Full disclosure, I'm the original author of the post.

Unfortunately, if you network to get a job, you're already months behind.

As I talk to college kids, I try to get them to find opportunities to network while they're in school, before they're desperate to get that first internship or job. They want to come at their search from a place of confidence, not anxiety.

There are so many meetups at universities (at least at the one near me) that they can mingle with the working world, and they stand out because they're there when it's mostly professionals.

Student or not, networking works best in-person when possible (conferences, meetups, professional events) where you get to know people and get truly curious about them. But after that, it involves following up and keeping the relationships warm, showing that you are interested in people professionally and can possibly help them with their problems, and that's no trivial investment.

If you do that enough, then you will build trust and rapport to create some opportunities, but it's admittedly a long game. It also has to be genuine or else people end up feeling used.

I think that there is a blocker that a lot of people have against networking in general because it feels gross and insincere. We've all seen people do it poorly, and so we avoid it, but it can be really fulfilling if done well.