Are you an aspiring artist?  Is entrepreneurship your passion?  Do you have trouble sleeping at night while thinking about your next great idea?  The answers to questions like this will give you the insight to create your personal brand.  The great thing about the Internet today is that you can become anything you want to be, whether it is your profession or just something on the side.  During the days of most of our parents, Mom and Dad were strictly known for what they did for a living, what they looked liked, and how they interacted with their contemporaries.  This is no longer the situation.

For the first time in history we are able to become whatever we want and there is absolutely no one there to stop us.   Personal Branding is the way to become the person you have always wanted to be, whether it be on Twitter or on the congested streets of Manhattan.  The problem is that it can also stop you from becoming what it is you have always dreamed about.  My question for you is simply what do you represent?  Are you a struggling architectural visionary, barely paying your bills?  If you are then live that.  Do not be afraid to display your designs on your Facebook page or Tweet about your innovative approach to gravity-powered water-collection.

The question what do you represent is vital to your future success and happiness.  Here is what goes through a recruiter’s head when they see your Facebook picture of your recent record-setting keg-stand?

“Nice form, but is his unique ability to drink 50 fluid ounces of ice cold Natty Light really going to make him a great Financial Analyst?” (Midway through the thought, your beautiful resume on bone-colored 32 lb. paper with a barely visible watermark falls into the trash-can, never to be seen again by that organization)

This picture may be good for a beer-tap inventor, but not for a financial analyst applicant for Goldman Sachs. You are representing your ability to party, not your potential to become an industry-leading business executive.

We must take the actions to create a personal brand that is completely representative of what we want.  Take five-minutes and browse through a friend of yours Facebook or Linkedin page and write down some of the characteristics that come to your mind when you are checking them out.  Is that what they are really like?  They could be an aspiring minister or a driven lobbyist, but if they are representing something different, then unfortunately that is what they are.  There is no escaping it.

Your Personal Branding efforts will pay off huge dividends and your social status on Facebook will not falter due to your lack of drunken images.

What do you represent?  Whatever you want.

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Brendan Wales is a co-founder of StarvingFreelancers,com, a site dedicated to bringing together talent and opportunity.  He studied Finance at the University of Georgia and enjoys working with small-businesses.  Two of his favorite authors are Jack Kerouac and Ayn Rand.  Wales’ goal in life is to wake up in the morning and be excited about going to work.

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There’s a strange chilling effect with social media users these days. With so many people looking for work, no one wants to write or post anything that might hurt their chances at their next interview. Not posting pictures of your last sushi night out with your friends, where you did all those saké bombers and wound up in the street in your underwear pretending to be a bullfighter and swinging your pants at oncoming traffic… that’s definitely something no hiring manager wants to see.

What about something more innocent? Should you write about your political beliefs? Music you hate? Post pictures of your last hunting trip, or a vacation video taken of you in a bathing suit?

What is the line between something that could be bad for you, and simply sharing something from your life?

Know the Line

Rather than simply being paranoid and not posting anything, think about whether or not what you are going to say or show is really negative. Is it anything that falls into this quick list:

1. Hate speech
2. Showing drug use
3. Commission of any other crimes
4. Nudity
5. Egregious swearing

Not surprisingly, these are the big ones that you should always avoid posting publicly. The easy rule of thumb here is keep your social media life as PG-13 as possible. The first four are painfully obvious, but perhaps number 5 isn’t.

If you are always swearing when you post, this not only gives the impression that you may speak this way normally, but that you aren’t smart enough to come up with other words on your own. (And if you knew what “egregious” meant, this probably isn’t the case.)

If you do post this kind of content on your social network profiles, by all means hide them – don’t use your real name, and DO NOT share them in places where an employer will read them. Most people are finally aware of how much damage sharing information like this about themselves in public can be for them, so if this is at all true for you, just detach yourself from these profiles before you even submit that next resume.

The Troublesome Subtleties

Well that’s easy enough not to do – but what about political opinions, or even opinions about the industry you work in?

For the most part, you should never have to censor your real beliefs on these subjects. The first is that if everything you post is edited and sanitized, you won’t have any more fun. The reason for that Facebook or Twitter account is to share something about you. The fact of the matter is, if you don’t get an interview because of an honest opinion, you don’t want to be working at that company anyway. If your honest opinions really are in conflict with the culture of the company you are applying to, it really is for the best if you don’t get the call – not just for them, but for you as well.

Also, your opinions on your industry, while they may not be what everyone else says, shows that you have an intuitive understanding of the subject matter, and can come up with outside-the-box analysis. If the general consensus is that Home Loan A is a great product, and you can share reasons why it isn’t, the right hiring manager can learn that you not only know about the home loan industry, but that you can think for yourself. If the company does not want employees who can think beyond what they’re told about a product, you probably don’t want to work there either. Generally speaking, the ability to think independently is considered a virtue, and can actually help you.

Frequency

Oddly enough, while so many are worried about what they post, there isn’t the same kind of warning about how often you post. It can definitely work against you if you are posting to Twitter and Facebook and Linkedin twice an hour all day. If you are unemployed and have oodles of free time on your hands, you might be doing just that.

What a hiring manager sees, however, is someone addicted to social networking. They may conclude that, if hired, you will spend an inordinate amount of time continuing to post messages and photos and comments.

What Kind of Company Do You Want to Work For?

Don’t think I’m being insensitive when I suggest you don’t want to work for a company that doesn’t want you. We are definitely in an employer’s job market these days, and there are many candidates for them to choose from. Dealing with pleasing potential employers by not posting anything at all, however, can hurt more than help.

I have always maintained that if you are worried about what you do on line coming back to haunt you, you should distance your real life from your social networks. If it is too late for that, consider keeping two kinds of profiles – the fun one that cannot come back to you, and the professional one that you don’t mind employers seeing.

This issue ultimately comes down to controlling what others can learn about you. Given the amount of use social networks receive, it’s rather like learning that employers are listening in on your phone conversations too – so watch what you say.

The difference is that phone conversations really are private, and what you do on social media is not only public, but everyone knows that it’s public. Anything you are ashamed to share shouldn’t be shared – but anything else you should simply be prepared to stand by, and possibly even defend.

Your social networking footprint is a representation of who you are, and the best way for hiring managers to get to know you before an interview. While it is smart to hide the embarrassing stuff, don’t be ashamed to show people the rest.

Eric Reid is an Internet marketer from Tempe, Arizona, specializing in SEO and social media marketing. Currently he writes the blog Ciao Enrico, which is also his nom de plume on Twitter and many other social media sites. He recently took the best driver’s license photo anyone has ever seen.

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Geoff Livingston, a brilliant blogger and thought leader, has generated a lot of buzz lately by laying out arguments against personal branding.

Using some of Geoff’s arguments as a starting point, I’d like to share why I believe personal branding is valuable to you, valuable to customers, and valuable to corporations.

First: What is personal branding?

I use this definition of personal branding:

“The process of compellingly marketing yourself – based on what you learn from an extraction process of deep soul-searching – to meet the needs of society in a way that benefits you (via fulfillment and financial success) as well as the specific audience whose pains you are alleviating.”

Geoff argues that personal branding is self-centered.

Looking at the definition above, if you aren’t meeting the needs of a specific audience, then your personal brand has no substance. Remember, your personal brand is “mental real estate” that’s held in the minds of others. If others don’t see value in your brand, then it has no basis for existence in the marketplace. Thus, by nature, personal branding must be others-centered in order to survive.

Geoff asks, “how does ego-centric branding help a corporation?”

Ego-centric branding does not help corporations. Personal branding – a genuine and authentic process that helps put you in a position of power in the job market so you can align your current career with your inherent need for fulfilling work – does help corporations.

In my mind, ego-centric branding means constructing a flimsy and/or fake brand (read: facade) for immediate, short-term gains – like recognition – rather than long-term fulfillment. I consider ego-centric branding the polar opposite of personal branding. In fact, ego-centric branding will probably damage your personal brand – and by extension, your company’s brand.

3 Ways Personal Branding Helps Corporation

Geoff argues that personal branding does not help corporations. I disagree. Here’s why:

1. Strong personal brands improve your company’s reputation.

The people we deal with at companies form our perception of the company as a whole. When your employees’ personal brands align with your company’s brand, customers are left with a better feeling about your business.

Every employee is a potential touchpoint between your company and your customers. If those touchpoints aren’t enjoying what they do, they won’t do their job to their full potential. That means you’ll lose customers. Since personal branding involves actively passing on opportunities that don’t give you fulfillment, a company that hires employees with strong personal brands will end up with a workforce whose interactions with customers are much stronger.

“When it comes to corporate social media programs,” says personal branding guru Dan Schawbel in his post Applying Personal Social Media Techniques to Corporate EMC, “it’s not just about ‘the grand vision’ or the ‘tools used.’  It’s about the people that execute it. The conversations employees have with customers and partners through these tools is what’s important because their personal brand is on the line, as well as the company’s. The more voices you have participating in conversations where they can lend expertise or interact to get feedback the better. At this stage, companies need to accept the important of social media, as a channel to communicate, get feedback, learn and build brand. Your employees can’t sit back anymore or they will be left out.”

Active participation and communication in your area of expertise is just one indication of a passionate personal brand at work. In the end, when your employees’ personal brands align with your company’s brand, your company wins out because all customer interactions will be handled by passionate people furthering the company’s vision and leaving customers with positive experiences.

2. Strong personal brands choose jobs where they are most productive, improving the employer’s bottom line.

Personal branding means staying true to that which gives you meaning. It means aligning your working life with your source of career energy. That way, you will be passionate about the projects you work on, and as a result you will excel because you love what you do. You will get more done in less time, increasing productivity and improving your company’s bottom line.

A customer service rep is who actually committed to their job – since their brand is in harmony with the company’s – will make me walk away with a positive experience, keeping me as a loyal and lifelong customer, and adding to the company’s bottom line.

In addition, personal branding improves employee interaction. Awareness of the personal brands in your company allows you to build a stronger network with richer and more meaningful ties. Not to mention the contagious enthusiasm that a strong personal brand brings when in alignment with the company’s brand – and the exponential potential created by putting a room full of teammates together whose personal brands are all based upon a similar vision.

3. Strong personal brands make it easier for companies to identify and hire the most qualified candidates.

As a hiring manager, more than anything else, I want an extremely “self-centered” employee who is ONLY willing to work in a position that aligns with his or her source of career energy. That way, I won’t end up hiring an employee who is unfit for the position. Imagine if every job applicant had a fully uncovered and developed personal brand: I would be able to choose from a group of people who have made it clear that they will get fulfillment – not just a paycheck – from the open position. The more my applicants know about what makes them tick before applying, the better.

JPMorgan Chase is an example of a company that sees the value of a workforce whose personal brands align with their corporate brand. They recently put on a personal branding workshop at Syracuse University’s Whitman School of Management. Spreading the message about personal branding helps JPMorgan Chase attract ideal employees and repel non-ideal employees.

My conclusions about personal branding

1. A legitimate personal brand is others-centered by nature (otherwise it will not survive in the marketplace).

I disagree with Geoff Livingston calling personal branding “self-centered branding.” Sure, it begins with a “self-centered” phase (cultivating self awareness and then developing a way to be visible to your audience), but it ends with an others-centered phase (serving a specific group of people with specific pains or needs – a group you can serve better than anyone else). Let’s be very clear: if your personal brand isn’t developed on a solid foundation that provides value to a certain group of people, then your personal brand has no basis for existence in the market.

A brand, as Michel Hogan points out, is the result of what we believe to be true (about ourselves or about a company) and what our actions show to be true. If there’s a gap between belief and action, then the brand is inauthentic and will either die, or be forced to evolve in today’s age of the radically transparent company. The same holds true with personal brands as the Internet moves us toward the concept of the radically transparent employee. An individual who promises you certain value (which is a self-centered action on their part), then makes good on that promise (which is an others-centered action on their part), is in no way selfish. If they fail to deliver on that promise, then a gap will emerge between what you believe to be true and what their actions show to be true, and their brand will be delegitimized.

2. Personal branding is beneficial to three groups: you, customers, and corporations.

If you properly cultivate your personal brand, everybody wins: you win because you work from the heart, become the best solution to a certain groups’ problems, draw energy from working with that specific group, and are financially compensated for it because you provide them value. Others win because they now have someone to turn to whose sole purpose is to specifically help them with their particular pains and problems. And companies win because their applicants are self-selected as aligned with their corporate brand, making it easier for them to identify the most qualified candidates who will boost their reputations and improve their bottom lines.

What do you think?

Blindly accepting any new concept at face value doesn’t make sense unless you understand the arguments on either side. Only then can you decide for yourself whether or not the idea is valid, or if it has any useful application in your life. On that note, many thanks to Geoff for sparking this discussion in the first place. I’m glad the back-and-forth between Geoff and I can provide you with two very different perspectives, and hope you will always question what you read on the web and come to your own conclusions.

If you’re interested in learning about personal branding as a tool to help you achieve career success, dive right in with our introductory post, Everything You Need to Start Building Your Personal Brand Right Now.

It’s now up to you to continue the discussion!

Before you go, leave a comment here and share your take on personal branding. Is personal branding a bad idea? Is it self-centered? Does it help or hurt companies? Is personal branding just a trend in career management that will pass?

I look forward to hearing from you!

Author: Pete Kistler

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