Why a small but mighty network is more powerful

We've all been there. Marvelling at a colleague's follower count.

The volume and reach on LinkedIn feels like a badge of credibility. And instinctively, there's nothing wrong with this. If you're doing something notable, people follow you to keep up to speed. There's real value in reach. But then I noticed something about one of my mentors. They had a comparatively small follower count. And yet, I credit this person for getting me as far as I did in analytics. Everyone who's worked with them is in awe at how they break down complex problems and move the company forward. They're the person everyone wants to be managed by. That's when I realised: follower count doesn't strongly correlate with network quality. Or individual quality, for that matter. There's a correlation, sure. But it's weaker than we assume.

The conflation problem

It's easy to conflate "network" with "reach." Social networking platforms have trained us to think this way. So have influencers. But if you strip everything away, a network is just a group of people you can turn to when you have a challenge. People who you'd help when something comes up for them. That's it. Smaller, in this regard, genuinely is better. A smaller network is one you can actually support. And in return, they support you more effectively. You may have felt the sensation of being spread thin when your circle gets too big. The same thing happens with networking when we optimise for volume over density. What works better is a smaller, denser, higher quality network. People who help you access the best ideas, challenge your thinking, and find routes around problems that feel intractable. Now, this doesn't mean you can't have lots of followers on LinkedIn and also have a great network. It just means we might want to reframe what LinkedIn actually is. It's an audience tool. A CV platform. Maybe not the place to build the relationships that really matter. There's a genuine gap in tooling for smaller, quality network creation. That's what we're building with Flynt.

Why large doesn't mean influential

This part was harder for me to untangle. It seems safe to assume that someone with more followers is more influential, more credible. And generally, having a large following is a decent proxy for "this person knows what they're talking about." But the reverse isn't true. Having fewer followers doesn't mean someone doesn't know what they're talking about. This is the lesson from my mentor, and a few other deeply respected people I know. They have massive impact. They're hugely valued in their companies and teams. They just don't have big follower counts, because they don't care for it. The lack of followers reflects a lack of interest in LinkedIn, not a lack of value. This is who Flynt is for. People who have more to offer than their follower count suggests, and who'd rather have real conversations than build an audience.

How Flynt fits into this

These ideas sit underneath everything we build at Flynt. Fewer, intentional conversations is the north star. A few principles that guide us: We believe in community, not concierge. Members are part of Flynt. They don't just "get connections through Flynt." Less is more. With matching, this means one match per month. With Circles (our in-development group product), attendance will be capped at six people. Max. Your space is yours. Your dashboard and profile are private. No one else can see them. When you match, you can choose to share your bio, but the dashboard isn't a public square like LinkedIn. It's a private space to consolidate your thinking and learn about yourself (an idea we're building on with future releases Career Challenges and Projects).

If this feels like something you're into, give us a shout.