Do the people in your networking groups know what pigeon hole you fit in? Are you sure?
Quick — think of someone you’d recommend for a speaking gig. Or a solicitor. Or a plumber. Or an accountant.
I’ll bet a name came to mind almost instantly. And I’ll bet that person occupies a very clear pigeonhole in your mind — a specific, well-defined category that allows you to retrieve their name precisely when that category becomes relevant.
That’s how referral networks actually work. And it’s why defining your pigeonhole is one of the most important things you can do for your professional reputation.
What a Pigeon hole Is and Why We Need Them
The term comes from the old-fashioned postal system of small compartments — pigeonholes — into which letters were sorted for retrieval. Your professional pigeonhole is the mental compartment someone files you in. It’s the category they put you in so they can find you when they need you.
Human memory works through association and category. When someone needs a professional service, they don’t scroll mentally through every professional they’ve ever met — they search by category. “I need a family lawyer.” “I need someone who knows about export compliance.” “I need a keynote speaker for our leadership conference.” The people who show up in those mental searches are the ones who’ve been clearly filed in the relevant pigeon hole.
The problem, for many professionals, is that their pigeonhole is fuzzy. They do several things, all reasonably well. They’re reluctant to be specific about what they’re best known for, because specificity feels like exclusion. “What if I define myself too narrowly and miss opportunities?”
The irony is that the opposite is true. The more specifically you occupy a defined pigeonhole, the more reliably you show up in the mental searches that matter.
The Case for Specificity
Consider two professionals introducing themselves.
“I’m a communications consultant. I work with businesses on a range of communication challenges — internal communication, leadership messaging, presentation skills, media relations, stakeholder engagement.”
“I help senior leaders communicate complex ideas to boards and investors with clarity and confidence.”
The first is comprehensive. The second is specific. Which one is going to be retrieved when a CEO says to their chair, “I need someone who can help me prepare for the board presentation next month”?
Specificity doesn’t limit you. It locates you. It puts you in the right pigeonhole so that when the right opportunity arises, your name comes up.
Having More Than One Pigeonhole
Many professionals occupy more than one clearly defined space — and that’s entirely workable, as long as each is clearly defined. The risk is when multiple pigeonholes blur into a vague general category that doesn’t clearly describe anything.
If you have two distinct areas of genuine expertise, you can have two distinct pigeonholes. But each should be clearly defined and communicated separately to the right audiences.
What you can’t do is maintain one loose, catch-all pigeonhole for everything you do and expect any of it to be readily recalled when a specific opportunity arises.
Maintaining Your Pigeonhole
Being filed in a pigeonhole isn’t a one-time event. It requires consistent reinforcement. Every time you write an article, give a talk, share content on social media, or have a professional conversation, you’re either reinforcing or blurring your pigeonhole.
Ask yourself regularly: does what I’m putting into the world clearly reinforce the category I want to be known for? Or am I being so diverse that nobody quite knows where to put me?
The professionals who get the most referrals are the ones who’ve made it easy for their network to know exactly what to recommend them for. They’ve claimed their pigeonhole clearly, occupied it consistently, and kept it in good repair.
What’s yours?