Recently, Zarb School of Business Distinguished Professor Joel Evans of Hofstra University did an extended radio interview with Suzanne Phillips, Psy.D. on self-branding from different perspectives and across our diverse roles. Self-branding — how we see ourselves and how we want to be perceived by others — is a key to long-term personal and career success.
In this post, we are including Part 1 of the interview, which is broken into three parts/posts.
- These are some factors to consider:
- You must have a clear sense of your self-brand.
- What are my short-term and long-term career and personal goals?
- How close am I to reaching these goals?
- What specific activities must I engage in/do (in each role and life stage) to reach these goals?
- When I set my self-brand for each role & life stage, is it perceived that way by others? Can others get beyond stereotypes? Often, others do not see us as we see ourselves.
- If I relate this to myself, I know there are clear differences in how I view myself and how others view me – and this has evolved through my own life stages and roles undertaken.
- Today, I am a senior citizen by virtually every definition and seen as such by some others; but I don’t see myself that way.
- For example, as a professor, even though I am the “old guy,” I run three blogs and I’m very active in social media. So, clearly, the stereotype about seniors and social media doesn’t apply to me.
- Also as a professor, I understand that my students today see my gray hair, wrinkles, and bald spot and do not relate to me the same way now as they did when I started teaching. To address this, I wear loud and colorful ties and socks with fun patterns (such cats’ faces), and I show a lot of videos.
- In another recent role, as father of the bride, my friends and family saw another side of me. But it was the other side that I wanted them to see.
- Authenticity is imperative for a self-brand to be perceived as desired by others. Faking won’t cut it.