How to Develop Your Personal Brand

How to Develop Your Personal Brand?

I was recently narrating to my audience, in a Leadership Training Program about how my high school teachers, didn’t remember me for all the talents I was known for in a school, when we met in a high school reunion. Rather, they remembered me for accidentally locking them up in the bathroom during a school excursion.

The reason for my disappointment as I saw, was that my teachers had seen innumerable students in their career, similarly in talent, but not any of them locked them in the bathroom. That instance, I remembered one of my old mentors sharing a piece of his wisdom ‘that people remember you for two reasons primarily, for the way you personally Impact them, or the Value you add to them.

Not discounting the Impact element in building a great Branding for yourself, adding value goes a long way. Adding value is solid in substance, less superficial and more profound in essence, considering as an approach to Personal Branding.

In this blog, I will focus on how you can work on your Branding at Workplace:

First Step: Believe in Yourself:

Your Branding is boosted if you are known for your Problem-Solving attitude. Capabilities are different from an attitude. People with high capabilities may fail due to attitudinal issues. Develop the attitude of ‘Internal Locus of Control’. It means, focusing on elements within scope of control to exercise, rather than blaming external aspects that don’t fall within the scope of control.
Example: If you find it difficult working with your boss, it is within your control to politely talk about your difficulties directly, rather than to gossip or back bite him with colleagues, or maybe complain about him to HR. If you choose direct discussion, it means you have an Internal Locus of Control. Internal Locus of Control is a great indicator of Self Belief.

Second Step: Discover & Re-Invent Yourself:
Be open to Feedback & ……Regular Feedback:
Are you aware of what ‘ticks’ about you among your colleagues? Or for that matter, what’s your ‘dud’ among people? Collect open and honest feedback from at least 10 of your colleagues, regarding their positive and negative opinions about you. The information you receive could be a great field of opportunity for you.
Choose some meaningful & challenging areas of improvement from the feedback received, and work on them. Thank your colleagues for the feedback they shared with you. You create a great impression for being open, and also will impress them for earnestly willing to improve upon information shared.

Third Step: Don’t Hide Your Good:

What are you hiding away about you at workplace? If you list them, you may write a sequence of your shortcomings. However, seldom are we aware, we are also hiding away our good. Do your colleagues know you are a good singer, story teller, stand up comedian, guitarist or drummer, script writer etc., Wait for the right opportunity and showcase your strengths. In fact, for highly talented people, one perfect instance is good enough for
gaining tremendous visibility.

Step Four: Develop a Tendency to Try New Stuff:
Do you believe, you are just limited to your current impression about you? What are some of the stuff you have been postponing for some time? Asking for that challenging project?
Applying to become a team leader? Initiating an internal network of like-minded colleagues, etc., Don’t post pone them anymore. Initiating those projects is going to help you learn a lot more about of your own self.

Step Five: Build Yourself:

Be a continuous learner. Be a voracious reader. Develop new competencies.
Figure out the ‘White Spaces’.
What according to you, are some methods, initiatives or practices you subtly think could be great for your department and team, but no one tried so far? Such initiatives are called white spaces. The reasons for not walking white spaces, could be need for more time & dedication, or they are difficult and so on. If you find some of the ideas worthwhile and can add value in some or the other way, start today. People who add value can never be ignored anywhere. In the past, if you felt that you did, and still were ignored, it means you were in the illusion of adding value but did not. Do your home work before walking the white space.

Step Six: Let go of Yourself:
Walk up to, or call someone who you are not in good terms with, to suggest you want to bury it and move on like friends. List all the tendencies and habits that currently hinder your growth and work on shredding them. Make Personal Development your number one priority. Not success and achievement. Accept your imperfections and be willing to commit
mistakes. That’s the only way one grows

Step Seven: Be Yourself – Be Authentic
You have a Right to be Yourself, until you know you are a loser. Losers can be destructive to their own selves as well as people associating with them. I assume you are not one!!!
Work on your Assertive Skills. Assertive people are taken seriously. In a workplace, even though this is hard to believe, you can either work on being liked by everyone or being taken seriously. If you claim you are taken seriously even if not liked, you have a great Branding. Be non-compromising on your workplace rights, however, abide by all your
responsibilities efficiently.

Train yourself to be Direct, Specific and Straightforward as a working individual Be comfortable and confident in expressing your feelings just like the way they are Learn to Disagree with people confidently, but politely
Learn to Say ‘No’ Accept your mistakes graciously and emphatically, but learn from them immediately so as not to commit them again.
I assure anyone reading this. The above takes time but is worthwhile. Focusing on the above seven elements will certainly create an incredible Branding for working people.