Personal Branding

What do you do well?  And how do you communicate that to people you meet?  Here’s what I’ve found useful.

I read a post a while ago wherein the author was touting the value in a “personal branding statement.”  The idea is that leaders need to have a 30-second elevator pitch type, pithy statement about their personal brand.  Good advice.  Succinctly communicating your business value is important.

So, I worked through a number of ideas about the Tracy Hunt brand.  I eventually came up with this statement: 

My legacy is three fold:  IT Strategy, IT Operations, and Information Assurance. 

Succinct, indeed.  Too succinct, probably.  But it catches attention, and gives me a platform from which to dive into other things.

To help me frame “those other things,” I created a personal branding graphic.  When conversing off the cuff, recalling this graphic helps keep me on target.  And, when talking with clients, colleagues, etc., showing and talking through this graphic helps them remember me and my value to their organization.

For my graphic, I started with the above triad of Strategy, Operations, and Information Assurance.

What I do

Everything I do generally falls into one or more of those three buckets.  It’s “What I do.”  Lots of IT folks do those things, so what sets the CIO-type apart is that we consider four critical success factors for every project.  That’s “How I do what I do.”  Those critical success factors are People, Process, Technology and Infrastructure.

How I do it

Most seasoned CIOs and other executives already know that successful projects consider many things beyond the direct scope of the project.  So, what sets me apart from seasoned CIOs is “Who I am” – my personal commitment to achieving a balanced mix of personal core values, business value drivers, and regulatory constraints.

Who I am

So, to recap…moving from the outside in, we have below

• Who I am (circle)
• What I do (triangle)
• How I do it (square)

Give it a shot.  Create your personal branding graphic.  If nothing else, it will help you work through thinking about your accomplishments from a different perspective.

Try it – you’ll like it.