Most people meet the host by accident, on the way out, with a coat already half on. Larry’s rule flips the order: find the host in the first five minutes, before you talk to anyone else in the room. The host is not just a person, the host is the room’s existing distribution, the same idea Larry calls External API.
Every introduction the host makes for you is more effective than ten you make for yourself, because it borrows their trust. Before you arrive, run the preview step of PQRST: find out who is hosting and what they care about, so the greeting is not blind. A short, specific thank-you to the host at the door is Larry’s karma move: an early deposit that a real host tends to notice and remember.
Hosts introduce people who make them look good. Your job in that first five minutes is to give the host a reason to want to introduce you. Larry’s advice is blunt: do not save the host for last, because by the end of the night they are tired and surrounded.
If the host is busy when you arrive, say your name, say one sentence about why you are glad to be there, and move on. You can circle back. The host remembers who greeted them first far more than who eventually cornered them near the door.
Larry says the difference between a good night and a wasted one often comes down to this five-minute window, though that is his read on it, not a fixed rule. Treat the host list like the actual guest list, because in most rooms, it is.
Details: Watch Larry’s host-first move
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