[ghaff]

It is at some level if you take definitions to extremes. If you actively avoid conversations and socializing with other people, you will probably suffer personally and professionally. Of course, that doesn't mean you always have to be the "life of the party."

[SoftTalker]

I’m not sure if suffer is the right word. Some people prefer a quiet life and accept what comes with that, because that’s what they want. And that’s fine.

Of course if you want to live a quiet life and avoid socializing very much, and want to be a successful independent contractor, those might be fairly incompatible goals.

[shadowerm]

This all really has nothing to do with extroversion to me.

We are talking about what is essentially sales and marketing skills.

I am the life of the party but I would never try to freelance because I hate sales and marketing so much.

This is all really asking how to start a business without having to do sales and marketing. Obviously, that is not going to work.

One can either gain these skills or do something else.

[ghaff]

There are some correlations. But I agree that you can be extroverted (whatever that means exactly) but most sales and marketing roles (which vary quite a bit) just don't appeal.

[SoftTalker]

All true but I think an introvert is going to have difficulty taking on a "face of the company" sales and marketing role. That just naturally requires a lot of extrovert personality traits.

[ghaff]

Certainly. I have heard of a number of senior execs who really hated public speaking (even when they were very good at it given sufficient rehearsal). But I agree in general. If you have a public/customer-facing role you're going to find it exhausting and probably not going to be great at it if it is uncomfortable/unpleasant.

I'm certainly not the classic stereotype of the outgoing sales rep (whether that's a fair stereotype or not) but that didn't keep me from attending a ton of conferences, customer meetings, and giving public presentations.

[hsuduebc2]

I personally don't have a problem with communication with people but honestly I cant really imagine let's say dev meetups or saturdays brunch with purpose of networking anything but somehow awkward experience.

[ghaff]

Well, "networking events" at least tend to be forced socialization of people basically looking for jobs as opposed to something more organic. Less true of meetups although they mostly never checked a lot of boxes for me either.