Text Engage: Re-connecting with your forgotten network.

The first thing you need to know is that building and maintaining relationships, whether personal or professional, is a practice — a set of habits — and not a one-off exercise. In other words, this write-up will help you to make sure you are building (and maintaining) relationships every single day. Above all, I want to make sure that you are using the simplest tools possible. You don’t need an air-conditioned room in Vegas, all you need is your cellphone.

So let’s start things off easy:

• Grab your phone and scroll to the bottom of your text, LinkedIn, Facebook, or WhatsApp messages — these are the people you haven’t talked to in months, weeks or even years. TIP: Do this no earlier than 10 am THEIR time.
• Take five minutes and reach out to four of them by text every single morning.
• Here’s a sample script to get you started (you can modify it to suit the language you and your contact is most comfortable with): “Hey! Haven’t spoken to you in a while. I hope this finds you well. What’s the latest with you? No rush to reply if you’re busy, but I’d love to hear what you’re up to when you get a chance!”
• Add this as a 15-minute appointment on your calendar each morning.
• BONUS – send a little note of praise to someone via text each day.
  You can do this at red lights or on the train as you commute to work, or between exercises during your morning workout. This is literally one of the quickest and easiest habits you can possibly do to breathe some life back into fading relationships, so grab your phone and do it right now.

Happy re-connecting!