DO I REALLY NEED TO BE A BRAND?
This was the somewhat amusing question I was asked recently by an £8m turnover, 70 employee business. Well, amusing to me, because the answer seemed so obviously YOU ARE ALREADY ONE, WETHER YOU LIKE IT OR NOT, but it wasn’t amusing to the owner of this business. He wanted to stay personally and professionally below the radar, not to have a B2C face, not to have logo, not to have an articulated vision, just to be allowed to get on with the operational day job; at which he is very good.
I have some sympathy on the ‘below the radar’ side of things, being intensely private myself, but in talking to the business owner I was reminded of that brilliant book from 1997, William Bridges’ You & Co. It explains that we are all brands, each of us, uniquely you and uniquely me, and with the job shift away from long term single employee careers, the only thing we can really count on is ourselves; what we have to offer, what we can give, who we are; ultimately what we have to bring to the workplace or market. And that unique something, that ‘product’, that ‘you-ness’, my friend, is the brand of YOU & CO. (read Bridges!).
There are lots of benefit in being the brand of YOU at work or in your business;
1. less likely to burn out trying to be someone else or ‘playing games’
2. more likely to live your own dream, not feed someone else’s
3. much more likely to love what you do, make a really great contribution, and live a harmonious live where work and home values are aligned and seamless
Janis Joplin said ‘don’t compromise yourself, Honey. You’re all you’ve got’ and a few years back Shakespeare, ‘to thine own self be true’. Living the life you really really really want will always bring you peace.
For more on how to weave personal and professional goals together and create a clear and compelling brand for you and your business, follow the link to the PLAN FOR SUCCESS business course for SMEs.
