Top 3 Reasons Why Workplace Rock Stars Need a Personal Brand

This past week I had the great fortune to be interviewed by the co-hosts of KSRO’s Ask the Expert: Career Conversations talk show here in Santa Rosa, CA. For those of you who don’t know, Sarah Scudder, Chief Growth Officer at The Sourcing Group, and Nicole Smartt, Co-Owner of Star Staffing and Bestselling author, co-host a weekly talk show where they addresses topics such as taking your career in a new direction, turning a passion or hobby into a business, starting out in the workforce, and becoming more engaged in your current job.

When they sent me the list of questions for the show, I could feel a fire burning inside of me—no not that kind of burning, ha ha! But I got very excited because the questions got me thinking a lot about the past few years, and how much I’ve progressed in achieving some really significant goals.

One of the items on their list we didn’t get to touch on while recording, but that I’m incredibly passionate about, is building your personal brand. Some people wonder why in the world you would spend time building a personal brand when you work for a company, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to give you my pitch.

Now, before I go down this rabbit hole, I must put in a brief disclaimer that if you are looking to build your brand while working at a company, take a moment to examine your professional reputation in your current role and organization. If you aren't pulling your weight, or getting your job done, and view personal branding as a way to potentially attract new employers, then I would recommend evaluating your current situation before pursuing external endeavors. However, if you are crushing it at work every day and would like to find ways to share the good word, then please continue on.

Back to the pitch. So, I could probably come up with a list of 30 reasons why you should have a personal brand, but I'll spare you the extras, cut to the chase, and offer my top 3 reasons why rock stars need a personal brand.

Reason #1: Fun

You can draw nerd glasses on me for this one, but the first thing you will find about building a personal brand is that you get to learn a lot about yourself, what you’re good at, and you get to share that knowledge with other people. Let’s say you’ve been in your career even 5 years—you have tons more knowledge than anyone else entering the profession for the first time. Don’t you think someone straight out of college would love to know what they could do to be successful in the first 5 years of their new job? I would! If you've been in your career even longer, then you will not only have lots of great advice for getting started, but richer wisdom on handling tricky situations you've faced throughout your career.

Reason #2: Opportunity

By building my brand, I’ve created a lot of great content (my blog, my book, LinkedIn posts like the one you’re reading now) that has led to opening doors for other cool, fun things. This past quarter, I taught a class on Training and Performance at Sonoma State University, which is something that would have not come my way if I hadn’t established myself as someone who wants more than a day-job out of life.

Writing and publishing my book has connected me to professionals, students, and even old friends who have reached out to reconnect or even ask for advice.

And of course, I know this is the one you have been waiting for... yes, my personal brand has helped me make more money,

Reason #3: You Never Know…

In 2007 I was working in the mortgage industry: one day I had a job, and the next day I had nothing. At the time I was working and going to school and had been putting some money aside for savings, but had not yet accumulated the recommended 6 months rainy day fund that so many financial experts recommend. I had to move to a cheaper apartment, take jobs catering, and hustle my can off while time seemingly stood still. Like the rest of Americans who lost their jobs in the Great Recession, I then understood what it meant to struggle, and it was my first real lesson on why it’s always good to have something to fall back on.

While my first book has not made me a millionaire, yet, it has taught me to think like an entrepreneur, and the revenue I’ve generated from it could certainly fund promo ads on Facebook that would bring in some additional cash. Additionally, my blog, High Gear Career, easily contains enough content I could convert into podcast topics to promote my book. Also, since writing my book, I know exactly how to go through the publishing process, and could easily repeat it again for a sequel.

So, if you’re sitting at your desk and wondering how to kindle your own fire and passion for your work, start building your own brand. Starting small is totally fine. If you have a gmail account, you can easily pop-up a blog on blogger in minutes, which is how I got started. You don’t have to spend money to get started- you just have to get going and start building content around the topic that gets you going.

If you have any additional questions about how to get started on your own brand-building journey please email me at wendy.burbridge@gmail.com and check out my appearance on Ask The Experts, which goes live Friday, November 4th.

You: CEO

This article is all about being a CEO. That's right: Chief Executive Officer. If you are reading this, you may already be one, or you may want to be one someday soon. In this article, I am going to show you exactly how. Are you excited? I am!

The reason I am excited is because I am going to tell how you becoming a CEO of yourself is going to kick your gear into high. While you may want to be the next Mark Zuckerberg or Sundar Pichai, I can tell you that you may be well on your way to leading Facebook or Google, but first you are going to have to be the CEO of the person staring back at you in the mirror.

WAIT! Before you click away because you thought I was going to give you REAL advice about how to become a REAL CEO, let me just ask you one question. Are you showing up as the CEO of your own life today, or are you showing up as the Intern? You see, a lot of people like the idea of greatness, or a title, or being perceived as being important, but when you show up as the CEO in your own life things start to change.

You're probably wondering what I mean about being a life CEO, so let me explain. What I mean is, look at every area of your life as if you owned it, as if the livelihood of tens, or hundreds, or thousands, or millions of people depended on it. Take a second to think about all the areas of your life: health, relationships, finances, your job-- how are you showing up?

In my career I noticed a huge shift when I really started to look at my job like I owned the company. I started coming from a place of contribution and thinking how I could add value. I started to act like my role was my personal company, and I began wondering how I might approach my work differently if Wendy Burbridge was a business and not an employee.

So today, I ask you- what would you change if you owned your own role? How would you show up differently if you focused on your work like it was your product (Guess what? It is!) and your co-workers, supervisor and senior leadership as if they are your customers (Guess what? They are!)?

You may be thinking, Gee, that sounds like a lot of hard work??? Well, maybe it is, but if you want to be a REAL CEO someday, the work is not going to get easier. However, if you start being your own CEO today, I can assure you that the work you do will be a whole lot better.

Being a CEO if my role has allowed me the opportunity to increase my income, do more work that I am passionate about, and create a life that I am excited to live. That same passion is available for you, today, right now. So, if you are tired of being in the same job, doing the same thing, punching the same clock, then take a step back, and think about how things could be different.

If you are stuck, and not sure if you are even in the right job, then connect with me, and I'd be happy to share my own Goal-Setting Manifesto with you from my upcoming book 30 Reasons You Didn't Get Hired to help you get clear on your own direction.

Have a great day everyone- get out there and Crush It!

Ditching the Management Trap: Your Best Career Move Yet!

You’ve been there, working hard for your company, waiting for the day your ship will come in, and suddenly the day arrives. The manager of your department decides to move to North Dakota and suddenly there is an opening on your team that will land you a big, fat paycheck. Without haste, you immediately pull up the resume you’ve stored on your personal drive and before you know it, you’ve hit the final “Submit” button on the application. With enthusiasm you begin to wait, thinking that this is your shot to move into management, your shot to finally get into the “big leagues.”

Your interview is a smash, and within days you get the offer, the office, and the title. The first day isn’t too bad, everyone is congratulatory, but then weeks and months in you realize you are spending what used to be your free time on annual reviews. The time you used to spend catching up with colleagues in the break room is now dedicated to coaching your team, managing budgets, tracking reports, and dealing with personnel issues. Time goes on and before you know it, you have less time, the money you thought you were making somehow vanishes, and you have a heap of responsibility weighing you down. What happened? You got managered!

                Since I started my career in Talent Acquisition, I have seen a number of people interview for management jobs who were incredibly talented individual contributors. However, after doing their jobs for a period of time they get complacent and get bored. They want to make more money and see what their manager is doing and think, I can do that job. However, once these individuals assume the coveted management title, they suddenly realize that life at the company isn’t how it was at all when they were a graphic designer, accountant, assistant, coordinator, or specialist. The wonderful freedoms available in those positions are now a distant memory because they let the lure of the almighty dollar pull them in.

                I find it interesting that when I interview people for management positions (in a promotion situation) and ask where they would like to be 10 years from now, many responders admitted they would like to continue doing what they are presently doing. In my imaginary mind, I stop and wondered, why are we even having this conversation? Why had these individuals taken the time to apply for a job they really didn’t want? After digging a little deeper in my follow up questions, I typically discover that the motivation for the move is to retire at a higher income bracket to ensure security for their families. While I find this to be a noble response, I have to speculate that perhaps the reason people think they need to move into management is because they don’t understand the ways they can grow exactly where they are right now.

                Believe me, I understand wanting to drive your career into high gear. I know what it’s like to want to work so hard that you will do whatever it takes to get what you want, what you need, or what satisfies your goals. But, I also understand the significant sacrifices that are made the higher up the chain you reach. Before anyone assumes that I am simply unsympathetic and am a dream-killer, I want to stop for a moment and talk about two things.

1.       Do you absolutely love what you are doing now?

2.       Will becoming a manager/supervisor/higher level officer bring more joy to your overall life?

If you answered positively to the first question, and you love what you do, then do not deprive the world of your gift. Make a voice for that passion, and share it! If it is anything from mopping floors, to singing, to analyzing data, to reviewing credit reports, if what you are doing everyday brings you joy, then you should absolutely pursue doing more of what you love. If being a manager will enable you to do more of that, then follow that path. If you love what you do, and you are passionate about teaching others how to do it, and you coincidentally also enjoy things like adhering to and creating budgets and would like to help others create a career path around that talent, then being on the management path works for you.

                However, if you move into a management position with the assumption that you are simply going to make more money, then there will come a time when the money will not be worth the significant personal sacrifices. So, what should you do instead? You should take your passion for the thing you do and become an expert. Here me out here. If you’ve read Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, then you know this already, but if you haven’t then here’s some news for you: it takes 10,000 hours to really gain mastery of a skill. If you are spending a minimum of 40 hours per week doing your job, and the typical work year is 2,080 hours, then by the time you’ve been doing your job for 4.81 years, you already have the experience necessary to achieve expert status. If you’ve been doing your job less than 4.81 years, then start investing in yourself in your free time: read books about people who are successful in your career, attend networking events to grow your circle, get hungry for success, find out what other people have done to be successful in your field, listen to every podcast on the topic, and start taking action. No matter what field you are in, there are experiences you have had that you can share with others that can help make them better at their jobs, too. If you become an expert, here are some opportunities that you will have available to you:

·         Get recruited by a competitor or vendor: Believe it or not, there are very few people in this world who bring true passion to what they do. If you are in a company that values that passion, then by all means stay, but if you are in a situation where you are demonstrating excellence in what you do, believe me, other people will start to notice.

·         Create an info product to teach other people what you know: People love success stories, and they love learning how to get to where you are. If you create an info-product, an e-book, online videos and tutorials, then you will further separate yourself from the average Joe or Jane. If your product is good, people will buy it, and you’ve just created a new opportunity to make more money.

·         Speaking opportunities within your field of practice: Speaking is not only a great opportunity to establish yourself as an expert, but it is a great way for you to grow personally and learn more about the thing you love. Start with professional associations, but be open to opportunities where you can meet new people and give back.

·         Start a side consulting business: If you are serious about creating more revenue for yourself, then doing consulting work will make you more money, and fast-track your knowledge. When you consult, you are going to have significantly more exposure to case studies and different scenarios, and you will find you become exceptionally effective at solving specific problems. Create a system around how you solve those problems, and package it for more than you make in your current role, and sell it.  Side note: Just double check your standards of conduct first to make sure you don’t have a conflict of interest in your present company.

·         Mentorship opportunities to teach junior employees, interns or even high school students: The best career advice I’ve ever received came from my old coach, Robert Schantz who always said, “Come from a place of contribution.” Don’t expect anything in return, just help others and your life will improve.

What I want to express more than anything is that you have options available to you. If you are passionate about what you do, then get ahead by investing in yourself. As you develop yourself in time that would have otherwise been spent on your department budgeting report, you will find you can start to have a vision of possibilities. Out of that vision, you can create opportunity, set and achieve goals, and drive your future exactly where you want to go. When you have that clear vision, then you will see that anything standing in the way of you reaching that goal is simply not worth your time.