How new immigrants can grow their contacts network?

There’s something I always insist on to the newcomers: your contacts network is the more valuable thing you’ll have when you get to Canada. The contacts network is a small seed that you plant when you are still in your country and something you’ll harvest at your arrival and the years after. It will provide you with lots of satisfactions if you are wise enough to know how to make it grow and keep it alive at all times. But be careful… any misstep can ruin it forever! And when your network is broken… it is not easy to get it back.

Let me share with you some of the most common ways to ruin your network contacts I have witnessed in the last few years.

7 ways to ruin your network… almost forever.

Sometimes, it may be on purpose. Others, you might not realize it. But the result is always the same: missed opportunities and a wasted possibility of getting involved with a new group of people that can help you out.

In these years as a blogger, I have contacted dozens of readers, most of the time at their early steps in the process. With a few I’ve managed to keep in touch once they arrived. With others… well… they’ve committed one or many of the the following mistakes:

Don’t talk about things you don’t know about… even if you think you know about them. Do not criticize what you have not experienced. It is not good. It is not a good move. If you are still ten thousand miles from Canad … is not a good idea to assume the role of “expert in Canadian affairs”. The most common subject is usually related to the health system. It does not matter how many reports, books or WHO papers you’ve read, it will never match the experience of others who had the chance to live the real situation first hand.

Behind every computer there’s a human being. Everything you read in a blog, it’s there because some person wrote it. Everything you write in your comments is read by a person. All your questions are answered by a real person. If during the long time your paperwork lasted while you were in your home country you were fortunate enough to have a blog, a forum or whatever else you have read and helped you answer most of your questions, then it’d not be a bad idea that a couple of days before getting on the plane you thank the people behind those computers, it’d be really nice! And you never know if the destination is not going cross you again with that same people in the future!

Will we be neighbors? Be sure to tell! If by any chance you end up living in the same region that those people who helped you during your process… Would it not be great even to send an email message to say “Hi!”? I’m sure many of the people that gave you a hand would be very happy with such a small gesture!

Have we met before? If you ever appear have the chance to meet in person someone with whom you had an email exchange before, it’d be more than nice to friendly and greet him or her with a smile. A “nice to meet you” is never wrong… or less is better than to put a face on his ass and watch as you do not know who it is!

Those who arrived before you, can always make a difference. Having the opportunity to share a moment with people who arrived a few years before you to Canada is an almost unique opportunity. Not many newcomers have access to make contact with people who can bring them experiences, advice and information. It’s your chance to get involved with your new social environment and continue to grow your network of contacts. Do not blow such opportunities!

Small Town, Big Hell! It’d be the poor translation of a saying we have in Spanish: “Pueblo chico, infierno grande! In a small town, everyone knows each other, so everyone will know everything about the others! Internet looks great but, I assure you, is small and is a place where you always end up knowing everything about someone else. Our digital trace is big! In particular in small niches such as immigrants to Canada. Be careful with what you say and comment in other places because sooner or later someone will end up finding that out! That we are from the same country does not mean that we are equal. It doesn’t mean we share the same habits or neither same tastes. We must learn to exercise tolerance not only towards the multitude of “different” that we find here, but also with those that come from the same country of ours.

Have you managed to maintain you contacts network since you arrived to Canada? Do you find value in keeping the contacts you have established by the Internet since the beginning of your immigration process? What things do you think can ruin your network?

No related posts.