The Rynge Blog

Reflections and thoughts on Personal Branding from an Entrepreneurial point of view.

Wednesday, May 24, 2006

To what extent do your personal contacts refer to you the way you would like?

The other day I visited my father and helped him prepare the new beauty centre for my mother. When introduced to his friend, a business man in the area, I was presented as my fathers "youngest son". Nothing wrong in that, but frankly I am not very keen on being referred to as the "youngest". It kind of sounds like that I am inexperienced and new to whatever I am doing. It just does not sound trustworthy.

So after we where done at the centre, I asked him how he would have presented me at a business meeting if I would be an employee at his company, responsible for the business development processes. Guess what, he would not have presented me in the same way.

Do you want you family to refer to you as "my baby girl" or "my daughter who is an expert in public relations" when meeting with their friends and colleagues. Most people has a limited network and does not work to expand it very actively, so when they hear that their friends daughter is known as an expert in public relations, guess who they will call when they need to market their new product line.

By the way, this does not only concern your family. It is even more important that your friends do not present you as a "couch potato" or "party animal" to people they meet. You probably want them to describe you as a fun, driven person with social skills as well as expert knowledge.

Maybe you want to separate your personal and private life. If you are presented as a public relations expert or a social skilled person and the other person wants to discuss that topic after the introduction, spend a few minutes discussing the topic, trade business cards and kindly point out that you would love to meet to discuss the subject further over lunch some day. The other person is most likely not to keep talking about your profession.

posted by Ola at 23:21 1 comments links to this post

Thursday, May 18, 2006

The use of personal branding for students

Are you interested in being great in your future profession? Are you confident that you can succeed, if only you had the network of a person that has been in the business for several years? Are you looking for a shortcut?

Well, if you are a student, then you are most certain to do some project work or thesis. If you can control the direction of the thesis, think of how you can do it to build your network in the areas that you want to. If for example you are thinking of being an entrepreneur, running a business in sell educations, then you could do a thesis on the structure and needs of the top companies in your region regarding educations. This way, you will get a real case to work with, you can book meeting and establish contact with the decision makers at the top companies and you will get a head start on starting your business.

Sure, that obvious, you're probably thinking. I could not agree more. So what can you do to develop the concept? Maybe you can build the connections even harder to the top companies by telling them that you would be glad to recommend them to the other top companies that you meet during the interviews. Now you start adding value to the companies, as well as your brand. The executives are probably thinking that this is a smart person which is eager to go the extra mile. Do not ask for compensation though, if you play your cards right you will get the favour returned at a later occasion.

posted by Ola at 13:49 0 comments links to this post

Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Are YOU in control of your life?

The Workplace

Are you educated, working with specialized tasks? Then you are probably irreplaceable at your workplace. This is a situation that you can be happy about, but you should also know that your employer probably does not share your positive view of this. Most employer wants to transform your competencies to "structure intellectual property" so that if anything happens to you (or between you and your employer), then he/she can replace you.

Are you frightened yet? Don't be. Be proactive and learn how to use this to your favour. Talk to your supervisor and explain that you have an urge to develop your company and want to share your knowledge, and suggest that the company starts a knowledge sharing program. This way you will show that you care and that your work matters as well as you will learn from others in the program, hence develop your own competencies. Do you think that this will make you replaceable? Actually, this makes you even more valuable to the company since you get a better understanding for more processes as well as it will be harder to replace you when you have more knowledge of the company. And do not forget that while developing your skills, your value increases when looking for new positions (within and outside the company).
By now you are probably thinking that this is a way to differentiate your brand at the workplace and creating value at the same time, and guess what, you are completely right. This is an excellent example of differentiation at the workplace.

This is two different views of intellectual capital, one representing the employer and the other the employee:

Employer:
I need to convert the skills of my staff to structure capital so that I can manage if I lose personnel without loosing intellectual capital. The staff should be replaceable. This can be done by documentation and knowledge transfer between the employees.

Employee:
I need to stay unique to keep my value to my employer to make me irreplaceable. This I can do by staying one step ahead in gathering knowledge and use the knowledge to excel in my current role.

Tip of the week: Do not fight the knowledge transfer. Support it and if possible, take control over the process. Learn as much as you can and analyze how you can use the knowledge in your favour.

posted by Ola at 18:24 0 comments links to this post

Sunday, May 07, 2006

Help with personal branding

If you just found out about personal branding or have been interested about the subject for some time, I can recommend you to read up on some information at Peter Montoya's FAQ as well as signing up for the free resources at his page. It is really good information, even if I represent a slightly different view of the personal brand that is not that focused on career, but rather as a personal development tool.

I am currently working on some material that I will present here later on. The concept in the material will be the foundation for me working with clients in the future.

posted by Ola at 10:24 0 comments links to this post