How to Get to Know VIPs and other “Out of Reach” Contacts

Posted on July 6th, 2009 by Keith Ferrazzi
dcwgybdinner

Our DC WGYB Dinner. This time I was the anchor tenant!

You, me, every one of us—we have an established peer set. But if you only have dinner parties with the same people, your circle of relationships will never grow. At the same time, we’re confronted with a small obstacle. Randomly inviting strangers, especially strangers who hold a level of prestige and experience above your own peer set, is rarely effective. These people want to hang around people of their own background, experience, or social status.

Parents tend to stay away from their children’s gatherings unless they expect other parents to be in attendance as well. In college, juniors and seniors avoid the parties populated solely by freshmen and sophomores. In the adult world, it’s no different. Go to any cafeteria at any major corporation in the country. You’ll generally find each strata of the organization—from the administrative staff on up to the executive suite—congregating in their own cliques to eat their lunches.

To overcome this herd mentality and pull people into my dinner parties that would otherwise not come, I developed a helpful little concept I call the “anchor tenant.”

I understood the value of anchors as far back as fifth grade, when I wanted to have my friend George Love and his Dad over for dinner. See, George Love’s dad was a lawyer. All the other grownups I knew were steel workers or cleaning ladies. I wanted his dad as a mentor. But once I knew George was coming over, I had a realization: Suddenly I had a great opportunity to invite others. I wanted my mom to invite our minister over. And my fifth grade teacher. George Love was an opportunity to have a dinner party at my house everyone I respected the most.

So how do you find your George Love Sr. and get him to your dinner?

Identifying and inviting an anchor tenant to your dinner party isn’t hard. Someone you know probably has access and is close enough to such an individual that an invitation will be well received. You’ll discover who these people are by paying attention to your friends’ stories and taking notice of the one or two names that continually pop up. They tend to be the names of people who have had a positive influence on your friends’ lives. And it stands to reason that they can have the same effect on you.

Once you’ve identified a person outside your social circle and successfully invited him or her to a dinner, here’s an added little nuance that pays terrific dividends. Landing an anchor tenant isn’t about entertaining your dinner-party regulars. They’ll come no matter what. But an anchor allows you to reach out beyond your circle in subsequent invitations and pull in people who wouldn’t otherwise attend. To put it in terms of the company cafeteria, now that you have the CEO eating lunch at the manager’s table, other executives will jump at the opportunity to eat at the table, too.

Frankly, anyone who can add a little electricity to your dinner party is an anchor tenant. Media, for example, are among my favorite anchors. They’re knowledgeable and interesting, and best of all – they rarely turn down a free meal.

For more on anchor tenants, check out my first book Never Eat Alone, from which this post was adapted.

Send a trackback!
2 comments // In Business Networking
Bookmark and Share
« Previous Post Next Post »

2 Responses so far | Have Your Say!

  1. Another great post, Keith!

    I'm thinking how I've applied this concept to online business partnerships - once I've partnered with someone with an email list of, say, 15,000 to get the word out about my offerings, I now feel more confidence (and have more credibility) to partner with others who have similar size (or even larger) email lists.

    With each partnership confidence and credibility grows. Each partner is like an anchor tenant!

  2. Great advice, as usual!
    This is timely for me as I am about to host a cocktail party of friends that do not know each other, but would find similar things in common. Adding an anchor tenant will make it that much more meaningful.

    This concept can also be applied successfully to a variety of other scenarios, as George mentioned.

Leave a Reply