Jurate Plungyte is the co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer of Joiner, a social platform helping people connect through real-world experiences.
Jurate has a proven track record of over 15 years of marketing and entrepreneurship, business development, and experience launching high-impact campaigns and building community-focused brands. As CMO of Uber in Lithuania, she spearheaded the nationwide roll-out of the ride-sharing app. She subsequently co-founded and scaled multiple ventures with Eduard Titov, including an agri-tech business with clients across Europe. Initially involved in Joiner as an angel investor, she stepped into the role of CMO in 2022. Today she leads brand, growth, and community engagement across Joiner’s European expansion, and under her direction the platform has successfully launched in Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland. Jurate holds deep expertise in marketing strategy, experiential branding, and user-centered design. She lives and works in Vilnius.
For the last several years, I’ve found myself in the business of genuine relationships.
I co-founded Joiner as a platform for expats and relocants to meet and make friends in interesting places and over shared interests.
But as I dove into deliberately facilitating meaningful relationships, I saw myself falling into the trap of measuring my success by the number of social media followers and LinkedIn connections. Articles about the global loneliness epidemic and young people’s sense of total disconnection rolled across my feed. People were losing their ability to connect—and maybe, in a way, I was struggling too.
Meanwhile, I found myself doing a lot of networking. The more I networked, the more I realized that good networking is inseparable from being a good conversationalist, seeking points of solidarity, and acting genuinely interested in other people. Despite networking’s specific context and specialized decorum, it’s just another form of building connections.
Women in tech don’t have the luxury of being bad at networking. We depend on our connections to cut through the noise, spread our ideas, and find belonging and camaraderie with one another. Here’s how to do it better (and without feeling like a phony when you do):
Be generous
People who are good at networking know never to lead with what they hope to get out of a connection. Most anyone can sense when they’re being approached by somebody thinking “What can this person do for me?” It’s off-putting and will always work against you. Act interested and start from a place of support. Maybe you know someone who can help with their project. When in doubt, offer encouragement or a simple compliment. “Listen more than you talk” is always good advice.
Be selective
It’s easy to succumb to pressure to collect contacts, particularly as women in tech whose experiences and challenges so often overlap. Real value will always, however, lie in nurturing a few relationships rather than trying to initiate as many as possible. Meaningful relationships depend on depth. In practice, depth looks like people you check in with, learn from, and exchange ideas with over time. And if you don’t click with someone, it’s not a reflection on you or them. Don’t take it personally.
Be in the room
I’m not going to bash LinkedIn, which is a highly useful tool and great for opening the door to a connection. But it will never, ever replace in-person, real-world conversations. Relationships are made and deepened by shared laughter and spontaneous conversation. Attend meetups, workshops, and small-group events. Get offline!
Be in a group
One-on-one networking can be intimidating, especially when you’re starting out or don’t feel overly confident talking to people you don’t know. Cornering one person at an event is rarely a good idea. Bring a work buddy and move through an event as a small group, talking with other clusters of people along the way. There’s so much more room for introductions to happen this way.
Be a whole person
You are not an automaton who does nothing outside of work. Don’t act like it! I love food, traveling, and wine, and I’ve used these passions to have great conversations with people in a networking context. You are a full person, as is whoever you’re talking to. Don’t trauma dump, but don’t be afraid to be vulnerable if and when it feels right. Discuss doubts you carry and challenges you’ve faced. This level of honesty and vulnerability is how we bond as women, and it shouldn’t go overlooked.
Networking can be a little harrowing for anyone, and research shows that women often have fewer informal networking opportunities than their male peers. If you approach networking with the sole aim of progressing your career, you might put your foot in your mouth a few times. If you set open-ended goals about finding visibility, support, and community, you’re likely to have more luck. Act like the collaborator and ally you want to have. Treat success as collective, not a zero-sum game between individuals. These aren’t just your potential co-founders, colleagues, and patrons, but people who can be sources of real support in ways you can’t predict. Your best networking will be done when you stop collecting contacts, and follow the basic principles of human connection from the jump.
