Branding, Career Development, Job Search
Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill
4 Ways Helping Others Can Define Your Brand

“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.

4 Ways Helping Others Can Define Your Brand
Job Search, Culture, Career Development, Career Advancement, Networking, Resumes
Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill
How Culture Impacts Talking About Your ...

“Don’t boast, it’s not the right thing to do.”

These are the words I often heard from my late mother during my childhood whenever she thought I was feeling myself just a little too much. The irony of her instruction was the fact that she, objectively, had a lot that she could boast about without anyone giving her the side-eye. My mother was the first woman to serve as the Director-General of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation. She was also the first woman chosen to run as a Vice Presidential candidate in Ghana’s political history.

Despite being a woman of many firsts, she was incredibly humble both by nature and by nurture of the collectivist and humility-led Ghanaian cultural context she grew up in. You would never catch her bragging and she taught me accordingly. To this day I feel awkward in the face of praise and uncomfortable when discussing my own achievements.

Does this feel/sound familiar to you?

How Culture Impacts Talking About Your Achievements
Career Development, Career Advancement, Job Search, Motivation
Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill
Speak Up, You Never Know Who is Listening

It’s been an interesting journey so far in my 18+ months of adventures and lessons as a new solopreneur. I am still yet to “arrive,” but looking back, I’ve made significant progress thanks to the community I’ve found and built on LinkedIn. One of the scariest things about joining, and more specifically, contributing to a digital, public conversation, is a fear of the unknown. This “unknown” relates both to peoples’ receptivity and response to what you or I share. This is a valid fear/anxiety that we can all trace back to the butterflies in our collective stomach when we raised our hands to participate in the classroom. On LinkedIn, similar to the classroom setting, everyone is listening, our participation matters, and also counts toward our grade.

Let me ask you a question... why did you join LinkedIn?

Was your goal simply to create a profile just to say that you have one, or were there some higher aspirational purposes for the time and effort you expended? I’ll bet that you had goals of (re)connecting with friends/professionals you already knew, meeting new people to expand your network, and furthering your professional development, including finding new jobs. The challenge is, it’s very hard to achieve any of these goals if you remain a silent observer or passive member in this digital, public, professional square.

Speak Up, You Never Know Who is Listening
Job Search, Job Search Wellness, Mental Health
Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill
5 Ways Therapy Can Benefit Your Job Search

I’m no actor, but conducting a job search can certainly feel like an endless cycle of auditions. You do research, memorize lines, & deliver several tailored monologues to countless people in hopes of landing your coveted role. Through all of this, you are doing your best to be your best authentic self when you show up to each interaction. Doing this consistently is hard, but it can be even harder if you are also feeling depressed, anxious, or managing challenging life circumstances, nevermind a global pandemic.

Let’s not forget that while you are job searching, there is no pause button for the other roles you play in your life. You don’t get to temporarily stop being a spouse/partner, parent, caretaker, or friend, just so you can focus on your job search. The regular demands of your time and energy in these roles coupled with the added stress of conducting a job search can be a lot for anyone to handle. Let’s collectively acknowledge that this isn’t easy, and that’s ok. The question is, how can you manage these various roles/responsibilities, demands of your time, energy, & emotions in a way that works best?

For some, the answer might be... therapy.

5 Ways Therapy Can Benefit Your Job Search
Resumes, Job Search
Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill
What Kids' Show & Tell Can Teach About ...

My 8yo daughter just started 3rd grade and even in virtual scooling, “show & tell” (S&T) is still a thing. It struck me that S&T is the first practice any of us ever get in delivering a presentation to an audience. While there’s no pressure to convince anyone of anything, and there is little at stake except for potential “cool points” based on your item, one thing is universally true -- kids must have a physical item to show or the whole exercise is pointless. Kids must show evidence of the thing they tell their classmates about or they won’t be believed. If we learn this lesson so early on about the need for evidence to back up stories, why as adults do we forget about it when it comes to writing our resumes?

Stop me if you’ve seen any of the language below in a resume -- no judgments if it’s in your own ;-)

  • “Proven track record of increasing sales.”

  • “Extensive experience delivering projects on time and under budget.”

  • “Demonstrated success in program development.”

While these statements don’t sound so bad at first, upon further review, they offer nothing of substance. Though meant to sound impressive and allude to success/accomplishments, in their current form, they are nothing more than claims. Further, since there is no evidence that substantiates them, they’re essentially baseless claims → until proven otherwise.

What Kids' Show & Tell Can Teach About Resume Writing

Advancing

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How to Trust Your Own Voice in Your Career Narrative

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How to Trust Your Own Voice in Your Career Narrative

Whose voices are in your head when it comes to your career narrative and what are they saying?

Depending on our experiences to date, the composition of these voices can range from largely negative to mostly positive. Where we find ourselves along this continuum can be heavily influenced by our identities and intersections. Our identities, especially those that are visible, can play a strong role in influencing the nature of the messages we receive about ourselves both in life and work. For those of us holding one or more marginalized identities with regard to gender, race, LGBTQ status, or having a disability, the voices we have heard may have trended toward the negative.

In the career setting, these negative messages can infiltrate, influence, or even impede your own voice when it comes to telling your career story to advance or land a new role. These voices are the manifestation of systemic racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism, and more, that are ingrained in the corporate world.

This looks like my client who is an accomplished black professional with ~30 years in her field worrying about formal and informal performance feedback she’d received years ago impacting her ability to find a new job today -- in a new industry…

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It’s Not Self-Promotion, It’s About Gaining Visibility

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It’s Not Self-Promotion, It’s About Gaining Visibility

We all know that friend/acquaintance on social media who seems to be in 24/7 self-promotion mode. Every post or tweet broadcasts their latest achievement, exotic trip, or new purchase. Whether you love, hate, or tolerate what they're doing, they have achieved one main thing -- they have your attention and you know what they’re up to. When it comes to the professional setting, like it or not, similar rules apply. Those who have mastered the art of self-promotion are typically the ones who get ahead faster than those of us who, by nature and/or nurture, are less inclined or even disincentivized to bring attention to our success (POC & women) or even just our simple presence.

Unfortunately, hard work alone is not enough to earn promotion. The critical ingredient that those of us who try to “just keep our heads down and work” are missing, is visibility. If you consider the definition, ‘visibility’ works in two ways:

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How to Work on Purpose - 3 Things to Consider

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How to Work on Purpose - 3 Things to Consider

My wife is dope. Not just because I love her or that she’s an amazing clinical social worker & supervisor, but also because of how clear she is about her likes and dislikes both personally and professionally. There is a lot of power that comes when you can give clear and immediate “yes” or “no” responses in life regarding your preferences. During a recent conversation about some misgivings she has in her new role, she said something that really stuck with me, “I want to live on purpose.” In the context of her professional life, the dual meaning of that phrase became clear -- she wanted to work with: A) INTENTION and B) A DEFINED MISSION.

As we find ourselves in the midst of a global pandemic that has put life as we once knew it on an indefinite pause, now is perhaps the best possible time to evaluate for ourselves what it means for us as individuals to work on purpose.

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When It Comes to Networking, "Just Be a Person"

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When It Comes to Networking, "Just Be a Person"

Depending on who you are, you will approach the concept of “networking” with various feelings and preconceived notions based in part on your personal experiences and your overall affinity (or lack thereof) for this critical professional advancement activity. A fundamental question that many job seekers are asking when it comes to networking is, “who/how should I be when I’m out in the world trying to network [to land a job]?” This question isn’t usually voiced overtly, but it underlies the many questions around how they should approach, frame, respond, react, and what they should say, do, expect, etc.,in various scenarios. You know how people occasionally ask you, “what is the best advice you have ever received on ___?” Well, if the fill-in-the-blank was networking, my answer would be:

“Just be a person.”

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Networking Isn't Instant, But It's Worth It

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Networking Isn't Instant, But It's Worth It

“Network,” they say...“expand it,” “tap into it,” “leverage it,” blah, blah, blah. You’ve repeatedly heard about the necessity of networking, but what often gets glossed over is the difficulty of the process and the medium to long-term nature of the results. Unfortunately, the way that networking is often discussed makes it seem as though it’s a simple, 1-2-3 process and then boom, someone puts you into an interview process and/or offers you a job. The problem with this framing is that it’s misleading and it leaves job seekers feeling frustrated, confused or even inadequate because their networking efforts are seemingly leading nowhere. This upsets me because I don’t want my clients or anyone taking on any more emotional stress than they need to in the already difficult job search process. So, let me correct the record… networking isn’t instant, but it’s worth it.

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3 Ways Helping Others Can Define Your Brand

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3 Ways Helping Others Can Define Your Brand

“You are only as good as the good you do for others.” ~Unknown
The quote above has appeared in my email signature since about 2011 and has come to embody both the philosophy by which I live my life and the mantra upon which I base my career and business. As I have worked with various clients on defining their professional brand, I have come to realize that more than anything -- a brand is ultimately 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 is to identify and articulate your value in such a way that it connects to others and encourages them to engage with you.

If you think about it, any 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…

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The Juice vs. The Sauce -- Which One is Your Professional Brand?

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The Juice vs. The Sauce -- Which One is Your Professional Brand?

Imagine that the whole purpose of your professional brand is to answer the question, “Why should I hire/advance/speak to you?” The quality of your response to this question is crucial, whether you are a job seeker or seeking career advancement. Whatever your response, it’s important that it be memorable and stick with your audience. This is where “the juice vs. the sauce” comes in.

“Why should I hire/advance/speak to you,” really means, “why should I care?” By answering the “why” question effectively…you can make your audience care. When they care, that means you have achieved buy-in. When you have achieved buy-in, you can be hired or advanced to the place you wish to be.