People trickled into the room at the University of Pennsylvania, some arriving with friends from previous Bescy Philly events and others completely new to the group. The space itself felt like an old academic library, with long tables lined up in rows facing a podium and two projection screens.
It was a familiar kind of setting for anyone used to lectures, but that evening the goal wasn’t to sit back and listen—it was to practice, participate, and learn. Terence Milstead, David Langner, and Michelle Niedziela welcomed everyone to Nudge Your Network, our hands-on workshop on how behavioral science principles can make networking more comfortable, more intentional, and more human.
You walk into a room full of people who might be important to meet, but you’re not quite sure what to say or how to start.
Networking is one of those things that almost everyone finds a little uncomfortable. With all the small talk, self-promotion, and unspoken expectations, it can feel performative or even transactional.
That shared sense of mild awkwardness was exactly what we wanted to tackle—not by pretending it isn’t there, but by redesigning the experience around how people actually think, feel, and behave.
We started with a simple idea: networking isn’t a personality trait, it’s a behavioral system.
Most of us think of networking as something you’re either good at or you’re not; maybe something that works best for extroverts or career climbers. But when we approach networking with a behavioral science perspective, it becomes more like a design challenge. The same principles that shape our decision-making—like reducing friction, creating social proof, or reinforcing small commitments—can also make human connection easier.
Our goal for the evening was to help everyone experiment with those principles in real time and walk away with strategies they could actually use the next time they introduced themselves, followed up, or made a professional connection.
Behavioral Barriers Behind Networking Anxiety
Most people don’t avoid networking because they’re shy or unmotivated. They avoid it, or say they hate it, because the situation itself is usually poorly designed. Behavioral science can give us language for why it feels so uncomfortable: friction, uncertainty, and cognitive load.
Think about what happens at a typical networking event. You walk into a crowded room, scanning for someone approachable or someone that you already know. There’s no clear path, no rules, but a lot of unspoken expectations. You're thinking:
Who should I talk to?
What should I say?
How do I exit a conversation gracefully?
That mental math adds up fast. Each decision you fret over (who to approach, what to say, how to follow up) creates tiny moments of hesitation and friction that compound into inaction.
This isn’t a personality flaw on your part, but rather a design flaw in the system. Our brains are wired to avoid ambiguous situations because they carry social risk that ultimately makes us freeze and fuels anxiety, and the result is often the same: we stick to familiar faces or retreat to our phones.
At Nudge Your Network, we framed this differently: networking isn’t about selling yourself. Networking is prosocial problem-solving.
When you shift from “What can I get from this?” to “How can we collaborate?,” everything changes, and it’s easier to get to “How can I help someone else succeed?” That small reframing reduces self-consciousness, builds empathy, and makes conversation flow naturally.
The good news is that small behavioral nudges can remove the barriers to that mental reframing, lower friction, and increase participation.
Behavioral Levers That Make Networking Work
When we talk about applying behavioral science to networking, it isn’t about learning neat tricks or scammy persuasion. We mean using science to understand the psychological levers that make human connection work, with less awkwardness. We highlighted seven principles that underpinned the activities throughout the evening:
- Friction
People avoid action when the steps are unclear or the social risk feels high. In networking, that might mean freezing up because you don’t know how to start a conversation. People often fail to act not because they don’t want to, but because the path to action is unclear—a concept rooted in nudge theory (Thaler & Sunstein, 2008) and the COM-B model of behavior (Michie et al., 2011), where friction impedes capability or opportunity.
That friction can show up as uncertainty: Who should I talk to? How do I start? Small design choices for organizers, like conversation prompts on name badges or structured rounds of introductions, lower that barrier and make participation effortless. Small, planned conversation openers for attendees take the pressure off of individuals. - Primacy and Thin-Slice Judgments
First impressions matter, and people form them in seconds. Research in social cognition shows that people make lasting impressions in seconds (Ambady & Rosenthal, 1992). Those initial moments, or “thin slices,” shape how later information is interpreted. Instead of rehearsing a polished elevator pitch, leading with a personal story or meaningful project creates emotional salience by tapping into narrative processing and self-relevance effects that will deepen memory encoding.
The goal isn’t to impress—it’s to elicit curiosity and invite conversation. Instead of defaulting to a title or job description, we encouraged participants to lead with a story or surprising detail, something personal, something meaningful to them. It’s not about impressing; it’s about sparking curiosity and continuing the conversation. - Reciprocity and Social Proof
When people see generosity modeled, they mirror it. From Cialdini’s (2009) principles of influence to evolutionary psychology, reciprocity is a fundamental driver of cooperation. People tend to mirror generosity, creating positive feedback loops in social networks.
Our “Help Wall” made this principle visible, where each attendee posted an offer of some skill and service they could help someone with (like résumé review or pizza dough recipes), serving as both a social signal and a behavioral nudge, reinforcing normative influence (what others are doing) and descriptive norms (what’s expected). The simple act of giving first, without demanding a return, activates trust and primes future collaboration. - Similarity and Trust
Trust forms more quickly when we perceive shared identity or overlap, a phenomenon known as in-group bias or the similarity-attraction effect (Brewer, 1979; Montoya & Horton, 2013). Even subtle cues (shared alma maters, interests, or experiences) trigger familiarity and reduce perceived risk in social interaction.
Our badge-dot exercise was a playful example of social categorization in action: by surfacing common ground (labeling our shirts with color coded stickers of areas of interest), we lowered the cognitive and emotional cost of starting a meaningful exchange. - Memory and Salience
Behavioral science reminds us that people remember experiences according to the peak-end rule (Kahneman, 2011): what stands out and how a story ends matters more than the overall average of the experience. By closing the event with a reflection exercise (“one takeaway and one person you’ll follow up with”), we helped attendees encode the experience as positive and actionable.
Techniques such as repeating names, linking people to context, or jotting down a note about a promise can help your networking by tapping into retrieval cues and strengthening memory for social commitments. - Commitment Devices
We’re more likely to follow through when we state a clear intention. Commitment mechanisms are classic behavioral tools that turn intention into action. By externalizing a goal (like by writing down who you’ll follow up with or when you’ll reach out) you engage implementation intentions (Gollwitzer, 1999), which increases follow-through by linking plans to specific cues (“When situation X arises, I will do Y”).
Our attendees completed these commitments live, converting the abstract idea of “I should follow up” into a tangible behavioral contract. - Identity and Emotion
Networking feels better when it aligns with who we are and what we care about—in other words, our personal identity. According to self-perception theory (Bem, 1972) and social identity theory (Tajfel & Turner, 2004), people define themselves through their group memberships and emotional narratives.
When participants framed introductions around why they do their work, rather than what they do, they tapped into intrinsic motivation and emotional memory. They made those exchanges more authentic, memorable, and coherent by including self-concept.
Each of these principles transforms networking from a performance into a designable behavior with real meaning.
Making connections is something you can shape, test, and improve with intention. When you understand the psychology behind how connections are made, you can build systems that make it easier to show up as yourself and to leave every interaction with a sense of genuine progress, not just another business card
Common Networking Myths, Mistakes, and Behavioral Fixes
Even with the best intentions, many of us fall into predictable networking traps. We have habits that feel efficient, but actually work against making meaningful connections. Behavioral science helps explain why these approaches fail and how to redesign them for better outcomes.
Below are a few of the most common networking missteps we see (and shared), along with the behavioral principles that can turn them into opportunities for authentic engagement.
| Myth or Mistake | Why it Fails | Behavioral Fix |
|---|---|---|
| “Ask if they’re hiring.” | Creates pressure and defensive processing. The other person feels immediately targeted, evaluated, or obligated. | Start with shared goals or curiosity instead. Ask about their current projects or challenges. Once rapport is built, information about opportunities emerges naturally. |
| “Send the same LinkedIn message to everyone.” | Generic outreach lacks authenticity and violates social reciprocity norms. The cognitive effort of crafting a personalized message signals sincerity while copy-paste messages do the opposite. | Personalize and reduce friction to respond: mention a shared connection, reference their work, and make your ask low-effort to answer. |
| “Networking ends when the event does.” | Without reinforcement, good intentions fade and are forgotten, the intention-action gap. Follow-up requires activation cues, and in unstructured contexts, it rarely happens. | Use implementation intentions: decide when, where, and how you’ll follow up before leaving the event. |
| “Lead with your elevator pitch.” | Starting with a self-focused monologue neglects social cognition bias, where people are more receptive to conversational reciprocity than one-way communication. | Replace your pitch with a curiosity opener, a question or story that invites dialogue rather than giving a performance. |
| “Networking is about quantity.” | Collecting contacts creates choice overload and weakens emotional salience. The human brain prioritizes quality interactions for recall and trust formation. | Focus on depth over breadth. Meaningful follow-up with a few key people builds long-term influence more effectively than dozens of surface-level exchanges. |
| “AI can write my outreach.” | Automated or overly polished language triggers authenticity skepticism and people can subconsciously detect tone patterns that signal detachment. | Use AI as a drafting tool, not a substitute for your true voice. Let it help with structure, but rewrite with your tone and context to preserve human warmth. |
Building a Behavioral Network
Behavioral science teaches us that the environments we create shape the behaviors we see. That applies just as much to professional relationships as to the types of work we do. A good network isn’t built by chance; it’s built by context, cues, and consistency.
That’s what makes communities like Bescy and local groups like Bescy-Philly so valuable. (Editor’s note: Check out Bescy’s upcoming event and find one near you at https://www.bescy.org/events)
They offer a living example of behavioral principles in action: shared purpose, visible reciprocity, and the psychological safety to experiment. Every event becomes a micro-lab for fostering connections. People learn by doing, reflecting, and then refining their approach. Whether it’s a structured workshop like Nudge Your Network or an informal meetup, the goal is the same: to make human connection easier, warmer, and more intentional.
Putting it into practice
We encourage everyone to keep the momentum going. Try designing your own small nudges:
- Set a calendar reminder for follow-ups
- Send a “give” before you ask
- Introduce two people who might spark ideas together
Track what happens when you do. Behavioral change doesn’t require sweeping effort; it just needs small, repeatable habits aligned with what matters to you.
References
Ambady, N., & Rosenthal, R. (1992). Thin slices of expressive behavior as predictors of interpersonal consequences: A meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin, 111(2), 256.
Bem, D. J. (1972). Self-perception theory. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 1–62. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0065-2601(08)60024-6
Brewer, M. B. (1999). The psychology of prejudice: Ingroup love and outgroup hate?. Journal of social issues, 55(3), 429-444.
Cialdini, R. B. (2009). Influence: Science and practice (Vol. 4, pp. 51-96). Boston: Pearson education.
Gollwitzer, P. M. (1999). Implementation intentions: strong effects of simple plans. American psychologist, 54(7), 493.
Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Michie, S., Van Stralen, M. M., & West, R. (2011). The behaviour change wheel: a new method for characterising and designing behaviour change interventions. Implementation science, 6(1), 42.
Montoya, R. M., Horton, R. S., & Kirchner, J. (2008). Is actual similarity necessary for attraction? A meta-analysis of actual and perceived similarity. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 25(6), 889-922.
Tajfel, H., & Turner, J. C. (2004). The social identity theory of intergroup behavior. In Political psychology (pp. 276-293). Psychology Press.
Thaler, R. H., & Sunstein, C. R. (2009). Nudge: Improving decisions about health, wealth, and happiness. Penguin.
