“I don’t need ‘personal branding’, whatever it is. I’m in a decent-enough job in a well-known company. I don’t want to talk about myself; my work should do the talking’. This is the inner voice of most people when they confront the topic of ‘personal branding’.
To demonstrate how misguided this line of thought is, allow me to present a different perspective on personal branding.
Think of personal branding the way you would think of your credit score.
That should lead most of you to exclaim, “But Karthik, I don’t think about my credit score all that often! In fact, I rarely think of my credit score, and do so only when there is a specific need for it!”.
Precisely the point 🙂
How, you may ask. Here’s how.
What is a credit score? It is a three-digit number that rates your creditworthiness. There is no three-digit (or any digit) number for your personal brand, but what is more relevant for this post is how your credit score is calculated and when it is needed/utilized.
How is your credit score calculated/How do you build your personal brand?
How is a credit score calculated? The most common factors involve the length of your credit history (because there is more data to determine your payment history), your payment history, and your credit utilization (or amounts owed by you).
Similarly, the factors that can affect your personal brand include the tenure of your experience in one or more areas of professional or personal pursuit/interest, your contribution in terms of perspectives and original thoughts in those spaces, and your ‘brand utilization’, which is your way of showcasing your ‘brand’ when it is being discussed by others in the same industry (or interest area).
Here’s an illustration.
Take the example of a finance professional with an active interest in fitness, nature photography, and science fiction genre.
She can stay completely quiet and do her job well, while indulging in her interest areas on her own without talking about them anywhere (online) at all.
That would leave her with the equivalent of a non-existent ‘credit history’, or a mere CV-level listing of her tenure of experience. There would be no way to know her perspectives in the various things happening in her (finance) industry unless you belong to her inner circle of friends/colleagues. Neither would she venture into offering her views when other vocal discussions are happening about her industry.
This means, to use the credit history parlance, when someone is ‘checking out on her’ (for any professional purpose like a potential job, partnership, collaboration, etc.), they would stumble on nothing relevant. Or they would notice merely rudimentary information like a static LinkedIn profile which is nothing but a CV. She could have very high credit worthiness, but unless it is made visible, nobody would know.
How to make it visible?
If she has a long-enough tenure of work (across organizations), she can dip into her experience and talk about her perspectives that affect her work and industry often. But unlike credit history, she can do that even if she has a limited work experience. How? By being a keen reader and listener of what is happening in her industry.
Similarly, she could join the conversations about her industry and showcase her interest/knowledge in those opportunities too.
This need not be about her professional knowledge alone. She could showcase the depth of her interest in her personal interests too (fitness, nature photography, and science fiction) by showcasing her work, perspectives, and joining others when they talk about these topics online.
When do you utilize your credit score/When do you utilize your personal brand?
You don’t need to go about thinking about ways to build your credit score every single day of your life. But you do need to know the factors that impact your credit score.
Similarly, you don’t need to think about your personal brand every day, but you do need to know what affects your personal brand, positively (your actions) or negatively (your inaction).
A credit score is used by an agency only when during specific points of your life, like when you are seeking a loan, or an increase in your credit card spending limit. These days there are insurance policies that are tied to your credit score.
Similarly, your personal brand comes into the picture only when someone is ‘checking you out’ for any purpose. In the above example, it could be a potential job offer in the finance industry, an organization considering her as a panelist in an upcoming event, someone seeking to be inspired by her fitness journey, or someone looking to collaborate with a nature photographer, and so on. Or, it could be as basic as someone wanting to follow her on LinkedIn or Instagram simply after seeing her last few posts on those platforms.
Any opportunity for someone to decide to ‘pick her’ for any meaningful (for her) purpose involves them wanting to know more about her than a mere LinkedIn CV.
Even when you do not have a credit score, it means something – that you are not credit worthy, simply because of lack of relevant information.
Similarly, even when you do not actively shape or build your personal brand, it means something – that you do not have easily available information about yourself which leads to you not being worth ‘picking up’ (or ‘following’ or being considered for some professional or personal interest).
The similarities do not end here.
Think of the many calls you get where you are offered a loan, even if you didn’t want them. Why do they reach you? Because of your credit score. No one would offer a loan to someone with a poor (or non-existent) credit score. A good credit score acts like a magnet. You make use of it when you really need it. But it is good to be in the consideration set.
Similarly, personal branding is about bringing focus to your touchpoints with the world (of strangers) so that the right kinds of people can find you and remember you. You make use of the attention when you really need it. But it is good to be in the consideration set.