Networking

I hate "networking."  I hate smarming up to people I don't know and don't yet have reason to care a lick about.

I hate professional conferences.  They're usually way too big to be directly relevant to issues and questions that are pertinent to my work.  They're full of people posturing as important, competing with one another for influence.  They're opportunities to strut and to sell your product (whatever that may be) and are usually only very minimally educational.

A lot of my work is based in and around Brazil.  A couple of weeks ago, I was speaking to a Brazilian colleague about an upcoming project and I bemoaned, "I wish I'd put more work into pursuing institutional connections when I was in Brazil last summer."  He was bemused, "In Brazil, institutional connections don't matter.  Personal connections do."  The entirety of my historical, social, and political knowledge of Brazil converged on that statement, and I immediately realized how right he was.  I also realized that perhaps Brazil is not unique in this regard.

The past two days I've been at a professional conference for the first time since this brief, revelatory conversation with my Brazilian colleague.  Instead of focusing on how I portray myself, my institution, and my work to supposedly "important" and "influential" people, I've focused on creating relationships.  I've tried to move beyond "So what do you do?", a question I hate asking and hate to be asked, even though I love my work.  Over the past two days, I've engaged in amusing conversations about horrendous housing situations, cultural misunderstandings, and the relative values of cured meats with people from around the world.  Some of these people I'll see again, in the U.S. or in Brazil, and some of them were people who will probably have an impact on the future of my career.  Others were simply wonderful individuals that it was a delight to meet.  I don't know if this new tactic is more effective than being all business, but it sure made for a more pleasurable couple of days.

Does your work reward "networking"?  Do you enjoy or detest it?  What are the goals that you hope to achieve through networking?