Finding Quality Professional Connections around the world--LinkedIn Social Networking

I need to find quality professional connections around the world.  Looking to social networking for a solution, LinkedIn.com seems to be a very good solution.  There are millions of people connected via the site.  Many of the discussion groups put me in touch with professionals in the areas I am looking for.  Alumni networks put me in touch with professionals who share a corporate history with me from the global workplace.

LinkedIn offered me the opportunity to start my own discussion groups.  I created three to gather together people interested in three different projects I am currently working on.  I've just dissolved one of these groups due to apparent lack of interest (at the moment) and have sent an announcment to members of the Audio eBooks for Learning to see if people want that group to continue.  My newest group is DrM-Language-Network so that people who choose to work with me on my latest project, making affordable online language learning programs available to learners throughout the world, can join with me to share ideas and to celebrate sucesses.

I've joined several pre-existing LinkedIn discussion groups so that I can invite people to work with me or to refer me to others who may want to be involved in my current project(s).  Some of these people have also joined my "primary" LinkedIn network.

Many of the people who are already in my primary LinkedIn network are the type of professionals I enjoy working with.  LinkedIn is one place to find quality professional connections.  Presently this seems to be the most direct and effective means, though I am open to learning about more.

Networks and Priorities and Exceptions to Rules

Each of us has a system we use, consciously or unconsciously, to determine our priorities and choices--for our time, attention, value, commitment, money, and more.

I had a call this morning from a friend who knew someone who had had a family tragedy and needed some help.  During the course of that conversation, I became aware of some of the processes I use to determine those priorities and to make exceptions.  It is a normal priority for me to extend what support I can to friends who ask.  When a friend asks on behalf of another friend, I extend my priorities and exceptions to the friend-of-my-friend.

I've offered my support and don't know whether or not I'll be called upon to follow-through.  The experience has already lead to a "snap-shot-awareness" of how I work my processes for priorities and exceptions.  That's a good thing to know.

Any one of us could have a family emergency or tragedy without warning.  It's nice to have friends to connect to and to have those friends connect to people they know.  LinkedIn talks about networks and degrees of networks.   In my network, I have 55 friends;  2 degrees away (friends of friends) I can connect with their 7,600+ people; 3 degrees away (friends of friends of friends) I can connect with 747,800 people.  (Some of my family members are on FaceBook.

Want to join my network on LinkedIn?