Building Your Global Network, One Travel at a Time

Master international networking while abroad. Ahh, the smell of lavender, freshly baked croissants, and the sweet sound of the world’s most romantic language whizzing through the open air patios. Hours or years after returning from a picture perfect experience in France, and you can still sense every bit of it when you close your eyes. You’ve captured the memories in Polaroids, a fancy scarf from a local shop, and maybe in a fantastic little snow globe. However, the second you boarded the flight home, you said au revoir and locked it away in your memory. 

Saying “au revoir” to your trip overseas shouldn’t be the end of your experience! Follow this list to continue to grow your global connections.

Then, the experience becomes an isolated event in the past.

If only you could put a French person in your pocket to bring a piece of the country back with you...Maybe in the form of a friendship on a messaging app on your phone?

Why do global connections matter?

Establishing friendships with those abroad keeps the cultural experience alive well after you touch down in your home country. Professional connections also expose you to career opportunities around the globe. 

We hear all the time about how the world keeps shrinking and that companies are becoming increasingly multinational as international borders continue to blur. Globalization isn’t just a business trend, either. Young Americans, for example, have much more ethnically diverse classrooms than their parents’ generations did. The world is full of cultural, linguistic, religious, and ethnic diversity, and international travel is one of the most direct ways to begin to understand it.

Getting to know people from around the globe helps more than just your resume or social media follower count. It helps you grow personally and leads to some of the coolest friendships you’ll ever have (no offense to your domestic buds). Having an insider to educate you about the local customs can also fight off potential cultural shock.

Make new friends, but keep the old! Don’t start ditching your friends from home, but making friends all over the world is definitely worthwhile.

5 ways to master international networking

Dreaming of a United Nations-style friend potluck with curry, bratwurst, spaghetti, and baklava on the table? Here’s a simple guide on how to establish your international networking empire, one friendship at a time.

1. Start Your Networking Journey at Home

This may sound like the start of an epic, fantasy adventure in which a hero sets out from his hometown to complete a quest by throwing a ring into a fiery volcano. It’s a little more low-key than that, for as counterintuitive as it may sound, the easiest ways to meet international friends can start at home.

Connecting with individuals who are from the country that you plan to visit while at home provide an invaluable asset once you’re abroad. Even if you already have some connections where you’re headed, having another insider friend never hurts. Not only will you have a live resource to ask all your burning cultural and linguistic questions to in preparation, but you’ll also get a local perspective that can hook you up with other friends once abroad. 

So how can you meet international friends at home without resorting to stalking anyone with an accent? Students can get involved with international student groups at their universities, which may even have a program to serve as a “buddy” to new students from overseas. High school students could ask their school administration or language department about any visiting exchange students or pen pal opportunity.

Getting involved in international student clubs at your university is a great way to make global connections once you get home.

Even those who are no longer students can leverage some international networking by connecting with foreign professionals or language groups in the area. We have a few group meetup suggestions in the sections below!

2. Participate in Every Opportunity Your Program Abroad Provides

For those studying abroad on a formalized program, I can promise you making friends has never been easier, even with the most dissimilar people. Being plopped into a foreign land with a bunch of strangers truly has a way of bringing people together.

To make friends all over the world while studying abroad, try these simple steps:

1. Link arms with your new study abroad friends and march straight into the favorite local hangout spots. (Trust me, it’s a lot less scary when not alone.)
2. Get ultra-involved at your host school.
3. Hit up all local festivals and events.
4. Lock down a language buddy.
5. Live with a host family.

Even if you’re traveling solo without a program to help you out, there are still plenty of strategies to meet international friends on your journeys. Stake out in the hostel common room, plan events for your friends to bring their friends and their friends’ friends, or join mini-excursions to neighboring cities that target other vagabonds like yourself.

Volunteering or going to local events will allow you to meet so many people while you’re abroad.

3. Take Initiative and Seek Out Social Events

Putting yourself out there is especially crucial for working professionals who spend their days at the workplace. If you’re an English teacher at an after-school tutoring school in China, for example, most social stimulation you’ll get at work is from children. Luckily, big cities like Beijing offer a diverse crowd and countless networking opportunities to get involved with and meet international friends.

Throwing yourself into uncharted territory is much easier said than done, and admittedly takes bucket loads of courage to do. First, ask yourself what you already enjoy doing, such as dancing, hiking, cooking, or photography. Having a comfort zone to build off of will help identity local groups to join that you will already have some level of connection with.

We’re fortunate enough to live in the digital age, where finding these groups are just an online search away! Smaller, local gatherings may require some insider knowledge, but here are a few internationally recognized meetup groups to get started:

• Meetup - Browse groups for virtually any interest from coffee chats to yoga in cities around the world.
• InterNations - Find a community expats and locals near you that organizes events and provides a home away from home.
• Facebook groups - Search for an interest group or event near with a social platform you probably already use!

Thank you internet, for giving us so many ways to get connected!

Employment overseas is a terrific way to get a new global perspective on a career path, but can working abroad can be isolating depending on the work culture and coworkers. Social outlets outside of work fulfill the need to meet international friends and let you feel better settled into your new home.

4. Stay Connected After Returning Home

So you’ve returned home and now have a lofty assortment of international friends at your fingertips. But what’s the use if you don’t foster those connections and keep them alive for years down the road?

You never know where life will take you, and you may just find yourself crashing at that Portuguese friend’s place who you met hiking in Japan some years later. Professionally speaking, it’s important to maintain connections from an internship abroad with occasional email check-ins, a postcard once you get home, or by commenting every once in a while on social media. It’s much easier to strike up conversation about job opportunities later if you’ve kept up consistent communication, rather than coming in out of nowhere. 

5. Avoid the Treacherous Comfort Zone

Not everyone is a social butterfly comfortable striking up casual, impromptu conversations with complete strangers in the grocery store checkout line.

If you’re nervous about meeting new people, don’t be—everyone wants to make more friends!

With that in mind, it’s normal to feel vulnerable and awkward by putting yourself out there. Branching out into new circles of people, especially with unfamiliar cultures and languages, takes guts. Some people truly enjoy mingling with new people, but what about the other half of the population that would rather keep to themselves?

If the intention is to travel and meet friends, a goal is already in place. Draw strength from this resolution to grow an international network and remember it anytime you think sticking around your comfort zone would be easier. Even just exposing yourself to the right social environments, like a mixer during your internship abroad, or a language exchange at a cafe, sets you up for others to start the conversation first. Even if you don’t talk to folks at the first few meetups, occasionally stopping by to warm up to the idea is a great place to start.

In the words of Dale Carnegie, American author of the bestselling book, How to Win Friends and Influence People…Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.

Now set off to make friends all over the world!

No matter where you go, we hope you come home with plenty of new connections.

Keep in mind: You can befriend everyone under the sun, not just “locals”! Of course getting involved in the local scene has its obvious benefits. However, broadening your horizons to include nationals from all over the world expands your knowledge and gives you some pretty nifty places to visit later on too. #travelperks

The ability to travel and meet friends from dissimilar cultures helps fight prejudice on both sides, widens your perspective and challenges your idea of how the world works. Welcoming diversity of thought, religion, and culture into your life helps to understand humanity just a bit better.

Meeting others around the globe has never been easier, and that same technology lets you maintain relationships no matter where you go. Who knows, that guy you shared a hostel room with in Berlin may even be your next job hook up in a few years!

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