Some think the key to a good time at your first college party is a lot of dancing, drinking, or drugs. They’re wrong. It’s all about networking. After all, this is the interview for the rest of your life. If you fuck it up, you’re gonna end up hanging with PR majors forever, and they don’t have rich dads who work at JP Morgan. Please understand: the stakes are high.
Dress for the job you want, not the job you have.
If the party has a theme, ignore it. You don’t want the vestiges of some sophomore’s ‘Superhero’ house party trailing you for the rest of your life. Don’t manifest that: wear a suit instead. You’re a high-powered businessman, so you have to dress the part. If it puts people off, that’s good. You’re weeding out the ones that don’t matter.
2. Come with two or three prepared questions
When people start to come up to you, and trust me, they will (you’re the only one at this party wearing Brooks Brothers), they’re gonna want to have what they call a conversation. That’s great. Humans generally need to speak at you for a while before they’ll give you what you want (the number to their uncle who was just arrested for fraud). Once they stop talking, you can hit them with questions like, “How would your friendship benefit me?” or “Have you ever had to verify an alibi?” or “Can we skip all this chit-chat and just fuck like wounded animals?”
3. Do your research
No one’s gonna want to link and/or build with you if you don’t express a ‘genuine’ interest in them first. Do your homework. Go through the Facebook feed of every single person who was invited to the party. Make sure to take notes and bring them with you. This allows you to reference memories you weren’t present for, molding them into the perfect friend//assistant/job reference. Make it clear that you want to get right to the good stuff: a friendship that resembles a royal European marriage which exists only to consolidate power.
4. Be yourself!
This is key! It’s also super easy, just relax, make good eye contact, keep your chest up, your shoulders squared, mirror the other person’s every move, make physical contact when it seems appropriate (which is always), tense all of your muscles at once, and, of course, breathe.