Your Network Is Your Moat

The reality of the modern job market is that it treats people as inventory. Companies hire speculatively during boom times. Then they cut when investors want better margins. You can be exceptional at your job and still be on the wrong side of a spreadsheet.

So how do you stand out? How do you prevent yourself from becoming a resource that companies can use and discard as they wish?

Human relationships, Your network.

Warm gets answered, cold gets ignored

I didn't get my role at General Motors from a job board. I didn't get my AI engineer position from cold applications, I got it from my network. My entrepreneurial journey started the same way. Friends. Warm intros. People who already knew how I think and work.

Now when cold outreach hits my inbox, I almost never respond. Not because it's bad or the person isn't smart. But because there's no context. The sender hasn't been pre-vetted.

Unless we share friends. Unless there's a reason I should care right now. Otherwise? Inbox zero.

Most people behave the same way. We respond to warmth. We ignore cold. Yet we keep building tools to send more cold messages, faster, at higher volume.

The real unlock isn't more outreach. It's better relationships.

Quality over quantity

Most people treat networking like a numbers game. Mass connection requests. Performative engagement. Collecting followers. Then they wonder why nobody responds when they actually need an intro.

Ten people who would pick up your call beat a thousand LinkedIn connections who wouldn't recognize your face.

The question shouldn't be "how big is your network?" It's "how many people would vouch for you to someone they respect?"

That number is usually much smaller. And much more valuable.

Invest before you need to

Networks aren't bank accounts you withdraw from forever. Every introduction you ask for is a withdrawal. Every relationship you let atrophy is depreciation. If all you do is take, eventually there's nothing left.

The people who build networks that actually protect them do two things:

They invest before they need to. They build relationships when there's no ask attached. They make introductions for others. They show up consistently, not just when they need something.

And they keep building. They don't treat their network as a fixed asset from their last job. They add new people. They stay curious. They maintain momentum.

The moat

When the job market treats you as inventory, your network is your moat.

Not your skills alone. Skills can be learned, copied, or made obsolete. Not your resume. A resume gets you past a filter, nothing more.

Your network is the set of people who would vouch for you. Who would take a call. Who would refer you before the job is posted.

That can't be automated. It can't be faked. And it compounds over time, if you treat it right.

Build your network before you need it. Maintain it like the asset it is. And when uncertainty hits, you'll have something that can't be liquidated.