The brand ‘You’
In the age of the individual careers at companies, YOU have to be your own brand! And the first thing you sell is yourself. See how you market the Brand YOU. There is literally no limit to the ways you can go about enhancing your profile. Success and fulfillment come from developing all of YOU through your thinking and performance. Read on…
Prof Sushil Bahl
You are not an employee of Hindustan Unilever. You are not a staffer at TCS. You are not a worker at Maruti. Or a human resource at Infosys. You do not belong to any company for life, and your chief affiliation is not to any function. You are not defined to any job title or job description forever.
Starting today you are a Brand! It is a brand new world and YOU are the CEO of your own company – Me Inc. You are as much a brand as Surf, Coke, or Kingfisher airlines. Start thinking as your own Brand Manager, and ask yourself “what is it that my product (me) does that makes it different?” Everyone has a chance to be different and stand out among others. Everyone has a chance to be a brand worth of a remark - with performance and contributions. Which means you are someone who is savvy, well informed, always learning and growing, and one who knows how to sell himself. And most important as a person who does work that matters!
It is influence power!
What do I want to be famous for? Write it down. Read it. Think about it. What’s the pitch in it for you? Do not sell the steak, sell the sizzle! A principle that every corporate brand understands – from customers, to colleagues, and your virtual network of associates. Life is a “sale” and a path to success at both living and selling.
Being known to contribute, and make a difference, intelligently, responsibly and powerfully as a “package” in the perception of others is what counts. People value the way you make them feel, and are willing to pay more for it. People buy feelings and emotional bonds. If you are a Brand, you also need visibility like all brand campaigns, but with no budget to buy it! Your career is a portfolio of projects, requiring skills, expertise, and capabilities. Grow your own and re-invent your portfolio of skills every three to five years. This is a minimum survival necessity. It’s about your growth and destiny, and how you control it.
As for the future for you, there is no more a vertical, no more a ladder. Linearity is out. A career for you today is now a checker board. Moves that go forward, sideward, diagonal, and even backward when that makes sense. Ask what is your specialty, and have one. Deliver on it.
Be a spin doctor
Tom Peters a modern day author, trainer, and management guru, offers 10 points to make an “Employee” into a “Brand YOU” -- that shouts distinction, commitment and passion. He advocates:
- Routinely ask “Who am I? What do I want to be? Think about it, and work about it.
- Pursue mastery of something. Have something important to say, and know how to say it and show it.
- Do work that matters 100 percent of the time. Do work worth paying for it. Work can be cool and fun, and beautiful. You can make it so.
- Focus insanely on the Project/s. Make every project a Wow!
- Pay close attention to personal packaging (enhancing your personality and presentation).
- Have a ‘competing sales proposition’ for yourself. You can, and have to make a difference.
- Select clients very carefully. Reject clients who are a bad match or toxic to you and the surroundings.
- Network – like crazy – facebook, twitter, flickr, linkdin, or any other means, social or professional.
- Develop and zealously guard your own, and your organisation’s reputation for trust worthiness and integrity. A ‘brand’ is a trust mark. Brand YOU, therefore, rests upon the bedrock called credibility.
- Renew and reinvent yourself quickly. Be distinct. Survive, thrive, and triumph in today’s wild wired world. Cultivate curiosity. Take every opportunity to learn something new – or extra.
All this is another way of saying that YOU, whoever you are, approach your life with the same intensity as you would if you were self employed. It’s a new millennium, so if not now when? It’s your future.
As you may know, brand warriors wear at least eight hats – from sales, to accounting, to product development. Wear them, and think outside and inside the box – grow a bigger box. And then go on to project yourself as a BRAND YOU!
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