The will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your full potential… these are the keys that will unlock the door to personal excellence.”
Confucius
A personal brand is built on the stories that the world tells itself about you. If you think you lack or don’t need a personal brand, Google yourself and see how the world sees you. Then think about your friends, families, colleagues and acquaintances and imagine how they see you.
Personal Branding Review
Using this 360° feedback you will start to see what your personal brand looks like. Your personal brand is made up of the stories that others tell themselves about you. We often fool ourselves because we see ourselves one way and the world sees us another way. In many ways most of the time the people barely see us at all because they have their own concerns and problems.
This mismatch between how we see ourselves and how others see us is an opportunity to rebrand our personal brand. We can do this by changing the story others tell themselves about us. By doing this we can position ourselves for better job opportunities, build better networks and gain peer recognition for our achievements.
Rebranding
The first step in telling a story to rebrand our personal brand is to understand how our brands look now. Identify what we need to change about our personal brand and what stories we need to tell to achieve this. This needs to be an honest appraisal because anything less will lead to a complete rebranding failure.
Identify what you need to change to tell a new story. Think about the journey that got you to where you need to be. For example if you were considered in the past very creative but you have now become more technical, tell a story about how that happened. Your storytelling needs to be really credible to change peoples mind about how they perceive you.
Create A Memorable Story
Your new story needs to be short and to the point. Personal brand building is all about telling a short story that lets your audience know who you now are. Your audience wants this in easily digested chunks of information that makes sense to them and are easily understood. Think about what makes your story so special as this will be the hook that gets your audiences attention and makes them remember you. The more memorable the story the more likely they are likely to recall it at a later stage.
“Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”
Abraham Lincoln
If you execute your personal rebranding well you will convince a new and old audience that your story is worth knowing and retelling. A personal brand is worth nurturing and building because it is how the world sees us. Our personal brand reflects what we stand for, what we value most and how we are likely to treat people. The stories we tell about ourselves influence how others define us. Think about how your story will define your personal brand.