Building our own brand is the best way to develop ourselves and to achieve our personal and professional goals. This individual process of improvement has a powerful social impact, as it favors relationships with customers and collaborators, and ends up strengthening organizations.
In previous conversations we have already mentioned how important it is, from the point of view of the leadership of the future, to understand the first generation of Digital Natives who are arriving in our schools and organizations. By understanding their values, their way of life and motivations, we will better understand the type of organizations we have to build in the future. In today’s conversation we are going to refer to a fundamental aspect for new professionals: their Personal Brand. This Personal Brand focuses on their professional and personal skills, on what makes them different, on those aspects in which they stand out, and that make a difference for them and for their companies within an increasingly transparent market regarding what each one brings to the organization.
Personal Branding, authenticity and transparency
The concept of Personal Branding was first exposed by Tom Peters in the article “The Brand Call You”, published in Fastcompany magazine: Large companies understand the importance of brands. Nowadays, in the age of the person, you have to be your own brand. I am a limited company. This original idea has found in the Internet a perfect scenario for growth and development. To begin with, because as a collaboration platform it offers the right tools to develop and communicate a personal brand. Professionals who want to consolidate their image can use blogs to communicate their knowledge, social networks to strengthen their contacts, and micro-messaging services such as Twitter to spread their values and activities. As we have already mentioned on other occasions, the development of the Internet has made the borders liquid and the walls of our organizations transparent. Today everything is visible to everyone. It is very difficult to hide information. And one of the consequences of this evolution is that authenticity has become an essential value. Digital Natives approach the world of work collaboratively and relate to their colleagues in the same way as they do on the Internet, that is, with transparency, authenticity, creating networks of trust and ignoring hierarchical structures, obviating useless formalities and old ways of working that only made sense in the past. They are creative and seek a more person-centered link, and with a personal balance between training, work and leisure. For them, the idea of the “man of the company”, dedicated body and soul to the organization, is a pure anachronism. With all this, they are forcing organizations to rethink how to attract, retain, develop, compensate and supervise their digital talent.
The unique experience you offer to others
Broadly speaking, Personal Branding consists of replicating at an individual level the brand-building process used by large organizations and companies to position and make their brand known in the markets. It implies a new way of relating to each other in our professional and personal lives: we must stop projecting ourselves exclusively as employees or collaborators of the organization for which we work, and we must begin to consider ourselves as intrapreneurs with our own brand. As Tom Peters would say: “I, a Public Limited Company”. Personal Branding thus becomes a surprising and versatile tool to develop personally and advance in our careers. It is also necessary in a world in which the Internet is changing the way we manage our careers, give visibility to our added value and communicate with others. The better our brand image, the better our chances of growth. And the better the personal brands that make up an organization, the better the products and services offered by it to customers. But what exactly is personal branding? Your personal brand is the perception – and emotion – that describes the experience of others when they interact with you. In other words, it is what you bring to others when you relate to them: your knowledge, your values, your attitudes, your abilities and skills. It is about you taking control of that perception that others have about you, so that you can create the impact you want. It is about defining yourself, so that others do not have to do it for you. And it is even more than that. Personal branding is an effective way to achieve our personal and professional goals. By building our own brand, we strongly reflect our values, our personality and our talent, we increase our credibility, we clearly differentiate ourselves from the competition, and as a result of all this, we manage to attract new customers effortlessly.
It’s not about selling smoke. It’s about being authentic
Personal branding is not a marketing recipe empty of content. It is not a promotion mechanism without real support, but quite the opposite. It is about each one looking for the best they are capable of giving, and building a brand from that activity in which they really stand out from others. It consists of reinforcing and developing our strengths, and communicating them to others to make ourselves visible. Authenticity is one of the key values, because a solid brand can only be built when we are based on solid pillars: it has to be born from what you are and what you feel. If you say you are who you are not, you will end up being discovered, and your reputation will end up in the drain. If you work against what you really feel, you will end up disenchanted and demotivated, fighting for objectives and goals that do not really interest you. To build a strong brand, your personal, professional and social life must be located on the same plane, or at least they must be perfectly compatible.
A great opportunity for future leadership
If leading is essentially about creating value through people, there is no better scenario for leadership than the one offered by an organization in which all members work, voluntarily, to enhance their capabilities, skills, and better values. Therefore, the essential thing for an organization is to provide the tools that employees need to build their personal brand. Innovative companies have already recognized that the Personal Brand of their employees creates value for organizations. Companies such as Microsoft, Google, P&G, BT and Sun Microsystems have incorporated the disciplines and best practices for the creation of personal brands into their talent development programs. The reason is very simple: it is about encouraging the initiative, creativity and passion of our professionals, and the best way to achieve this is to create organizations designed for people, where innovation and leadership are the work of each one. In this new context, people feel more committed and give the best of themselves, because the organization respects, nurtures and develops their individuality and creativity. Companies must overcome the idea that, if one of their collaborators grows and becomes known in their area of activity, they will immediately be hired by another organization. The greater their individual talent, the greater the collective talent available to the organization. And the way to retain that talent is not to limit and hide it, but to create a perfect scenario of motivation and confidence. The strategy benefits all parties. Individuals grow on a personal and professional level, and strengthen their social relationships. Organizations take advantage of the motivation and the drive for excellence of all individuals, who are in continuous growth.
Vision and purpose: where you want to go
To grow and develop on a personal and professional level, you need to define general goals and objectives, a point of reference that allows you to move in the right direction even when you are focused and busy with the concrete tasks of the day to day. Where would you like to go? How would you like to be in the not too distant future? It is about defining your vision and your purpose.
Vision. The vision is something like your dream future. A concrete expression – a phrase, if you will – that ideally and evocatively describes the main goal you want to achieve. This phrase inspires you, gives you energy, and helps you visualize your goal.
Purpose. We all have a dream and we all have talent. But many times we need a reason or an impulse that allows us to activate and motivate that talent; something that allows us to get going, to start working towards our goal and to share it with others. That is the role of purpose. In short, it is about defining our values, and within those values, determining which of them we are passionate about. If you have a hard time defining your own vision,
You can think of the people who have influenced you and whom you admire. They can be an excellent reference. Think: How can I become like them? Why do I admire them? What values do I have in common with them? Do they enjoy the quality of life that I hope to have at some point? Are they successful? Do they support and counsel those who need it?
Creating Your Personal Brand
As with company branding, in order to build our Personal Brand we must know what our weak and strong points are, and what those of the competition are. It is about discovering what is true and unique in us in order to make it known to everyone, using the enormous opportunities that the Internet offers us to do so. In short, it is about identifying and coherently articulating our personal value proposition, what we are different from and what allows us to contribute to others, personally or professionally. Then it is about communicating it in a convincing and coherent way, with authenticity and credibility. Visibility on the Internet is key: the more people who know your Brand, the better. In this way, you can establish your reputation as a connoisseur or expert on the topics that interest you, establish your credibility and advance in your career with the confidence that you will achieve your goals. To communicate these values and make our identity visible, standing out from the competition, there is nothing better than asking yourself the right questions. What are your practical skills and knowledge? What are the life experiences that you can use in your work and personal life? How do you relate to others? Are you able to generate attraction? Are you able to inspire others, advise and guide them? How do you place your action in the general context? How do you define your role in society? What are the beliefs and motivations that drive you? To summarize, these are, according to Andrés Pérez Ortega, expert and pioneer in Spain of personal branding, the three basic pillars on which you should build your personal brand:
1. Different. If you fail to stand out from the crowd, you will be seen as a follower, and not a leader.
2. Superior. The brand is built on the basis of “excellence” in a particular field of activity, whatever it may be. It makes no sense to develop and communicate mediocre performance.
3. Authentic. The brand is built on the truth of who you are, not on an image. You can’t isolate personal and social life from work, because they are mutual support systems for the brand.
A Matter of Personal Leadership
It is important not to get confused. The essence of personal branding is not an individualistic approach, but a social and personal leadership approach. Because what we do is enhance the best of ourselves to offer it to others. What we seek is to guide, reinforce and improve the perception that others have of us. And from this process, all parties gain something. After all, our employees, customers and family members will be delighted to enjoy the best version of ourselves. The only way to improve this perception is to work on and strengthen social relationships. To make them closer, more fluid and enriching for all parties. That is why we say that the development of one’s own brand has a lot to do with personal leadership. A professional with a Personal Brand is a leader who: – Cares about others – Develops relationships and networks – Is authentic and dependent – Serves as a model for the rest of the organization – Is equitable and consistent in their decisions and evaluations – Has positive values and attitudes that are highly contagious
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