You Have A Personal Brand – Why It Matters, What It Means, and What To Do

You have a personal brand.  Do you know that?  Well it’s true, whether you’ve realized it or not.  You could call it your reputation but I like to call it your personal brand.  I want you to understand why it matters, what it means, and what you should do about it…

Why Your Personal Brand Matters

Have you ever met someone and had them say “I’ve heard a lot about you”? What they’ve heard is your brand.

Your personal brand goes before you and travels to others before you even meet them. When this happens, what do other people think? Are they inspired to meet you? Do they wish you were their leader? Do they want you to be their mentor?

Your personal brand directly leads to people wanting to work with you and be led by you. As a leader, a great personal brand increases your opportunity to influence others through your leadership. It also attracts the best team members to your team. This is important!

Your personal brand also shows up when your leaders consider you for new opportunities and promotions. When a new team is being created, are you considered the right leader to take it on? Do they think about you when they need a leader to deliver results on a critical project? When you’re being considered for a promotion, how are you thought of?

Your personal brand directly leads to new opportunities. As a leader, a great personal brand provides new opportunities for excitement, growth, and advancement. This is important!

What Your Personal Brand Means

Here’s my definition of your personal brand: (modified by me from the Nielsen Norman Group’s definition of brand)

Your personal brand is the subjective perception of your value from others based on their experiences with you that ultimately influences their sentiment toward you. Share on X

There are 4 key elements to this definition:

1. Your Personal Brand Is Subjective

Your personal brand comes from what others think and feel about you, not what you want others to think and feel about you.  It’s their perception, not yours, and as the saying goes, “perception is reality”. If people don’t think and feel about you the way you want, you must change, not them.

2. Your Personal Brand Comes From The Value You Bring To Others

If you want others to value you, bring value to others. Share on X

Your personal brand will be valuable to you if it’s built by bringing value to others. Do this with everyone you work with but especially your team.  Serve your team and they will value you as their leader.  (Check out “How To Put Your People First” for examples.)

3. Your Personal Brand Is Built From The Sum of Someone’s Experiences With You

Every experience someone has with you adds up (via your actions, words, emails, results, etc.). You can’t fake it, or fix it, or change it with one or two interactions.  You have to earn your personal brand over time and then work hard to keep it over time.  Be consistent and authentic every time.

4. Your Personal Brand Is A Sentiment

Your Personal Brand taps into someone’s emotions. People feel a certain way when they see, hear, and think about you.  Engage the hearts of others and have meaningful interactions with them to create a deeper connection between them and you.

What Should You Do About Your Personal Brand

Your personal brand is important so you should do something about it, right? 

Yes!  Be intentional in building your personal brand. 

If this feels disingenuous to you in any way, it’s not.  This is not a way to manipulate others to think about you a certain way.  The goal isn’t to do whatever it takes to have a good personal brand.

The goal is to ensure your personal brand (1) authentically matches who you are, (2) doesn’t get in your way of making a positive impact, and (3) unlocks opportunities for you to achieve the career success you desire.

Your personal brand matters. A great personal brand unlocks opportunities but a bad personal brand prevents opportunities.

Three Questions To Ask

Here are some questions to ask yourself to help you build your personal brand.  Carve out time to reflect on the questions, actually write down your answers, and then add your takeaways to your to do list.

1. What is your current brand?

• What do you think your team members say to their coworkers, spouses, and best friends about you?
• Since this is another person’s perception of you, how are you going to truly find out how others feel about you?  Who can you ask for an honest answer?
• How far does your personal brand reach today?  Is it just your immediate team, across your company, or across your industry?

2. What do you want your brand to be?

• What are the key aspects of your desired personal brand?
• Who do you know that has a great personal brand, and which brand aspects do you want to be part of yours?
• How far does your brand need to reach so you can achieve success in your current role?  How far does it need to reach to achieve your future career goals?

3. How are you going to take your personal brand from what it is now (Question 1) to what you want it to be (Question 2)?

• What tangible steps do you need to begin taking now to build a personal brand that is authentic to you and enables you for success?
• Who could be a valuable mentor for you in growing your brand?
• What questions do you need to add to your next set of mentoring meetings to help you?  

I hope you now understand why your personal brand matters, what it means, and what you should do about it.

I’m creating a “Building Your Personal Brand” workbook to expound upon the details in this post. If you would like to be a beta tester, let me know via the contact page.

"Your smile is your logo, your personality is your business card, how you leave others feeling after an experience with you becomes your trademark." – Jay Danzie Share on X