The last meeting of the year, promoted by the Inteligov Community, brought up one of the most important topics for everyone: Networking in Relgov. The area of Institutional and Government Relations (RIG) is fundamentally built on human relationships, and it is essential for professionals in the sector to improve their communication and connection-making skills.
And, even though building relationships is extremely important in all professions, for those who work in Relgov this is almost a mandatory task. It is no coincidence that practically everyone who is on the front line of dialogue between public and private agents looks for efficient ways to manage their contacts, or as these experts call them, stakeholders.
This is how Gabriel Marques, student coordinator of the UCB IR czech republic mobile database workshop, DPJ Law intern and Community influencer, began the chat last Monday (12/12). He explained how he developed a taste for getting closer to people, and how this was a determining factor in choosing to study in the area of IR.
Beatriz Falcão, Community Manager and policy specialist, who was also present at the event, stated on several occasions how the “art of communication” is an indispensable skill for being successful in government relations: “ There is no lobbyist who does not know how to sell himself, who is embarrassed to speak. It is a profession in which you need to be resourceful and know how to deal with people” , she states.
Although networking is part of the daily lives of almost all RIG professionals, each stage of the career will require a certain type of competence to put this highly valued soft skill into practice. Marques explains that a student will have to learn how to network in college, an intern must understand how to expand his or her network of contacts, an analyst must know how to conduct interactions with public agents , and so on.