The 1-Step Personal Brand

May/10

The 1-Step Personal Brand

by ReThinkHR.org (@BenjaminMcCall) under Brand

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You hear a lot about personal and corporate brands.

How to build them. Steps to address and repair them.

There are many approaches and you can break it down and break it down into the minute and detailed steps. However, I have come to a conclusion that there is essentially only one thing you need to build a brand…

For your company. For yourself.

My opinion for building a Personal Brand is very simple…

The #1 Step to building your Personal Brand =

personalbranding2 The 1 Step Personal Brand BE… YOUR…. SELF

That is all.

That’s it. Not that difficult. Not world changing… or maybe it is.

We are so caught up with steps that we fail to see the simplicity. Whether your brand becomes great or essentially shows the horribility (is that a word, um nope) you truly are… the only thing to be, is yourself.
At least you and everyone else knows what they get.

Think about this when you work or are in your job search. As you walk through your company doors. Think about this when sitting in your department and dealing directly with the people you interact.Think about it when walking into an elevator and you see someone running towards it. Think about being yourself when you give a salutation or negative remark on a Monday, Friday or at the park.

You can be you or you can be someone else.

I don’t know how to be anyone but myself. To be someone else is not as cool as being me!

Am I making it to simple or is this basically it? Please tell me what you think

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http://unbridledtalent.com Jennifer McClure

I absolutely agree with you in regards to the importance of “being yourself”, but I do think that in terms of a Personal Brand, it's important to take many of the steps you've outlined in your drawing (very nice!) to communicate the qualities you're known for to assist in getting a job, developing business, etc.

For example, Tide gets stains out. It does it very well. However, if P&G had never taken active steps to communicate what the product is, what it does better than others and the benefits of using it, very few people would probably be using it today. Word of mouth would have gotten a few customers, but by developing a brand and communications strategy, Tide is probably one of the most well known and popular brands today. Still works the same, but people know it more than other brands that probably work equally as well.

So while I'm growing a bit tired of the phrase “personal brand”, the concept is important. To maximize the value of You/your brand, I believe it's important to develop a strategy and communication plan.
benjaminmccall

I do agree with the many steps. I sometimes struggle with the keeping-it-simple versus break-it-down. There are layers. Like an onion we want to break things down to understand the parts. For corporate brand this is very true. There are the levels of assessment. Understanding your purpose for “building the brand” or “improving your brand” and then working in the right medium and space to nurture it. I simple like to argue. Argue the fact that we often make things more difficult then they need to be.

In support of your point, if someone/a-company/product doesn't know where to start they should take steps to learn and develop. We do need some strategy to do what we want and need to do with a “brand” yet I like to say simply…

…if you are “yourself” then that is the best start and sometimes the only thing you need.