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Hi there, happy Thursday!

Welcome to issue #18 of the Network Wrangler. It’s our first sponsored issue (can you show them some love?!). Here’s what we’re covering today:

• Setting intentions for connecting

• A visual system for staying connected

Why We Connect to Others

I was trying to wrap my jet-lagged head around the sight of Christmas decorations shimmering in the 95-degree heat. It was mid-December 2019, and I’d just landed in Perth, Australia for a business trip. I was in a hotel lobby with my then-partner, Lisa, escaping the mid-summer heat that had just broiled us poolside.

During this air-conditioned downtime, Lisa taught me the highly useful process of conducting a “Seven Areas of Life” (7AL) review to round out the year and prepare for a productive 2020. It was the best gift she ever gave me.

The 7AL process is a planning tool that requires you to assess your life across seven areas: Spiritual, Health & Fitness, Personal Development, Relationships, Family, Friendships, and Finance. For each area, you give yourself a rating on a scale of 1-10 to capture where you’re at as of that moment. Then, you set your intention of the rating you want to be at in one year’s time. Finally, you identify the clear steps you need to take to cross the gap between where you are and where you want to be.

I like the 7AL review because, while I use it as a year-end process, you can do a review any time you’d like to assess and set intentions for the future.

While I didn’t realize it then, that first 7AL review in a Perth hotel room catalyzed me to improve my “Family” rating by focusing on my relationship with my dad, who was then living in Seattle.

Flash forward to Q2 of 2020, during the COVID lockdown, when I began a weekly “Drinks with Dad” by ZOOM. We both logged on at 9pm on Tuesdays, a whiskey or a beer in hand, to catch up and talk about life.

Over the course of the lockdown, our weekly habit formed, and we kept up our ZOOMs when the isolation restrictions eased. Even when we started to see each other in person again, during those weeks we were apart, we connected online. And no matter what we discussed during the call, we always ended with “I love you, Dad,” and the reciprocal, “I love you, too.”

I felt closer to my father than ever before, and each year, my “family” area rating climbed higher because of it. If I hadn’t intentionally connected with him regularly like this, I would have missed out on learning so much about him (and about me through him) in those ZOOMs together.

My final “Drinks with Dad” happened three years after the first. It was the night before he died of sudden cardiac arrest.

My last words to him were, fittingly, “I love you, Dad.”

And his last words to me were, “I love you, too.”

The grieving was and, a year later, still is hard, but I know it is softened because of those last words we shared.

When we think we have years left with someone, the time feels expansive with all kinds of opportunities to connect. But as the illustration below shows, that’s not the case.

We only have a few precious moments to connect with others over those years of opportunity. And it’s up to us to make those moments happen.

Who do you know needs your attention and your intention?

Reach out today and start the journey toward connection.

You don’t know how long you’ve actually got left with them, but there is still time—especially if you need to tell them you love them.

And if you’d like a copy of the 7AL template, just hit reply. I’m happy to share it with you.

Using Numbers to Manage Your Dunbar’s Number

As the saying goes, you don’t rise to the level of your goals; you sink to the level of your systems.

It’s one thing to say you want to stay connected; it’s quite another to create the system that supports your doing so.

Last week, I listened to an insightful interview with Michael Bungay Stanier (aka MBS), author of The Coaching Habit and a legendary coach in his own right, as he explained the system he uses to keep in touch with all his closest connections.

MBS identifies segments his Dunbar’s number of connections (we’ve talked about Dunbar’s number before, remember?) into two populations. The top 10% are his core connections, the ones he wants to have a good conversation with at least monthly. The next 35 connections are the ones he’d invite to a barbecue in his backyard, and he feels like touching base once a quarter is good enough for these folks.

All his conversations with these people are either coordinated by or conducted within text messages. The system he uses provides visual cues to let him know how long it’s been since he connected totally within his messaging app. Here’s how it works:

He identifies each of his core connections by putting a “15” in front of their first name in his address book. For example, if I were one of his core connections, in his address book, my name would appear as “15 Thomas Kriese,” not just “Thomas Kriese.” For the “barbecue status” folks, he puts a “50” in front of their name.

When he has a moment of downtime (in line at the store, waiting at a traffic light, etc) he simply scrolls his messages app to make sure all of his “15” contacts have been texted within the last 30 days. If he sees someone is getting close to a month since he talked with them, he sends a quick message across to them either to update them on what he’s doing or request a phone call to catch up.

And as time allows, he does the same scroll to check in on all his “50” contacts to make sure it’s been no more than 90 days since they conversed.

No need for a separate app to track the relationships, it’s all done by recency of connection in his messages app.

I just implemented this on my own contacts, and I like seeing the 15s appear in my messages app to remind me how long it’s been since we spoke. So easy.

Some of you may be asking, why is it incumbent on you to make the connections happen?

Well, if the connection is important to you, then you are responsible for ensuring it stays fresh.

Don’t wait for them to be the one to reach out to you.

Think of your connertor role as your gift to the friendship.

One last thing: you really should follow the link to visit MBS’s website for all kinds of resources on developing the better version of yourself. It’s a wise investment of your time. I promise.

SCROLL: This Week’s Quick Hits

• Sixty questions to ask to get to know someone. (BetterUp)

• How to invite people to do things without being awkward about it as extracted from Alan Garner’s book, Conversationally Speaking.

• Studies show social isolation is associated with increased risk for all-cause mortality. (National Library of Medicine)

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That’s all for this week. See you next Thursday!

— Thomas

PS: Personal networks are more complex than digital ones. Let me help you. May 7 is my next available date for coaching. We might be a good fit if you know you need to reconnect with your network and want to make 2024 the year you harness the power of your connections.

I work with clients to:

• audit their existing networks

• identify gaps and opportunities

• unleash the power of old and cold connections

Just reply to this email if you want to know more.

Got any feedback for me? Just hit reply. I read every email.

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