Last week I visited with a former client and good friend of mine, Susan Nolte, founder of the May Cookie Co. Her latest success story prompted me to write this week’s networking tip. Her wisdom is something we can all learn from…

The back story

I met Susan at the University of Hartford’s Entrepreneur Center a few years ago when she was an motivated student formulating her business plan to make healthier, homemade cookie mixes for retail sale. I was a guest lecturer there, teaching classes to the budding entrepreneurs in grass roots marketing, branding and business networking.

Susan and I connected in the class and have stayed in close touch ever since. I am a big fan of Susan Nolte and her vision with the May Cookie Co. She has worked extremely hard to launch her business from scratch, creating the original recipes, sourcing the best ingredients, securing a high quality manufacturing partner, and of course, establishing distribution so that people like you and me can find and enjoy her wonderful cookie mixes.

• My prediction: I see Susan Nolte and the May Cookie Co. as the next organic food success story like Annie Withey of Annie’s Homegrown.  That just might happen to Susan Nolte too if you buy her products and tell other people about them! Get your company’s food supplier to feature them in your corporate cafeteria!
• My favorite: I love all three varieties of cookie mixes, but if I had to pick only one to have on a stranded dessert island (intentionally misspelled), it would have to be the out of this world vegan mix: Rich & Chewy Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookie Mix

Success takes patience

During our recent networking get-together Susan mentioned to me that earlier this summer she realized that she was pushing too hard in her business and that it was exhausting her physically, emotionally and financially. She made the conscious decision to back off and give the business a little breathing room.

“Sometimes you need to sit back and give the seeds that you have sown a chance to take hold. When you believe in yourself and your product, the right path will emerge.” – Susan Nolte

As a result of her patience, Susan was just notified that her cookie mixes are being picked up by a distributor that serves the 27 Whole Foods stores across the North Atlantic region (including MA, ME, RI and half of Connecticut!) Way to go Susan!

Your Networking Goal for this week

Go with the flow this week. Give your networking relationships a little breathing room. Allow yourself and others to find the right balance of connection and assistance. Don’t force something that shouldn’t be forced. You just might break it and then what good is it for you?

If you push too hard or try to bulldoze networking relationships to form or to advance, people will pull away from you. There is an art to appropriate levels of networking follow-up. It’s somewhere between the extremes of stalking and abandonment (of course, don’t do either of these extremes).

If you are patient, helpful and confident, good things and good people will flow your way.