You want to crack on and do the work with your team… but first, you need their commitment.

In this series, we have covered:

• Why a strong Personal Branding focus moves teams forward in leaps and bounds
• How to develop the Personal Brands of your team members for impact

And now, in the final piece in this edition:

• How to get buy-in from leaders and team members on Personal Branding

In Part 1 of this series on developing the personal brands of your team members, I described what happens to the team and the business when you work on your team’s personal brands.

Here in Part 2, I will show you that a Lunch ‘n’ Learn on Personal Branding isn’t going to cut it – and what to do instead.

In this series, we will show you:

• Why a strong Personal Branding focus moves teams forward in leaps and bounds
• How to develop the Personal Brands of your team members for impact
• How to get buy-in from leaders and team members on Personal Branding

“When people value themselves and their contribution, and can articulate this clearly, they STEP UP, CARE MORE, PERFORM BETTER and ACT LIKE LEADERS.”

– Julissa Shrewsbury, Director & Lead Facilitator, New Work Consulting

In this series, we will show you:

• Why a strong Personal Branding focus moves teams forward in leaps and bounds
• How to develop the Personal Brands of your team members for impact
• How to get buy-in from leaders and team members on Personal Branding

At NWC, our Purpose is ‘To help people grow in confidence and contribution, through knowing their value.’

Why? Because at the heart of our work is a belief that people do well when they think well of themselves.

And we’ve seen it in action, time and time again…

Seeing yourself differently to act differently

Whether it’s a board director, a CEO, a manager or a junior member of the team… everyone acts differently when they see themselves differently. Everyone can benefit from reflecting on how they see themselves, and how they need to see themselves, in order to step up to the next challenge.

In working with hundreds of professionals at every career level and in a wide range of industries, I’ve had the privilege of witnessing people’s professional confidence – as individuals and as teams – come to life.

As they dig deep to uncover the unique value they bring to others in their daily work, and develop clarity around the right ways to express that, they are visibly transformed.

They sit or stand taller and a new light ignites in their eyes.

They speak with more certainty and they emanate excitement.

They hold themselves to better standards and treat others the way they want to be treated.

They start to see they are worthy of being in the room with decision-makers and important stakeholders. That they have something to add, something to say, that is valuable.

Being seen as a peer to decision-makers

When your role is to build the business, develop client relationships, or simply to be a brand representative (everyone!)… you need to be trusted by stakeholders and audiences. Often this means being seen as a trusted advisor or peer to leaders and decision-makers.

How do you get your team members a seat at the table?

Clear and confident communication of value and expertise builds trust with important others. Positioning yourself at any introduction point (networking, LinkedIn, email, phone calls, website…) to highlight the value you bring to a specific audience is necessary to be seen the way you need to be seen… yet most people fail to do this impactfully!

First, you need to be visible to the right people. Next, you need to be saying the things that matter… with authenticity and conviction.

This means a clear strategy and action steps for building the personal brands of team members as trusted peers to specific audiences, through network-building, thought leadership and relationship nurturing – leveraging focused online and offline tactics that make sense for that team, that team member, that personal brand.

Beyond the Lunch ‘n’ Learn

You can probably guess from what I’ve described above that a Lunch ‘n’ Learn on Personal Branding isn’t going to cut it.

What can I tell you from running countless Personal Branding presentations over a decade? Everyone shows up for this topic (we love to know how others see us and how we might influence that). Everyone is engaged – leaning forward in their chairs, taking notes, asking questions. Everyone says it was a fascinating topic and they learned something. Everyone knows the next step they want to implement (and some people actually do it).

You usually get all these results in an hour. You get a little more action in two. In a half day you can create a plan. With a follow-up session down the track you can remember key take-aways and become accountable to achieve at least one action step.

But with an aligned team (or better yet, company) strategy on personal branding, including individual and team development experiences (such as personal brand foundations training, personal brand team strategy planning, individual coaching, measurable goals and team check-ins, say, over 3-6 months) you can actually transform how people see themselves, how they are seen by others, how they see each other as colleagues, and how they see their team as a differentiated, value-adding unit.

People who truly value their own and others’ contributions, and display that to stakeholders… that means real impact in business and in organisational culture. Now that’s exciting!

Stay tuned for more detail in our next post on how to develop the Personal Brands of your team members for impact.

Increasingly, I’m seeing the rise of Diversity & Inclusion programs to support professionals from different backgrounds or with different needs to flourish in their chosen career. This is an important stepping stone to achieving a business landscape that is inclusive and makes the most of the whole range of talent that is available. Until we achieve this, there remain challenges and experiences at work that are particular to certain groups or individuals, that need to be considered when designing an inclusive and supportive space to grow.

Some of the challenges I’ve heard people mention when they feel they don’t fit in with the ‘norm’, include – in their words:

• “I’ve had to jump through more hoops to get to where I am.”
• “I had to prove, right from the start, that I’d stick around.”
• “I didn’t think I could ask for what I needed in order to make it work.”
• “I can easily advocate for others, but not for myself.”
• “I can’t do business development and sales conversations the expected way.”
• “I am constantly talked over.”
• “I feel like I’m not in the club.”

There has been much said about bias in the business world, along with the dangers of stereotyping and early conditioning in society. In workshops with teams and groups of professional people, when the issue of ‘who has power and who has not’ in business settings comes up in discussion, my approach is to separate experiences into ‘internal’ and ‘external’ landscapes.

While the external environments we face are filled with factors we individually can’t control, like workplace structures, hierarchies and cultural norms… there are some things on the outside we can personally influence – like how people see us.

More importantly, our internal environment – how we think about ourselves and how we choose to see situations and other people – is filled with opportunities for self-empowerment. When we take time to understand our strengths and the value this contributes to others, for example, we come from a place of heightened confidence, clarity and personal power.

So how do we create structures to explore how to increase our sense of personal power and grow our influence as professionals? To me, it’s about focusing on what we CAN do.

Empowering our diverse teams to grow their professional influence

While being transparent and being allowed to talk about the real issues facing staff are important in an organisational culture, it’s also important not to stay here, but to move on to constructive conversations and experiences that empower all staff to grow.

When asked to work directly with diverse teams, my approach to supporting staff to feel empowered follows these 3 P’s:

The topics we cover in each of these key components include:

Personal Power

What does it mean to be ‘powerful’? How do we develop a sense of personal leadership in our own lives? How can an understanding of cognitive bias and influence research help us to be more empowered to achieve our professional goals? What practical tools are there for building influence and credibility with others?

Personal Brand

What’s important to know about first impressions, in person and online? How can we assess where our personal brand is currently at? What kinds of roadblocks do people experience in building their personal brands, and how can these be overcome? How do you develop clear personal brand positioning now, and how can you develop and grow your personal brand throughout your career?

Professional Confidence

How does our mindset and self-talk affect our performance in professional contexts? What daily habits can we build to strengthen our professional and personal confidence, and what tools do we need in our toolkit to tackle ‘scary’ scenarios and be ready for anything at work (such as pitching, presenting, networking, sales, leading, negotiating, difficult conversations)?

Building your program

If you are building out a program to empower your increasingly diverse teams – that’s great – and you need to create a safe space for this to unfold. The best place to start, whether or not you have experts working with you, is to engage your people in what they need to see in order to feel safe and enthusiastic about participating in your program.  Being seen and heard should be at the start, middle and end of all your People & Culture programs!