Listen, for those of you college students who want to be entrepreneurs, the time to build your network is now. Boston has a thriving tech ecosystem and every day that you’re not getting off campus is a missed opportunity. Start building connections that matter now. Learn to play the game.

When I graduated from Bentley University in 2006, Boston was a much different place. It was much harder to connect with people in the startup ecosystem. My friends and I didn’t know who were the local venture capitalists, angels and successful entrepreneurs; let alone how to get a meeting with them. Now all you have to do is head out to one of the many events happening each night and say hello.

The great thing about Boston today is that people want to help you succeed. We created hack/reduce to help connect Boston’s Big Data community. Since our launch in 2012, we’ve hosted over 300 events including: hackathons, meetups, office hours, trainings and more; and we have been the pipeline for several early stage companies. Our goal is to catalyze the next great companies in Boston by connecting its greatest resource, the people.

Our effort is supported by private companies and the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative’s Big Data Initiative. Our main goal is to draw you as an individual into the local tech ecosystem. We ask ourselves: “How can we help you build a network so that you want to stay here in Boston and build your company?”

We know that once you have your network established, it’s harder to leave. Say you come by FKA and meet Bentley alum Chris Lynch (MBA, 91, D.Com.Sc.(Hon.), ‘11), a partner at FKA and former CEO of Vertica Systems, which he led from late-stage startup to the number one ranked big data company in the market. There’s no denying that relationship holds value for your long-term career. Connections are priceless.

A big component of hack/reduce is the technology that we’ve built behind it. When you sign up for hack/reduce, we’re able to develop a sense of who you are, what you’re working on and who you might be interested in connecting with. Then we make recommendations. We have successfully paired countless new entrepreneurs with people who have done it before and who can break down doors. Since 2012, we’ve seen over 6,000 people flow through our community.

For students we’ve even set up the hack/reduce Scholar Program, empowering students to learn how to build community on their campus and giving them a leg up on meeting the influencers in the Boston tech community. For the Scholar Program, we look for students who are active not only with their student communities but are also making the effort to be involved in the broader tech community in Boston.

With many young people, I find the desire to be an entrepreneur is there, but they don’t know what to do next. That is why students need to get off campus. Come down to Kendall Square, the Seaport, Leather District and get involved.

Believe me, there are many opportunities through hack/reduce for students. Chris Lynch is a great example of that. Once you start meeting and talking to people, awesome things will happen.

But first you have to show up.

Here is another piece of advice for when you’re starting out: find a passion, not a job. For people who want to start companies, choose jobs that reflect a skill you want to learn and mentors you want to learn that skill from.  

As soon as I graduated from college, I started my own company. It didn’t work out. Looking back on it now, I should have worked somewhere to get experience first. I needed to develop skills and understand a particular domain before setting up and doing something on my own. So even though that first attempt was a failure, I learned from it.

Next I found a full-time job and put my off-hours energy into DartBoston, an organization that I co-founded in order to help gather ambitious young entrepreneurs. As I said, we didn’t have an easy time of it back then. We had to work to find each other. People were interested in meeting but nobody knew what to do or where to go, so we created that infrastructure. In the end, DartBoston helped me build my personal brand and led me to the next thing, which then led me to starting a company, Terrible Labs, which was later acquired by Autodesk.

If you want to eventually start a business, my advice is: start becoming part of the tech community now. A big part of that involves building your network. Today there are so many activities going on around town, so many events, so many resources. Young people who don’t take advantage of them are missing out on a great opportunity. hack/reduce can help you build the relationships you need to found or join the next great technology companies. If you’re ready to get started, get here and join us.

Cort Johnson is an executive director with Hack/Reduce and a venture partner at FKA.