“You are only as good as the good you do for others.” ~Unknown
The above quote has been part of my email signature since 2011 and has come to represent both the philosophy by which I try to live my life and the mantra upon which I base my career & business. As I have worked with various clients on defining their professional brand, I have realized that more than anything -- a brand is our offer of value to others. The beauty in this perspective is that we all have something of value to offer and contribute to the world. The challenge is how difficult it can be to identify and articulate this value in a way that resonates with others and inspires them to engage with you.
If you think about it, a job posting is just the far wordier equivalent of the classic, “Help Wanted” sign, hung in a retail store window. Employers are seeking the best person they can find to help them deal with a specific set of pain points that are currently hurting their business. Your job as a candidate is to develop a brand and career platform that demonstrates your experience in resolving this or a similar enough set of pain points to be compelling.
One of the best ways for you to make your case in response to that “Help Wanted” sign is by thinking through how you have been successful in helping others in similar business situations and leveraging that experience as one of the defining characteristics of your brand.
4 Ways Helping Others Can Define Your Brand
Here are four questions to think through to help build identify & articulate your brand:
1) Who do I help?
Depending on your role, the recipients of your help could be customers, constituents, clients (external or internal), co-workers, superiors, or the company itself. The point is, regardless of your role, there will always be someone or some entity receiving the benefits of your work. You may have become specialized at serving a particular audience, a niche subset, or perhaps you have strong experience serving multiple audiences. Whatever that looks like for you, it's important to define it.
Brand Building Block: By identifying who you help, you can align yourself with roles and position yourself for employers that serve the same/a similar audience. When you can articulate the audience you're best equipped to help, it comes with a built-up body of knowledge around the nature and nuances of the challenges they face. Consequently, it also comes with the ability to tap into their needs and craft ideal solutions. If companies spend time & effort identifying their audience, why shouldn't we as professionals do the same?
2) What problems do I solve & how does that help?
A recent CFO client was really good at identifying operational flaws and creating solutions that generated multi-million dollar savings. A clinical research client was very strong in writing clinical trial protocols that created more efficient studies. By helping them identify and hone in on what problems they were good at solving -- it also provided a path to articulate how they help.
Over the course of your career, you have encountered and/or been asked to resolve a range of business problems. There are problems that you are both skilled at and enjoy solving and those you are also skilled at but would rather avoid.
Brand Building Block: It's helpful to orient your platform toward the problems you solve that lie at the intersection of your strongest skillset(s) and enjoyment. Since no one wants to be known for solving problems they don’t enjoy tackling, it’s critical that you clarify this component. Being able to articulate your ability to solve a specific set or type of problems will help make you highly attractive to the right audience. Where there is a match between employer needs and your solutions, employment opportunities are found. Looking back over the body of your work will likely reveal to you themes and patterns around the problems you solve to help you carve out the lane which you occupy that few can.
3) What's unique about my help?
One of the most important things about building your brand is figuring out what makes different, unique, and/or better. Too many professionals turn themselves into commodities by not being able to demonstrate how they stand out from the crowd. Keeping it 💯, you're not the only person with your job title and the accompanying skillset. Your unique qualifier is the fact that only you are you. That means that the way in which you help is also unique to you. I've previously written about creating a lasting brand, and as DJ Khaled would say, the 'major key' to this is figuring out what's unique about you and what you offer.
Brand Building Block: Your distinct advantage may lie in the way you understand/deconstruct problems, the method(s) you use for solving them, the solutions you devise, or all of the above. Whatever it is, you need to be able to identify at what point(s) along the problem-solving continuum you add value in a way that is different from others. Some of you excel in technical ability while for others, it’s your soft skills that shine. Still others bring their unique perspective that shapes proceedings in ways not possible without their presence. We all bring something to the table by dint of our way of thinking, doing, or being that give our solutions a unique flavor.
4) Why do I help?
While people can share a common goal (e.g. workplace racial equality/eqity), their motivations for getting involved can be vastly different. Being able to articulate why you are motivated to help within your specific industry/function can communicate a lot about you.
Brand Building Block: Knowing your "why" let's your audience know clearly where you stand and what you stand for. Having a handle on your why means that you are aware of the energy that you possess and can share with others when you help. Why you help is essentially the animating force that drives you to do what you do. Undefined energy is hard to harness, focus, & deploy. It's also hard to connect that energy to anyone or anything else in a meaningful way.
If you have difficulty seeing any of this for yourself, getting feedback from colleagues you trust that have seen you in action and/or working with a career coach can support you in successfully defining your brand.
Remember, your brand doesn't have to be nor should it be for everyone. If it is, that means it's too broad, which will render it generic. Trying to be all things to all people doesn't work in life or in business -- it's simply not possible. The same thing goes for your brand. You want people to be able to make a clear 'yes' or a clear 'no' determination about whether or not they vibe with your brand.
What energy are you projecting into the world? How do you want people to feel about you after you've helped them?
By answering these questions, you will be able to better identify and articulate your brand through the lens of how you help others. When people can connect to how you have improved the situations of others, they can start to envision how you might help them.
So, what stories does your brand tell about how you help?
Need help defining & articulating your brand? I’d love to support you!
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NIIATO@AVENIRCAREERS.COM | CALL/TEXT 917-740-3048