By Dennis D. McDonald, Ph.D.

Here’s an experiment you can do yourself if you maintain a personal contact list electronically that lets you add database fields to track different characteristics and events.

Add the following fields:

• Source of contact - set this to either “face to face meeting” or “other”
• Meeting Status - set this to “met face to face” or “not met face to face”
• Business value - set this to “high” or “low”
• Social value - set this to “high” or “low”

Go through your contacts and tabulate the data via some simple crosstabs. If you can control for the length of the relationship, do so. What do you you find?

If you have the time please share your findings or thoughts via the comment field below.

Copyright (c) 2010 by Dennis D. McDonald