The Isolated Connector

You see the value in networks. You understand—intellectually—that connection is power. You want to be a hub.

But you're not connected enough to connect others.

You're on the outside of the networks that matter. You don't know the people who could use introductions. You don't have access to pass along. You're a connector with nothing to connect.

This feels like a chicken-and-egg problem. You need connections to make connections. How do you start from zero?

Why Isolation Persists

The Isolated Connector often makes the same mistake: they try to jump straight to hub status.

They see the successful connectors—the people who effortlessly introduce, who convene, who sit at the center of webs—and they try to replicate the behavior without the foundation.

So they network aggressively. Collect contacts. Try to manufacture a hub through sheer volume of connection attempts.

This doesn't work because hubs aren't built from connections. Hubs emerge from value.

The people at the center of networks got there by being valuable first. They had something—insight, skill, access, creation—that drew people to them. The network formed around the value. The hub status was a consequence, not a starting point.

Trying to build a network without underlying value is like trying to build a city by drawing roads first. Roads connect things. If there's nothing there, the roads go nowhere.

What Starting Looks Like

The Isolated Connector becomes a hub by not trying to become a hub.

Instead:

• Play a different game first. Build value through one of the other five games. Create ideas people want to extract. Build models people want to use. Offer coaching that produces results. Make meaning that helps people understand their situation. Develop an identity worth following. The network game is often a second game. It's what you can play once you have value to exchange.
• Start smaller than you think. You don't need to connect important people. You need to connect anyone—usefully. Two peers who could help each other. Three people interested in the same thing. A tiny network is still a network.
• Be a node before being a hub. Join existing networks. Contribute. Be useful. Let people see what you're about. The path to the center usually runs through the edges.
• Connect around something. The strongest networks form around shared purpose, not just shared contact. Build the thing people gather around, and you won't have to gather them—they'll come.

The isolation isn't permanent. But escaping it requires patience and indirection. You become a connector by becoming valuable. The connections follow.