Building strong, authentic professional connections is vital to your career joy and success. Your network is key to helping you ‘get ahead’, build trusted relationships with colleagues, and find mentors you can learn from.

One great way of getting to know someone in a professional setting is through coffee catch-ups; the professional meeting, with a hint of personal flair — away from the desk in a casual and relaxed format. And the best part is, it can be used as a meeting between you and your team members, fellow placement participants, new people in your network or even your supervisors. 

While coffee catch-ups can be great for creating bonds and getting to know someone on a much more personal level, they are in fact still a business meeting and can be used to discuss feedback, gain advice, or run through projects and tasks.

So how can you ensure you gain the most out of your coffee catch-ups and make the time useful for everyone involved?

Create an agenda

List down at least two to three things you would like to speak about during the coffee break. While informal meetings are fantastic for building rapport, they can be viewed as a waste of time if nothing is achieved. So, be clear when you set the meeting about what you want to meet to discuss and keep the meeting on track bringing the conversation around the agenda items.

Drive the conversation

If you call the meeting, it is your responsibility to drive the conversation. Because of the informal nature of coffee catch-ups, you have the opportunity to get to know someone on a personal and professional level. So, be a great audience, ask questions and be an active listener. 

Don’t forget to have fun

It’s normal to feel nervous before meetings or having a one-on-one with someone new, but remember, these are just conversations. It’s a great opportunity to get to know someone outside the office, so keep conversations light and remember to have fun with the meeting. 

Virtual coffee catch-ups

Working in a hybrid world now, it’s not uncommon for many of our meetings to be online – and the great news is you can still have a coffee catch-up via Zoom. So follow the same principles and even utilise the meeting subject as ‘Virtual Coffee Catch-Up’ so the attendee knows the tone of the meeting. The only difference is, it’s BYO coffee.