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Greetings Pothole readers and listeners! I have a fantastic treat for you today. No, I am not going to sing to you! Nor am I going to do my one man reenactment of Brokeback Mountain. Instead, we have a very special podcast today - how about $25,000 worth of free career coaching, courtesy of Ricky Steele, one of Atlanta’s premier business networkers?

This past Friday, I invited my good friend Ricky Steele to come out and speak to the Kettering Executive Network (KEN), a professional networking group here in Atlanta to which I belong. Ricky was kind enough to allow me to pin a lapel mic onto him and record his speech for preservation here at The Pothole. Those of us in attendance received a lot of inspiration and motivation from Ricky’s material, and I’m sure you will too.

In this presentation, Ricky shares his view of what a good networker looks like. While doing so, he offers his “seven habits of highly effective networkers”, and shares many of his business networking strategies along the way.

I know a lot of you readers/listeners are not from the Atlanta area, and you may not be familiar with Ricky Steele, so please allow me to introduce him to you.

Ricky Steele is the Chief Development Officer for Thompson Technologies, where he focuses on sales and corporate relationships. Ricky is the consummate networker, having been a client partner with Korn/Ferry International, a director for PricewaterhouseCoopers, Chairman and CEO of QuadBase Software, President and CEO of Innovative Media, Founder and President of SunBelt Transportation Group, and Publisher of Georgia Travel Publications, Inc.

He is the author of the acclaimed book, The Heart of Networking. According to Ricky, it was a best seller last year — he sold 15 copies in his neighborhood in a 2 week period, and that was a standing record until the Girl Scouts muscled him out with their magazine subscriptions! All kidding aside - it is a fantastic read - and it is a book that personally changed my life for the better. You can order a copy through his web site at rickysteele.net.

Ricky was honored as the Georgia Small Business Person of the Year and also one of the Georgia Jaycees “5 Outstanding Young Georgians.” He is intensely active in community service - for him, the bedrock foundation of networking, of leadership, and of life. Steele is the founding chairman of both Atlanta’s Table and Hospitality Helping Hands, a former board director for the Atlanta Community Food Bank, Hands On Atlanta, Atlanta Convention & Visitors Bureau and most recently a Trustee for Leadership Atlanta.

So, without further adieu, click the play button above, or download the MP3 to your iPod or a CD and ramp up your networking efforts by listening to one of the best. If you know of someone in your network who could benefit from Ricky’s message, do them a favor and forward them a link to this page. You’ll have done a good service to them, and they will hopefully thank you for it later.

And oh, by the way, if you need some IT staffing love, look no further than Thompson Technologies. Ricky, David Thompson, and the rest of the gang there stand by their word, their promises, and their people - traits that are seemingly hard to find these days. They’ve been a tremendous asset to the folks within my own personal business network, and I implore you to give them a chance to help you and your associates as well.

Cheers.

- Scott Burkett