A Successful Career Needs A Strong Network—Here’s How To Build One This week’s Careers newsletter offers advice on building a strong network, ways to boost your happiness at work, the highest-paying remote jobs and more. This week’s Careers newsletter offers advice on building a strong network and networking tips, ways to boost your happiness at work, a roundup of some of the highest-paying remote jobs and more.If you want to advance your career, you’ll need to build a strong network. The statistics make the case: 54% of people report getting their job through a connection, according to a 2025 survey byThis is why networking in the first place can set you apart in today’s tough job market. Use these strategies to network successfully and creatively.because they lack confidence, the MyPerfectResume survey finds. Remind yourself about everything you bring to the job market and know that we all need assistance sometimes. Second, be expansive in what you ask for. Seek advice, inquire about job openings, request introductions to hiring managers or ask for referrals. Third, get creative. Host a small gathering over dinner or start a quarterly learning group. Invite people with different backgrounds and ask each to come with a conversation starter. When you connect other people, you build their networks as well as your own.in the long run, according to studies by Human Resource Management Review and the Center for Economic and Policy Research. Networking can be intimidating, but when you take an intentional and confident approach, it can return tons of value in finding opportunities and landing your next role!If you want to boost your happiness at work,Critical ConnectionsWeak ties are the people in our network that we know less well and who are further out from our core. They are our second or third order connections: acquaintances or friends of friends.come from weak ties. By definition, weak ties have access to information that we, and our closest ties, lack. Our further-out connections tend to know about new opportunities or job openings that we are unaware of.When you start your job search, let your weak ties know that you’re exploring and ask them for advice or information about new openings or opportunities. When you apply for a job, search for connections who may be able to introduce you within the organization or who can provide more information about the job or the person who will be interviewing youStaying in touch over social media, for example liking or commenting on their posts, is an effective strategy. You can also reach out to say congratulations or to wish them well on job changes or career milestones. You may even want to invite them for atop roles include psychiatrists, product managers and software engineersAs job candidates increasingly use AI to write their resumes, more than two-thirds of hiring managers say that the, according to a new study from HR consulting firm Robert Half. Many also say that skills are becoming harder to verify, which has external recruitment firms more appealing for companies. For job seekers, there are still a number of ways to