know her contacts better on a personal note but also to ensure her networks are more intertwined. She plans her dinner parties very carefully ensuring that every invitee knows half of the list.
This creates a comfortable but also beneficial environment for all her attendees.The main challenge Heidi faces in her way of networking is the resourcing. As Heidi’s fundamental success is based on performance and consistency, the time needed for Roizen to respond back at a consistent time become overwhelming the more her network expands. In order to combat this, Heidi has evolved to build network in the nuclei of other networks. She realized that like her, there are many other people who have strong networking abilities. This enables her to only maintain those connections and offload the ever increase of work that comes with networking.
Heidi’s networking strategy with the “New Valley Girls” have many similarities but also many differences. The similarities are the social events that Heidi holds in her households which attract the A-List of Silicon Valley and providing a platform for these successful people to liaise out of the business environment. Many of the “New Valley Girls” are also very powerful and well connected. The main difference is Heidi’s strategy does not only involve powerful people, she also maintains her relationship with unknowns and upcoming entrepreneurs as she understands “you never know who these people may become.”Heidi Roizen needs to understand that if she wishes to free up more time to allow her to maintain her network she needs to offload her venture capital work to other networking nuclei. By building mentee’s who have the same work ethics, performance and consistency as herself she is able to keep 50% of her work related to venture capital and the other 50% of her time networking and building a great network via network nuclei.
I think that the main success for Heidi Roizen is her performance and consistency. She see’s relationships as a long term thing rather than short term benefits. I have managed to use similar skills as Heidi in my own workplace by assisting senior management of other departments and offering them time in achieving their goals even though it may not be directly related to my own performance rating. I understand that by doing them a favor, they may be able to assist me in the future.
I also understand the importance of people who are unknown but have potential, the idea of working for one of your employees in the future is very possible and ensuring that you maintain relationships with them by offering them mentorships and consistency is important.I would like to be more like Heidi Roizen by investing more time in my management style by screening more ideas and people before making the contact. At times, I am vulnerable to not assessing the benefit of connecting two parties before action and find myself making contact between two people who cannot benefit each other. This in-turn affect my reputation of being able to deliver.
