Individual Case for Strategy of Heidi Roizen

Roizen hard adult life molded the reason, why she wanted to become a self-sufficient and independent person. After suffering from terrible financial security and then the unexpected loss of her fiancé she realizes that she needs to build a career on her own. Roizen wanted to be in the technology industry but with the creative writing degree, she had a very limited job to select from. At her first job in tender, she experiences about the networking power and learned that building connection with people was something she had a talent.

From the beginning of her career, Roizen started making good relations with the people who were talented and interesting. She developed her network not on the basis of the commercial experience, but the talent. By doing so, she met a different type of people while working with different companies like T-maker, Apple, and STA. If we study deeply, we can easily understand that working with the organization looked to be her secondary job, her main job seems to be her networking business. The important point to consider is that people use networking to develop their business while the business of Heidi was networking. This approach reflects the working style of Roizen in making communication with the people. In the starting time of her career, she established the relations with the people around her or the people she meets in her day-to-day life. Roizen believed that it takes time to know or have an access to the people you want. Also, recommend to maintaining performance and consistency during each interaction. She kept her network by offering the value of certain relation with her. In beginning, she emailed her contacts on daily basis to make the connection. Heidi believed in maintaining a constant relationship, specifically helping the other without any short-term expectation. This helped Roizen to build the trust of the people which she used in later times to build a profitable and valuable relation with them.

Roizen has the ability to bridge gaps of connectivity as described in “A note on Social Networks and Network Structure,” and has benefited from it. She built her network and maintained it by playing the role of intermediary between two parties. In the case, Roizen has been referred as a catalyst, market marker so before she can do anything for someone she wants to make sure there is a common benefit to be recognized. She did that by the study of each of her contact and analyzed how the two parties could offer value to each. In a way, she able to established the faith with them and other people, about the win-win offering that Roizen could make by her strong analysis power.

Referencing “The network secret of great change agents”, Roizen had a bridging network. As mention in the case, Roizen love to host parties at his home and the guest list included high-tech friend which provide excessive networking opportunities. At her home, Roizan took great care on placing the guest list properly. She invited the people who knew 60% of the other people in the party to make the members feel comfortable as well who could be valuable for each other. In this way, she made her networking work. In these parties, people got to know the market informally and found parties not only a socializing place but also profitable in long run. Roizen rule of thumb was that why any person would even interested to talk to you or do business with you when they don’t even know about you. She created a bridging network where the people could get to know each other and then later those relations could offer a significant business meeting. In this way, Roizen maintained and established her network which offered a value to each of her networks.

What are the strengths of Roizen’s networks at the end of the case? Weaknesses?

Before assessing the strength of Roizen network one must recognize that it takes a great patient, hard-working, and consistency to be able to achieve a network with the wide range of powerful people. Roizen has dedicated so much time and effort to create a specific kind of networking/relationship with the people during her professional career as a working lady into a different industry, especially in the Silicon Valley. So the strengths of Roizen’s networks at the end of the case are following

•  Instead of handing out business cards at random networking event Roizen network was focused on the CEO or executive CEOs level. The aspect of the network helped her in networking with the big players of the market. In addition, due to the strong relationship with CEO market, she maintained a reputable of an authentic person.
•  Relationships are built on a combination of personal and professional interaction. Raizan love thronging parties at her place and she uses these events not only build her relationship but also provide networking opportunities to others. Through her networking, she was able to leverage her relation to make win-win situations for herself and others.
•  Roizen willingly acknowledges that ‘it’s easier to get to know people when they are not famous’. So as an emerging vendor capitalist, Roizen always responded to promising entrepreneurs who submit a business plan to her, which was Roizen believe is the best was to build network naturally. She always keeps those potential contacts close in case that they could become useful in future.

Unfortunately, networking does come with some downside. To maintain a consistent networking it needs lots of time and patient. Trying to manage her network, in the case Roizen mentioned she spends lots of time replaying 100 of email a day she feels obliged to answer personally to maintaining the relationship. A colleague mentioned in the case that the lengthiness of her e-mail decreased over time until the responses were incomplete phrases. Also, people who consider Roizen as a “friend” become excepting more than she provides with the term of time.

What steps did Roizen take to develop her network? To maintain it?

Roizen is a very reputable and well-known person in the tech industry. During the course of her professional career, she built a very strong and powerful network. The main reason for her powerful network is her curious nature for high energy and talented personality coupled with a desire to interact and help people with high caliber. At the beginning of her career at Tandem she realizes that she needs to use her networking skill to move up in the world. In addition, when Roizen co-founded T/maker with her brother, she was required to build a strong network to support the software company. The main objective was to market the company product. Roizen always follows the ‘what can I offer’ method. Roizen always wants to help people with their project/needs while interacting with them. In her first job in Tandem, she had an opportunity to work with the companies CEO by the social and friendly approach she able to build a good relationship with the CEO. The relationship with CEO benefits Roizen as he recommended her for Roizen MBA program.

While promoting T/Maker, Roizen networked with the press, the tech entrepreneurs, and the software publishers association. Roizen always trusts her judgment on the talent-person she connects with rather than their position on the company. Roizen always builds a good relationship with smart, interesting people who later become senior executives in their company. Her success was mainly attributed to her relationship how she was able to effectively use them to her benefit in this case in apple. Apple calls Roizen to rescue them where Roizen first times use her network in the tech community to rebuild a brand.

Relationships are built on a combination of personal and professional interaction. Raizan love thronging parties at her place and she uses these events not only build her relationship but also provide networking opportunities to others.

To maintain network Roizen believe in Consistency and performance. Roizen believe respond with consistency is the best practice to maintain the network and by performance, Roizen always believes in the delivery of the commitment/action you made with your network. As I discuss above Roizen always follows the ‘what can I offer’ method. Instead of asking for help Roizen always tries to turn the tables and offer support first. By this method, it could make the networking partner grateful and would increase the probability to return the favor. Roizen always tries to value her connections time and make the request short. Roizen also very careful about asking favor frequently. One of the best tricks Roizeb uses to maintain her network is via email. Roizen always emails people right after their meeting and thank them for their time to maintain a communication flow.

What suggestions would you give Roizen for adjusting and maintaining her network?

The Heidi Roizen case was very interesting to me because I cannot believe how many people she networked with. I believe her networking skills had more to do with her being outgoing, personality, and high-energy by nature. My suggestion for Roizen will be listed below:

•  By Answering all the above question I believe that, Roizen biggest strength is her friendly behavior and her interest to know talent and interesting people. In the case, it's very visible that Roizen only creates her network in tech industry my suggestion for her will be to create some network out of hir industry sector. This will help her to know more talented people that Roizen enjoys the most and also not creating any pressure for her professional career.
•  Another suggestion will be, to create a priority list of people and maintain a consistent relationship with them. That will help her to add value to her professional career by that she also can focus on her personal life, work, and network management. If Roizen tries to maintain her huge network, not to priorities her network that there is a high chance that anyone or both will suffer.
•  In the case, it refers that Roizen one of the strength is planning. My suggestion will be to plan her work or delegating some of her work to others. Example: reading the business plan or rejection letters to her assistants. By delegating work Roizen could use those time to maintain her network which is the primary reason why Softbank hired her. I know why Roizen wanting to spend her time by reading the business plan but by delegation an early screening method downward in the company she may find some extra hours each day which would help her performance and effectiveness.