I watched an amazing movie today.  It was not a blockbuster but it was an incredible story.  It was Freedom Writers starring Hilary Swank as a high school teacher in a difficult school.  The movie is based on a true story.   One of the secondary points of the movie really stood out to me.   The teacher that Swank played had a difficult time getting books from the school for her students. I ran into a similar situation a couple years ago when the BNI-Misner Foundation had a request from a teacher that said th...

I met someone recently who said she’s been having a hard time building her network because people can’t seem to understand or relate to her business.  I asked her why she thought that was and she responded that her business is pretty complicated and when she tries to explain what it’s all about, she can almost see people’s eyes spinning in their heads. I told her that before she can even begin to network effectively, she needs to find a way to explain her business in a way that people will easily understan...

I am writing to you today from Necker Island in the Caribbean where I am meeting with about 20 business leaders including Sir Richard Branson the founder of Virgin Atlantic Airways and owner of the Island. My journey to this island is a dramatic example of the “Butterfly Effect of Networking.”  The “Butterfly Effect” is the theory that a small action in one place may have a ripple effect that creates a dramatic action in another place. It is like a pebble in a pond creating ripples on the sur...

Recently, I had lunch with the president of a Southern California University along with his dean for the School of Business. We spoke about many things but, specifically, he wondered what I thought the school could be doing better to teach students graduating from his university. My answer was easy–”start teaching courses on networking, social capital and/or emotional intelligence.” He asked me why.  I told him that if you ask the average business person or entrepreneur what one of the most importa...

Welcome to the “Networking Now” Blog here at Entrepreneur.com.  My name is Ivan Misner and I am the Founder & Chairman of BNI – the world’s largest business networking organization and the Senior Partner for the Referral Institute – the world’s leading referral training organization. I am looking forward to creating an environment where we can talk about topics related to relationship networking, referral marketing, and maybe a few other themes from time to time in a way th...