Crafting Your Professional Identity: The Art of Personal Branding
What are the first five words that come to mind when someone says your name?
Whether you realize it or not, that’s your brand.
That’s why I always start my Personal Brand Pulse®️ — an exercise I do with executive clients — with that question. It’s an effort to ascertain what their friends, team members, and bosses think of them, and it’s the first step in identifying their brand.
Some might not like to think we are “products” with “brands,” but wishing it away does not make it so. If I say the names “Bernie Sanders” or “Oprah Winfrey,” specific attributes immediately come to mind. Those are the “brand values” linked with those individuals. Even experiences are brands now: mention the words “Coachella” and “Burning Man,” and people in LA and Silicon Valley will instantly associate those festivals with a particular type of Californian.
Whether or not you’re consciously building a professional persona, others observe what you do and develop their conclusions. As Simon Sinek points out, “Our reputations don’t come from how we talk about ourselves. Our reputations come from how others talk about us.” While you can’t necessarily control what others think, you can engage in behaviors that reinforce the image you aspire to build.
I recognize that extending marketing concepts to people — especially ourselves — makes some of us cringe. The reality is that today, more than ever, people and, increasingly, algorithms are making rapid judgments about you in ways that affect your career and livelihood.
Personal branding is not just for influencers, in other words. It’s for everyone.
The Big Idea
I first encountered the concept of personal brands in 1997. I was a newly minted Press Secretary for a US Congressman, and I had just read what would eventually become a famous Fast Company article entitled “A Brand Called You.” Written by business guru Tom Peters, it was the first article to suggest that people are like products or businesses: they have brands, too.
It inspired me to make my boss’s unique qualities a central element of our communications strategy. Since he was the only surfer in Congress then, I called our weekly email newsletter, The DC Surf Report, and ensured our constituents knew when he was back home in San Diego hitting the swells. His genuine love of surfing became part of his political identity.
Here’s the relevant question to your career: have you tried to create your brand, or has it been a haphazard by-product of your actions? Think of the world’s great performers and organizations: do they leave their image to chance?
Managing your image is about being intentional about the impressions you leave and building a professional identity that reflects who you are.
Here are five suggestions on how to get started.
What To Do Next: the 5 Rules®️ of Personal Branding.
1. Personal brands are fragile yet dynamic.
Jobs and titles are temporary; the only permanent thing is your professional image — in other words, your brand.
But while having a brand is perpetual, what it stands for is ever-changing. The algebra of image-building is complicated. Warren Buffett says, “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.”
Even if you avoid reputational calamity, your professional identity should not remain static. In fact, it should evolve throughout a career. Since most people develop new skills and assume different roles, they should rebrand themselves repeatedly.
2. The goal is to be in a Category of One.
Ideally, it should be hard to compare you to someone else.
Silicon Valley sage Naval Ravikant has some excellent advice in this area. He recommends that you should “become the best in the world at what you do. Keep redefining what you do until this is true.” In practice, this means embracing your individuality in an authentic — and unapologetic — way.
Eddie Van Halen understood what it meant to be in a category of one. When comparing himself to his peers, he pointed out:
“I am the best at doing me. Nobody else can do me better than me. You know, Eric Clapton is Eric Clapton. Nobody does Clapton better than him. Nobody does Hendrix better than Hendrix. We’re not trying to be anything other than who we are.”
Instead of serving a niche, create one. That’s what the Grateful Dead did: in an era with many huge rock bands, they created a completely unique sound.
The Sun Tzu move in positioning is to avoid competition — and be one of one.
3. Every brand needs a story. Do you know yours?
The most crucial public story is the one we tell others about ourselves.
It’s the 30-second elevator pitch you uncork at an industry networking event when the person next to you asks: “Tell me about yourself.” That story should connect the dots of your career and current ambitions to create a compelling narrative.
I could write a whole issue on the power of story, but here’s the distilled version of how to write yours.
First, identify the themes running through your professional life. Maybe you’ve always liked managing projects or are excited about motivating people. Next, ask yourself what kinds of tasks you like to do. Consider what you’ve enjoyed most in previous jobs and what ties them together. Explore what you do, why you do it, and how your past is relevant to what you want to do next. Finally, reflect on what you’re great at. After you’ve done all that contemplation, then craft your story incorporating those key elements.
Your personal narrative is what brings your brand alive. Take the time to compose a good one.
4. Attention is a crucial 21st-century currency, so indifference is the enemy.
I remember a chilling tale from business school when a friend went through dozens of interviews to land a coveted internship at Goldman Sachs. At the final one, the person sitting across the table from him broke the news that he wouldn’t get an offer. This is what he was told. “The good news is that everyone liked you. The bad news is that no one said: “we have to get him on our team.”
It was a brutal lesson in the cold realities of crowded, competitive markets: to break through the noise, you must stand out.
That sometimes means attracting both ardent fans and critics. You can’t be loved without also being hated. If you have champions, you’re also going to earn enemies. Accept that as the price you need to pay to inspire passion in people and have the impact you desire.
Everyone likes vanilla, but no one loves vanilla. Don’t be vanilla.
5. Manage your exits as carefully as you do your entrances.
People frequently go to great lengths to plan their entrances but seldom consider their exits. Perhaps this is driven by the belief that you never get a second chance to make a first impression, as the saying goes. But we often forget you never get a second chance to make a last impression.
What makes an excellent exit, in my opinion? First, one must wrap up loose ends, putting a period at the end of the metaphorical sentence. Second, one should leave a lasting and positive impression so their lingering thought of you is ultimately flattering. Finally, a perfect postscript brings with it a sense of completion.
The next time you leave a role, remember this advice. I always counsel my clients to “run through the tape” like a marathoner in their last two weeks at a company. Endings matter as much, if not more, to their professional reputation than their first day on the job did.
Key Takeaways
The IoNTELLIGENCE 5 Rules®️ of Personal Branding: Brands are fragile yet dynamic. The goal is to be in a Category of One. Every brand needs a story. Attention is a crucial 21st-century currency, so indifference is the enemy. Manage your exits as carefully as you do your entrances.
