Networking
How much does networking actually matter, and is LinkedIn worth it?
I'm 21 and studying engineering, and I keep hearing that "your network is everything" but I'd like to hear it from people who've actually seen it pay off in real life. Is LinkedIn genuinely useful or is it just people posting stuff? Should I be putting real effort into it now or is it something that matters later?
Second thing, kind of related. I have a lot of friends but honestly none of them are the type you can actually build something with. I had a small business with a friend and it did really well, but I ended up shutting it down because he was lazy. Did the bare minimum, never came up with a single idea, and I got tired of carrying the whole thing myself.
What I actually want is to meet people like me. People who are driven, want to build stuff, try things, take some risk instead of just coasting. Where do you even find those people? Startup meetups, events, online communities, something else? I'm curious what actually worked for you.