FANs of Networking

"Your recruiter isn't calling you back. What do you do?" That was the tagline for the FAN event (Free Agent Networking) on Tuesday, May 14th at the Metropolitan Café. Elyse Spalding of Spalding Associates enlightened the gathered guests on how they can work with media industry recruiters to land their next job--and ultimately advance their careers. When I arrived I was greeted by CommConnect LLC partner Jennifer Kronstain, who introduced me to FAN founder Matt Prohaska. Matt told me the scoop on how he started this networking event for people out of work. Recognizing that many jobs are found via networking, Matt wanted to "speed up the randomness" associated with it. He invites those looking for work and companies looking to hire. After three events in New York and one in San Francisco, they are on a roll. Matt's wife, Bronwyn Prohaska, is working fulltime for the organization and eight part-timers, including Beth Cohen and David Nadel, help ensure things work like clockwork. PR veterns David Murrow and Tim Paul were out hitting the parties this night. David told me his wife, Debra Lee and he just had a baby boy-Lukas David! Vicki Herschman, an administrative assistant in TV, film and media and Discovery Communications' operations administrator Pamala McCormick-Steward were also enthusiastic about the event and their red-paper gift bags complete with a mug and CD. With a plethora of job-networking events going on, check out the FAN one too. You never know where your next job will come from and it's good to have as many options as possible!