“Personal brand” appears to be the new business buzzword making the rounds (a Google search for the term brings up over 6 million results). Loosely defined, it translates into the practice of intentionally cultivating and curating a persona, image, or impression, ostensibly to drive career success.
But the truth is that whether you’re a teen trying to get into college or a working professional trying to get ahead in your career, you’re not a brand at all. You’re a human being, not a widget. You’ve got independent and often changing thoughts and feelings. A tagline, logo, or social media profile doesn’t encapsulate you.
But here’s what we all do have—a reputation. We’re always leaving a trail, like a wake we can see in our rearview mirror. That’s our history of the work we’ve done, the impact we’ve made, and the people we’ve helped. Our history tells a story, one that influences the expectations people have of just who and what they’re getting when we show up. And those expectations are the closest thing we’ve got to a personal brand.
Yes, you can improve or outright change that story. But you can’t do it without changing the behaviors that drove the expectations. Give people the best version of yourself. The expectations—and the resulting story—will inevitably match.
Yes, it’s still important to tend to your online presence so you can give Google good fodder. But it’s a lot easier to sell a true story than one artificially concocted to create a personal brand.