By Janani Shyamsundar (PGDM 2020-22) and Ananth James ( PGDM 2020-22)

Under the JAGSOM Chronicles webinar series, a JAGSOM faculty member and a senior corporate executive are invited to talk on a contemporary and relevant topic. In a recent edition, the topic was “How To Build Personal Brand“.

Jerry McLaughlin in this article in Forbes argues that the meaning of the term ‘brand’ has come a long way and today it means much more that merely the name or logo. So what exactly is personal brand? Tom Peters espoused this concept in his famous article in 1997 titled “The Brand Called You”. Prior to that, personal branding was considered important for celebs and politicians alone. No more. Today, every professional is a brand and needs to nurture it. We invited noted branding expert Mr.Vineet Trakroo (CEO, Evolution Strategy LLP), and Prof. Anand Narasimha (our brand management teacher) to talk about this topic and to steal a few tips.

The event was hosted by Barun Jha (PGDM 2020-22).

Personal Brand

Q. What is a personal brand why do you need a personal brand?

Personal brand is the aura or image a person is associated with. It may not be limited to work environment. This image or brand will be created intentionally or unintentionally. Hence it is better to take a conscious effort to build a brand.

Creating a brand is especially important for a fresher as it helps them stand out from a crowd of job applicants. As the demand-supply gap is increasing day by day. The relevance of personal brand will not decrease.

There is a huge gap between good job profiles and competent candidates, which can be termed as employability. Thus, it is very important to tell the world that who you truly are which is possible by consciously building a personal brand.

Macintosh advertisement in 1984 which was telecasted and printed only once created a huge impact because it mostly talked about standing out in a crowd, which is more relevant even today as we all are oceans of same. Hence in today’s world, it is one of the hygiene factors to build your own brand.

Personal Brand Building

In the quest to build your own brand, there are few key things to be taken care of, which are,

1.Be focused and clear: If you don’t stand for one thing, you will fall for everything.

2.Be genuine and honest: As people can see through you, better to build what you actually are.

3.Tell your story in an engaging way, create a network where others will tell your story.

4.Be consistent and create impact: No use in keep boasting about yourself, try to make an impact in others life. Again, no use in working hard for a week and giving up.

5. Find a mentor: Follow successful people and grow under a guidance of a mentor.

How to Promote your personal brand

Social media is an obvious platform to share and promote your personal brand

Just as there are two sides of a coin, there are two sides for a personal brand too.

1. Social brand
2. Professional brand

Social brand is synonym with B2C wherein you interact causally with other fellow humans not necessarily from your area of interest. Eg: Facebook, Instagram

Professional brand is synonym with B2B wherein you interact mostly with people of your area of interest. Eg: LinkedIn.

As the world is becoming more ‘Phygital’, it is important to balance your personal brand in both physical and digital platforms.

Checklist for Personal Branding

1. Identify the area of expertise based on your career goal.
2. Put your extra effort to develop that skill like certification and research on the latest happenings in your area of interest.
3. Start building a professional network, both online and offline.
4. Decide on the theme and the story you wanted to tell your professional network.
5. What engaging content are you creating and sharing to be noticed as ‘Bight Young Talent’ (BYT)

Bottomline: A personal brand is a plant that needs to be watered regularly and adequately to grow healthy. The above checklist can be considered as the watering toolkit.