How do you want to be remembered?

Since becoming a recruiter 4 years ago, I’ve probably learnt a lot more about myself in this role than I ever have previously. 

One of the main things I’ve taken away from it is how important it is to have a personal brand.  

Whenever, I speak to a client/candidate I always think to myself ‘How Do I Want To Be Remembered?

To tell you a little of how I got here, I want to take you back to the 90’s where it all began up in London, 18 years old fresh out of school and working for a publishing company. I felt free, young and excited to be working and earning a wage. However, looking back I never thought of myself as a brand.  I wanted to work in the media for an exciting brand, help them market themselves and create an inspiring career for myself.  

I thought that hard work, dedication and loyalty would help carve out a successful career, however, I didn’t know that as well as working hard and proving myself I needed a ‘Personal Brand’. 

To be honest, I struggled until my 30’s to even know who I was, and how I was going to achieve my goals.  Now, in my 40’s, I know that having a professional personal brand is one of the most important traits to have.

As we all know, there’s a lot of content at the moment about ‘Personal Brand.’ Having attended LinkedIn events and followed blogs/video content, I wanted to highlight a few things that I have found relevant and helped me to build my own personal brand:

Personal Brand

A Brand is ‘an expectation of an experience’ – so a personal brand is how would people feel working with you?  What will they say when you leave a room?  

Your brand is your legacy, your reputation.

Personally, I’m a bit of an over thinker and probably over sharer, I always wonder what people think about me.  When I’m with family and friends, I’m more relaxed as they know me and know what I’m like. However, with colleagues, some of those traits I possess, I perhaps don’t want to be shown in a professional environment.  

I don’t want to change myself but I’d like to be seen as a professional, level headed, trustworthy and a truthful person. Not a pushy or rude individual, so it’s just finding a balance of what works for you.

Being in recruitment, helping candidates with interview techniques and formatting their resumes has helped me to not only build their brand but also my own. 

The below 2 questions I think are important to help start building your personal brand:

What are your values?

Ask yourself what do you believe in?  When you know your values, this will help build your credibility with your colleagues and in the workplace. Think of how you are behaving, and whether this is consistent with your values.

How do you want to be remembered?

For me, this is probably the most important question to ask. As mentioned at work I want to be seen as friendly, trustworthy and true, Lida Citroen – International Branding Specialist – said ‘There’s a lot of judgment in Personal Brand.’ 

How would your colleagues describe you? Would it be the same as what your family and friends think? Be brave and ask the question, you may have in your head of how you’d like to be perceived but is that actually reality? 

Scary, but maybe it’s time to find out. Feedback is always a positive, as it will help you grow and get to where you want to be.

These are all starting points and, like anything, it takes time to build your brand but like any good marketer you can create a strategy to help you reach your goal. This in turn will help you get the respect and career you deserve. 

So ask yourself ‘How would you liked to be remembered?’