How to build an authentic personal brand in the metaverse. (Part 1)

I was recently asked by a remarkable young woman that I coach, for some tips on personal branding. I was lucky enough to gain experience in personal branding from my background in Management Consulting and marketing, and so I thought to write a piece that would help many more people benefit from my experience.

You may be wondering what management consulting and personal brand have in common. The answer is "Everything". You see, as a management consultant, you are the product. A consulting firm doesn't traditionally sell a physical product, they sell time (billable hours) and expertise. As a management consultant, your value is determined by what and who you know, and how effectively you brand that "subject matter expertise". So any consulting firm worth its weight will teach their consultants about personal branding early in their careers. They should learn about becoming what is commonly called a "Thought leader", an eminent person in a specific topic and/or industry (a business influencer, if you will). In fact many consulting firms have key performance indicators (KPI's) concerning "eminence" - like writing articles (called "thought leadership" or "eminence") or speaking at conferences. So I'm going to teach you what I've learnt about personal branding over the last 13 years.

I'm very analytical and structured so I'm going to give you a set of steps to work through, but feel free to work on multiple steps at a time, or stop and go back to earlier steps - whatever works for you - growth is not a linear process.

Step 1 | SELF:

The very first step is the most challenging (and rewarding), and took me 15 years to complete (I'm actually still working on it). You need to answer the most important question you'll ever ask yourself... ready?

Who are you? Really. Deep down.

Yeah, I know, it's a tough one. People have been lamenting the importance of knowing oneself for centuries. Socrates' famous quote "Know Thyself" was inscribed at the temple of Apollo at Delphi. Carl Jung famously said “The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are.”Aristotle said “Knowing yourself is the beginning of all wisdom.” and to quote another famous philosopher:

"You attract the right things when you know who you are" - Amy Poehler

If you know who you are or how you want to position your personal brand then you can skip to step 2...

To take the sting out of this question and get things moving (because the analysis paralysis could keep you in this step for years), it can help to cast your mind into the future and think about who you aspire to be - what does your best life look like? There are many tools that you can use to get to this answer, but I like to use an "envisioning" exercise because it helps to remove the fear and self-limiting beliefs you may have about what's possible.

Before you do the envisioning exercise, it's important to make sure that you are in an "expansive" frame of mind. The first step requires "divergent thinking ". Many studies (including this one ) have shown that being in a positive frame of mind is the best "soil" from which to germinate divergent or creative thinking. Deepak Chopra says, “Gratitude opens the door to … the power, the wisdom, the creativity of the universe”. So try to get yourself in the best place physically & mentally to do this work. A quick fix is to take 5 -10 minutes to think deeply about everything that you're grateful for. Make sure you aren't hungry or thirsty and won't be disturbed for at least 30 minutes or more if you can manage that.

Envisioning Exercise

When you're in the desired frame of mind, grab a notepad and pen and sit quietly and close your eyes. Think about what your perfect day would look like. No limits, no boundaries. If your mind/ ego steps in to say things like "Don't be silly that's not possible for you", or "You can't afford that" or "How do you expect to be married if you're not even in a relationship", watch those thoughts move across your mind like a cloud moves across the sky. See it, acknowledge it but don't own it, watch it go. There is no space for limiting thoughts in this exercise.

See yourself wake up on this perfect day. What do you hear? What do you see? Where are you? What are you wearing? Notice every detail of the place that you're in. What does it smell like? How do you feel? Spend as long as you can here and involve all of your senses in taking in this experience.What is your ideal morning routine? What do you do next? How do you feel now?

You're excited about the day ahead. What are you looking forward to? What kind of "intentional activity" - not leisure - will you be embarking on today? Don't feel any pressure to label it with a job description or title, just notice the characteristics of the "work". I define work as "The fulfilling activities you undertake to produce value". Are you alone or with others? Where do you do this "work"? How does it make you feel? When/ how do you complete this work? What's missing that would make this experience even more joyful? Add whatever is missing.

Go about your best day like this in your mind, adding, subtracting, amending until you have envisioned your perfect day, or week or month. Make sure that there isn't one thing that you could add to make it more joyful or perfect. How do you feel? That's how life should feel. Now write it down in as much detail as possible, as if you are narrating your life in the first person and present tense (e.g. I wake up in the morning, open my eyes and I see...). A very powerful exercise is to either read this every day, or record yourself reading it and then listen to it every day. This first step alone can take days or weeks depending on how much time you want to spend doing the work. It also evolves, so don't expect it to be a destination that you check off the list as "done" at any point - this is your life's work.

Step 2 | THEMES:

This is when that self doubt or fear may make another appearance. It's important to note that the feeling of self doubt is a defense mechanism that your mind has created to keep you small... because staying small is safe. We don't do safe here though... not when you're excavating your authentic self. So watch those thoughts come and go like lanterns in the night sky. Give thanks to that part of yourself for wanting to protect you and then recommit to crafting your best life and move forward.

Now that you have a vision of your best self, you can start to build your personal brand around this vision. We're going to move from divergent thinking to convergent thinking now, which means we're going to focus.

As this article is focused on the "work" lens, it's helpful to go deeper into that part of the vision and identify themes. If you don't see the themes immediately you could think about or journal on these questions:

In the vision of your best life, how do you create value?

Q: What problem are you solving? (e.g. I help people make sense of their lives and find their authentic path to fulfillment.) OR (e.g. I help entrepreneurs grow their small technology business's into sustainable, employment generating concerns).

Q: Where or how do you deliver this value/ solve this challenge? (e.g. I speak at large conferences) OR (I teach in small groups) OR (I package and deliver my IP using digital tools).

Q: Why is it important that you do what you do/ solve this problem? (e.g. I save lives) OR (If I don't solve this challenge, companies become inefficient, less profitable and aren't able to offer employment in my community) OR (If people can't live an authentic life they are more prone to depression and anxiety)

Q: Get specific about who benefits from this work? Who benefits when you solve this problem? (e.g. I help African women in tech to break the glass ceiling and access the C-suite) OR (e.g. I help busy single parents make informed choices about nutrition for their families.) OR (e.g. I help online game development companies to create the best user experience for their customers.)

Q: Do you have an industry or sector focus? (e.g. Mining, Insurance, Personal Growth, Publishing, Healthcare, Wellness etc.)

Q: What soft & hard skills or experience do you need to do this work? (e.g. coaching, speaking, patience, coding, writing, strategy, communication, finance degree, driving change, building things etc.)

Once you're clear on the value you create, get it down to a succinct sentence or two, like this, making sure that you cover the "What, where, how, why & who":

You can also write it out in anyway that works for you as long as you have all of the elements, here are two more examples:

It's likely that your current skills, experience, role will not be 100% aligned to your vision and that's OK. If this statement feels right to you, move forward and identify themes as I have with the below example. If not, go back and see what you're not happy with and rework it. Your gut feeling is what will guide you.

If you're having trouble identifying key words, then go and have a look at people that you admire online, follow them and see what hashtags (#) they use, what they comment on or write about and who they follow. Start to follow your "tribe" or community of people with similar interests so that you're immersing yourself in the content they share all the time and staying up to date on what's happening in your chosen field.

Read on for Steps 3 & 4 in Part 2 here .