On my last trip to Barcelona on the AVE (Spain’s high-speed train), I finally became convinced of networking on certain means of transport.
In the boarding queue for the AVE at Atocha I had already bumped into 3 people I knew, so we arranged to meet in the café car.
The good thing about the Madrid-Barcelona and Barcelona-Madrid AVE, and why not Madrid-Seville, Madrid-Zaragoza and so on, is that you have precious time you can spend on whatever you like.
Taking a nap to catch up on sleep, listening to music, doing a bit of work, reading or enjoying the scenery.
Another option, and the one I chose on this trip, is to go to the train’s café car. There I spent a pleasant while with my work colleagues and chatted with one of the contacts I’d met while boarding at Atocha.
The café car isn’t exactly the most comfortable place, as you have to stand, but with a good conversation the journey flies by.
Now, thanks to Twitter, you can ask who’s on the 7:00 train, as Carlos Blanco and more and more people often do, so you can meet up on the train. That’s more than 2 hours you can use to chat with someone and perhaps agree on some kind of collaboration.
The people who organised themselves brilliantly with the AVE and planes were most of the attendees at EBE 09. Thanks to the great atmosphere at the event, there were some good parties and debates in the café car from Madrid to Seville and back.
On my way back to Madrid, exactly the same. I was travelling alone, but in the café queue I suddenly ran into one of my best friends, whom I’d been meaning to call for a chat, so the 2 and a half hours flew by, and we also ended up talking to a consultant who writes for Expansión and came over to us.
So, every time you travel, a few recommendations:
- If you can, don’t travel alone; try to travel with a colleague from work.
- Tweet your trip to your followers in case you coincide with one of them on the train or plane.
- Take some good music and a good book with you in case you don’t run into anyone.
- Get to the train or plane in plenty of time so you don’t arrive running and sweating buckets.
- If you have work pending, get your laptop out and get ahead, or make notes of your to-dos, ideas, etc.
- Take a stroll to the café car and, why not, break the ice with one of your fellow travellers.
Happy networking at 300 km/h
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