Networking
Networking is mostly one conversation at a time: twenty minutes with a Wesleyan alum who was glad you asked. It is also how many students find their first internship or job, through a person rather than a posting. This page covers where to find the alumni, faculty, and employers working in fields you are considering, how to write the first email, and what to do after you talk.
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On this page:
Why Networking Matters at Wesleyan
Networking means talking with people who do work you are curious about, so that you can learn what the work involves and what it takes to get into it. You are not asking anyone to hire you, which is the part many misunderstand about it.
Preprofessional degrees tend to come with a route attached, while a Wesleyan education leads almost everywhere, and that breadth is both the value of it and the reason nobody has handed you a map. What you study and experience opens onto more paths than you can see from campus, and these conversations are how you start to picture yourself on one of them. The most reliable way to learn where your major can lead is to ask alumni who studied it.
There is a practical argument as well. Now that anyone can send fifty applications in an afternoon, fifty applications are worth considerably less than they were a few years ago, and a large share of roles are filled through referrals and internal networks before they are ever posted. A candidate whose name someone recognizes moves faster through every stage of a hiring process, which is why we generally suggest putting more of your search time into conversations than into applications, closer to 60-40. Applying still matters, but it works better when you are not a stranger.
Why People Say Yes
Students often assume they are imposing, so it helps to turn the situation around. If a high school senior emailed you to ask what Wesleyan is really like, whether they should apply, and what they ought to know before they do, you would almost certainly write back, and you would probably enjoy giving them the honest version.
That is roughly what your message looks like from the other side. Most people are glad to be asked about their own work, and the ones who are too busy will simply not reply, which costs you nothing beyond the few minutes you spent writing.
Wesleyan alumni value conversations with current students since they get to reflect on their own path, hear what campus is like now, and pass along the advice they once needed. Shared ground makes it easier still. A professor you both had, a club or athletic team you both belonged to, a favorite study spot, gives the conversation a place to start.
Not every message you send will be answered, but what makes a yes easy is a small and specific request: twenty or thirty minutes, one clear question, and a line showing you read their profile before writing. The rest is in How to Write the First Message.
Start Where it is Comfortable
If the prospect of networking makes you anxious, there is no reason to begin with a vice president at a company you admire. Start instead with someone you already know, whether that is a family member, a friend’s parent, a former teacher, a teammate, or a professor whose class you liked, and have the awkward version of the conversation somewhere low-stakes. The structure does not change from one to the next, and the practice carries over.
Every class you take is practice for this. An informational interview is a seminar with one other person: you read up beforehand, bring a real question, and follow the answer wherever it goes.
Who is Already in Your Network
Your network includes the people who already know you and would recognize your name in their inbox, and it includes the thousands of Wesleyan alumni who will make time for you because of the school you share. Whether that first list is long or short, the Wesleyan half of it is the same size for everyone.
At Wesleyan. Your professors, the deans, coaches, the staff in offices where you work or spend your time, the student organizations you belong to, your classmates, and students a year or two ahead of you who have just done the thing you are about to do.
Alumni. More than 30,000 Wesleyan alumni are working in nearly every field there is, and many of them have already volunteered to talk with students, which makes this both the largest and the most usable part of your network. See Where to Find Wesleyan Connections.
Before Wesleyan. Teachers, coaches, counselors, and former classmates from high school, along with your high school’s alumni directory if it has one you can still reach.
The people who raised you, and the adults around them. Parents, guardians, grandparents, siblings, cousins, aunts and uncles, stepfamily, and the people who were family in practice if not on paper. If any of them work in a field you are curious about, or know someone who does, that is a good place to start.
Your communities. A cultural, religious, or identity-based group you belong to here or at home, a team, a band or theater company, a volunteer group or mutual aid network, a unit you served with, the neighborhood you grew up in, or an online community built around something you care about.
People you have worked with. Supervisors and coworkers from campus jobs, summer jobs, internships, and research positions, including the supervisor from the job you did not enjoy, who still knows people.
Where to Find Wesleyan Connections
Wesleyan is a small school with an expansive and supportive alumni network. Use the tools below to explore their paths, discover possibilities, and build connections. Note that alumni are often not doing the work their majors might predict. A short conversation will tell you more than WesMaps can.
WesConnect
Search the alumni directory by industry, location, job function, or major. Look for the “Willing to Help” badge, which notes alumni especially open to hearing from students.
From the Wesleyan University page, go to the Alumni tab, and filter by location, employer, field, keyword, or what they studied.
Handshake
Visit the People tab to search Wesleyan students and recent alumni by employer, major, organization, or skill. Profiles often list courses, activities, projects, and work experience.
GCC Programs that Make the Introduction to Alumni for You
If cold outreach is the part of networking you dread, start with one of our career programs. You sign up or apply, we make the introduction to an alum who has already agreed to talk with you.
WesLink & WesLink Global: Apply in the fall, tell us which alumni you would most like to talk with, and we match you for one-on-one virtual conversations over winter break. Applying requires a GCC-approved resume on Handshake. → Learn about WesLink
Cardinal Connections: Informal, small-group conversations with alumni who walk through their career path and answer questions from students. Registration on Handshake is required, join the waitlist if the event is full.
Career Treks: Site visits to organizations, often hosted by Wesleyan alumni who work there. You see the workplace first-hand and hear from alumni and recruiters.
Employer Info Sessions and Coffee Chats: Alumni and recruiters visit campus to recruit interns and new graduates. Info sessions cover what an organization does and what it looks for, while coffee chats give you a short one-on-one conversation with someone who works there. → Learn about Recruiting
Upcoming Cardinal Connections, career treks, employer info sessions and coffee chats are on the Handshake events calendar.
How to Write the First Message
Four Things Every First Message Does
Usually in under 150 words.
- Introduction: Who you are in a line or two, including class year, what you study, and anything that explains why you are writing to this person in particular.
- Connection: How you found them, whether that is WesConnect, LinkedIn, a mutual contact, or a talk they gave.
- Purpose: What you want to know, stated specifically. Not that you would like to learn about their career, but the question itself.
- Request: What you are asking for and how long it will take. Twenty to thirty minutes is the standard ask and the one most likely to get a yes.
Put one real question in the first email. A message that ends with “I would love to learn more about your career path” gives the reader nothing to answer, which is why it sits in the inbox, whereas a message asking how they moved from clinical work into policy, or whether a master’s degree was necessary for their first job, gives them something they can answer today. One question rather than five.
Reaching Out Respectfully
Alumni who make themselves available to students are volunteering, usually because someone did the same for them, and the network holds together because students treat it well.
- Write the message yourself. Use AI to tighten a draft or check your tone if you want, but do not have it write the message, because alumni can tell, generic outreach gets ignored, and the same template sent to fifteen people does more damage than sending nothing at all.
- Read their profile first, and do not ask what their profile/website/portfolio already answers.
- Do not ask for a job, in the first message or on the call. If a role exists and they think you fit it, they will raise it themselves, whereas asking directly puts them in an awkward position and usually ends the relationship.
- Use their full name rather than a title, since you often cannot tell which honorific someone uses and getting it wrong makes for a poor first line.
- Attach your resume only if it is relevant, and only once it has been approved on Handshake. It gives the reader useful context, but it is not the point of the message. A Handshake or LinkedIn profile link in your email is more subtle.
- Show up on time with your questions ready, and if you have to cancel, say so as early as you can.
- Send one follow-up, then let it go. If you have heard nothing after ten days, a short note is reasonable, and after that it is better to move on. Silence is almost never about you.
- Keep what they tell you in confidence, since people are often candid about their employer, their pay, or their regrets.
- Say thank you within 24 hours, every time.
Two Examples
Cold outreach through WesConnect or LinkedIn
Subject: Wesleyan junior interested in sports media
Dear Jordan Ellis,
I am a junior at Wesleyan majoring in History. Working at WESU has turned a general interest in media into something more specific, and as a student athlete I have been paying attention to how sports coverage gets made. I found your profile through WesConnect and saw that you moved into production at ESPN a few years after graduating.
I would be grateful for twenty or thirty minutes to hear how that transition happened, and what you would tell a student trying to get into the field now.
Would you have any availability in the next two weeks? I have attached my resume for context. Thank you for considering it.
Best,
Ren Okafor ’27
Wesleyan University
Outreach through a mutual contact
Subject: Introduction from Priya Raman, question about quantitative trading
Dear Sam Whitaker,
I am a senior at Wesleyan majoring in Mathematics and looking for quantitative work after graduation. Priya Raman suggested I write to you, since she thought your route into trading would be a useful one for me to hear about.
What I am trying to understand is how much of the skill set gets learned on the desk rather than expected on day one, and whether people tend to arrive from math programs or from somewhere else entirely.
I will be in New York from January 12 to 16 and would be glad to meet if you have half an hour, or we could talk by phone if that is easier. Thank you for your time.
Best,
Alex Mendes ’26
Wesleyan University
See our networking outreach templates covering a range of starting points.
How to Prepare for the Conversation
You asked for the meeting, which makes you responsible for running it, meaning you open, you bring the questions, and you keep track of the time.
Beforehand: Reread their profile, then write down five or six questions in the order you most want them answered, since you may only get through three. Have a two-sentence version of yourself ready as well: what you study, what you are curious about, and why you wrote to them.
During: Introduce yourself briefly and then start asking, listening more than you talk. Follow what they say rather than working down your list, and ask about the interesting thing when it surfaces, since you are aiming for a conversation rather than an interview assembled from unconnected good questions. Take notes.
Keeping to the time you asked for: Watch the clock yourself, and when you reach the time you requested, say so: “I know I only asked for thirty minutes and we are right about there, so thank you for the time.” Many people will offer to keep going, and the ones with another meeting will be glad you noticed.
Seven Questions Worth Asking
- How did you get to where you are now?
- How do you think your liberal arts education prepared you for this work?
- What does a typical day look like, or if there is no typical day, what did yesterday involve?
- What is the hardest part of the job, or the part people do not expect?
- What does someone need in order to be taken seriously for an entry-level role here?
- What question have I not asked that I should be thinking about?
- Based on what we talked about, is there anyone else you would suggest I talk to?
That last question is what turns a single conversation into a network, so ask it every time, and if they offer a name, ask whether you may mention theirs.
→ More questions, organized by what you are trying to find out
How to Follow Up and Stay in Touch
This is the part almost everyone skips, and it is what separates a contact from a relationship.
Send a thank-you within 24 hours. Email is fine and a handwritten note is memorable. Name something specific they said so it is clear you were listening, and confirm anything you told them you would do.
Then do it. If they suggested a book, read it. If they offered an introduction, follow up while they still remember offering, and if they told you to check back in the spring, put it on your calendar now.
Keep track. After a few conversations you will not remember who said what, and a simple spreadsheet is enough to fix that: name, title, organization, how you know them, email, date of last contact, what you discussed, and what happens next. The networking tracker below is set up this way if you would rather not build one.
Put it on your calendar. Outreach is the sort of task that slides to next week indefinitely, so block half an hour to write messages, add every scheduled call to your calendar so you do not miss one, and set your own reminders for when to check back in with someone.
Stay in touch on a slow schedule. Twice a year is plenty. Send a short note when you get the internship they advised you about, when you graduate, or when you read something they would find interesting, since alumni like knowing how it turned out.
Then pay it back. Answer the first-year who emails you, and sign up for WesLink once you are an alum. Any of this works for you because people ahead of you decided to keep it working.
If You Have Done This Before
You have had a few casual networking conversations or informational interviews and want to be more deliberate about the next round.
- Build a target list rather than a contact list. Pick eight to twelve organizations you want to work for and then find the Wesleyan alumni inside them, since three conversations at one organization will teach you more than one conversation at forty.
- Aim one level above where you would apply. Someone two or three years into the job you want knows what the hiring process really screens for, and their manager knows what makes a candidate stand out.
- Ask for a referral once you have earned it. After a real conversation, and only when a specific role exists, it is reasonable to ask whether they would be comfortable passing your materials along. Make saying yes easy by sending the posting, a tailored resume, and two sentences they can copy.
- Be findable. A LinkedIn profile that says what you are working on and what interests you, updated a couple of times a year, means people can come to you rather than only the reverse.
- Reach out before you need anything. The best time to email someone is when you have no request to make.
- Talk to an advisor about strategy rather than scripts. Once you have the basics, the useful conversation is about which twelve people to talk to and what to ask them.
Downloads and Tools
Outreach Message Templates
Seven editable emails, from a first message through the thank-you note.
Networking Tracker
A spreadsheet for contacts, conversations, and next steps, with one example row.
Question Bank
More than fifty questions, grouped by what you are trying to find out.
Get Help With Any of This
A career advisor can help you build a list of alumni worth contacting, read your outreach message before you send it, and run through your questions before a call. Advisors work by field, and appointments fill up during busy stretches, so book two or three weeks ahead. For a quicker read on a draft, Peer Career Advisors are an easier first stop.
