Promote Yourself With Passion
My first corporate job interview was for a health care management company that was looking for someone to manage their 30 physician cardiac rehab center. At the time, I was recently divorced with two young children and I was looking for a 9 to 5 job. In my interview, I didn’t talk about my business experience because I had none. I didn’t talk about my resume or skills because my background in education was not relevant. I spoke about my passion for cardiac fitness. (I was an aerobics instructor). I talked about how their mission to help patients transition back to a normal life post cardiac events resonated with me. I shared my personal story about my Dad who had a heart attack in his mid-fifties and how we dramatically changed our lifestyle to accommodate his new exercise and diet regimen. I believed wholeheartedly in what they were doing.
Long story short: I got the job! and a year and a half later I was managing eleven rehab centers for this company up and down the east coast. This was the beginning of a very successful corporate career for me. Though I was not conscious of what I was doing during that interview, I was promoting myself with passion and purpose.
This is a lesson that I share with all my clients and speaking audiences. If you are in a job interview, talking with a potential clients or making a sales presentation, it is important to connect with the passion and purpose for what you do. When you are authentic and enthusiastic about your job, your potential job, your product or services, people respond in a positive manner. People want to work with someone who is not only competent but has energy and passion for what they do. Wouldn’t you?
Where Does All Our Self-Confidence Go?
Where does all the bravado and self-confidence of our early childhood go? Do you ever think back to when you were a young child? If your childhood was anything like mine, you were probably happy as a clam and had a bounty of self-esteem. I did. I vividly remember my childhood dreams of becoming a prima ballerina. I took ballet lessons three times a week and carried my ballet shoes with me to every family outing and special event. I was ready to perform anywhere and anytime. In fact, I remember asking the band at my cousin’s wedding to play a specific song and clear the dance floor so that I could dance in front of a couple of hundred people. No joke. I did. Of course, everyone indulged me and thought it was cute at the time, but when was it not cute anymore?
I can’t recall any specific time or event that caused me to lose that self-confidence of my early childhood but I do know my self-esteem eroded slowly but surely. Perhaps it was messages from my parents, teachers and friends over time. However those messages were delivered, directly or not, I certainly “got the message” that what was cute as a child was no longer acceptable behavior as a young adult.
It has taken years and a lot of self-work to bring back that self-confidence. All those messages about the need to be humble and take a back seat became hardwired in my subconscious mind and re-surface periodically to remind me that I am not as wonderful as I think I am. No one will like me if I brag and put myself in the spotlight. It is such an internal tug of war. Is this true for you?
As professional women, it is vitally important to re-connect with this self-confidence and talent. It is critical to our success to promote ourselves in the business world.
A success or bragging journal is a great way to keep track of your accomplishments and talent. Make a daily entry and review the entries each week. Take the time to write down what these accomplishments say about you.
Do the work necessary to make the connection to your value and talent and re-establish the self-confidence from your childhood. You are still wonderful. Nothing has changed but your perception of yourself.
Identify Your Web of Influence
Years ago, I went through a training program on customer retention that emphasized the importance of identifying a web of influence within a client account. The web of influence not only included the main contact or champion, but other individuals within the company that could “influence” your success. Having more than one contact is of the utmost importance to maintain stability and ongoing communication to retain the account and hopefully expand the current business. After all, what if your main contact leaves the company? Without more influential contacts in that organization, you are very vulnerable.
Of course, the same web of influence approach is vital for client acquisition as well. Early in any sales activity with prospects, identifying the key players and communicating consistently with all these individuals broadens your scope of influence and enhances your chances of landing the account.
Now let’s transition to the corporate world and the topic of career advancement. Identifying your own web of influence at work is key to your own success. What are your career goals? Who a re the major players in your organization that you need to be in front of consistently to advance your career?
Identify those key players and create your own personal sales plan for promoting yourself. In your plan, include action items that will create credibility and visibility with these individuals.
Carefully craft your message and practice the delivery of your message. What information do you want to communicate? How often? Like any other sales activity, your personal sales plan requires consistency and follow up.
Continue to look for opportunities to add to this internal network through special committees or projects.
The strength of your web of influence is determined by the individuals you select, how often your communicate, and the content of your message. Maintaining this web of influence is key to advancing your career.
Choose Three Adjectives
Carla Harris, Managing Director on Global Capital Markets at Morgan Stanley, is quoted as saying that she believes the key to success is identifying “three adjectives you want people to use to describe you and then training people to see you that way”.
I love this idea! What Carla is really doing is creating her personal brand message by choosing these adjectives.
So, how do you decide which adjectives best describe you?
Try this exercise.
- List your top 3 personality “pluses” or your personal strengths that have contributed to your success.
- Record 3 of your recent accomplishments and review the list and reflect on what these accomplishments say about you. Write your answers.
- Look at both lists and choose the top 3 adjectives.
Now you are ready to go. Develop your personal brand message using the three adjectives. Incorporate your message into your social media profile, your website, your resume, your bio.
Write a personal affirmation using the three adjectives and keep it visible. Recite the affirmation daily so that you can easily identify with your message and the adjectives that best describe you.
How are these adjectives for a starter?
- Competent
- Self-confident
- Successful
What are your three adjectives? Let everyone know who you are and what you are all about.
Cindy Loughran, New Leaf Touchstone
Cindy is a certified business coach and change agent. Because change can be so challenging, Cindy created beautiful bracelets to reinforce her message of changing behaviour with her clients. Now she has a whole new business! Listen to this great story of how she developed her new business and check out these lovely bracelets on her website.
Her website: http://newleaftouchstone.com
[podcast]http://womenssuccesscoaching.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/5-19-09.mp3[/podcast]
The Female Advantage
I read a very interesting article recently in The Boston Globe called, “The Female Advantage. A New Reason for Businesses to Promote Women: It’s More Profitable”.
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2009/05/03/the_female_advantage/
The premise of the article is that companies with more female leadership in place at the Board and executive level are more profitable. From the article,
Measured as a percent of revenues, profits at Fortune 500 firms that most aggressively promoted women were 34 percent higher by industry means, a 2001 Pepperdine University study showed.
The call for women’s advancement in business has been primarily focused thus far on gender diversity and fairness. Equal representation. Equal pay. Now there is a new perspective to consider. There is a sound business reason to promote women. It is a proven advantage that companies with more female leadership have greater profits.
Why does the correlation exist between higher profits and female leadership representation? There are several theories presented in the article.
- women have a better understanding of the consumer market
- gender diversity leads to more vigorous discussions
- women have a different leadership style
- women are more risk adverse
Though I believe that all of the above factors contribute to the success of high performing companies, I also think that organizations that are sensitive to gender issues and actively support female managers in the pipeline are more likely to be high performing companies (true meritocracies) to begin with.
As the author states about these companies,
They’re picking the best and the brightest and letting them bloom.
What are your thoughts on this topic?
Why do you think that companies with more female leadership are more profitable?
Please send me your comments.
Create Visibility to Market Your Personal Brand
Visibility is the key component to any successful marketing campaign. There is no limit to the ways that you can market yourself. Visibility is contagious and once you get started it takes off. The biggest challenge is to get started.
Be aware that everything you do and everything you don’t do or choose not to do is all part of your personal brand. It all communicates your value and character. The way you answer your phone is part of your brand message. Your voice message, the way you respond to emails are all part of your brand so it’s important to be conscious of the way you are communicating to people.
Here are some tips on how to create visibility for yourself to enhance your profile at work:
- Sign up for a special project or committee that has visibility within your company which will introduce you to new colleagues and showcase your skills or teach you new skills.
- Become a SME (subject matter expert). Teach at a community college or an adult education course.
- Start a blog on the subject. Create buzz about you and your brand.
- Write a contributing article/column for your local newspaper or alumni magazine. You will have a track record of your work.
- Sign up to speak at a conference. Volunteer for a panel discussion.
- Be strategic about social media networking sites. Choose the sites that best suit your needs to promote your brand and carefully craft your promotional message and profile online.
- Nurture your network. The best way to market your brand is word of mouth marketing. Find conscious ways to communicate your message to your contacts. What they say about your contributes to the value of your brand.
Marketing your brand requires you to act selfishly to promote yourself and to grow yourself. This is a win-win situation for you and your company. Everything you do to promote your personal brand and grow professionally is gravy for them. When you are learning, growing, building relationships,and delivering great results, it’s good for you and good for the company where you work.
10 Tips to Prepare for Your Job Interview
With good preparation, job interviews can be a great experience to not only showcase your talent but build new relationships.
Here are some tips to help you prepare for the best possible interview.
- Thoroughly research the company and the people who will be interviewing you. During the interview, refer to any pertinent information you learned in order to demonstrate your resourcefulness and interest in the company.
- Go back and review your strengths and accomplishments. Focus on why you are the best person for this job.
- Write down how your current boss would describe you and incorporate it into your interview.
- Emphasize your strengths, but don’t stretch the truth.
- Acknowledge your weak points if asked and be prepared to stress the positive side that outweighs any perceived weakness.
- Do NOT just recite your resume. Face to face interviews give you so much more opportunity to convey your passion, drive, energy, personality and enthusiasm for the job.
- Prepare yourself mentally and emotionally for the interview. Say to yourself, “I am thrilled to be here and I am so excited to tell you about my experiences. You will definitely want to hire me.”
- Create memorable messages and stories about yourself to use in the conversation. Is what you’re saying about yourself compelling and interesting? If not, go back and add some passion to your message.
- Practice a mock interview with a friend.
- Smile!
Need practice with your positive self-talk?
Join the Friday Breakfast Brag Club
starts this Friday, May 1st at 8-8:30 am EDT
or
enroll in the May Group Teleclass
The Power of Positive Self-Talk.
For more information and to register online:
http://womenssuccesscoaching.com/services/group-coaching
8 Tips to Prepare for Your Performance Review
Performance reviews are a great opportunity to highlight your accomplishments and talk about your contribution to the organization. Always be prepared. The worst thing you can do is to walk into a performance review cold.
Here are some simple tips to set the stage for a great review that showcases your talent and value.
- Outline your progress over the last year. If you have been journaling about your accomplishments, you have already started an ongoing performance review. This journal gives you the hard data you need to show what you have done. Start a journal NOW, in preparation for your review.
- Don’t let your manager control the entire review and do all the talking. Make sure that you are prepared to tell your boss what you want him/her to hear. When you are prepared, you can present yourself in the most positive manner.
- Think of your review as an opportunity to speak about your value to the company and your unique talent.
- Create a conversational message that summarizes all your accomplishments and gives specific examples.
- Graciously accept compliments. Do NOT deflect any praise that comes your way. Do NOT put yourself down. Present yourself as a valuable person who deserves the credit for the good work you’ve done.
- Don’t be defensive if some negative comments come up. Just acknowledge and focus on your strengths.
- Practice your message beforehand.
- Smile. This is your opportunity to shine.
Need practice with your positive self-talk? Check out the Friday morning breakfast brag club or enroll now in the May teleclass.
The Power of Positive Self-Talk
In the fun interactive group class you will:
- Explore your limiting beliefs around positive self-talk
- Connect with your value and talent
- Practice positive self-talk to build your self-esteem.
3 one hour sessions consecutive Tuesday evenings 7-8pm EDT
May 5, May 12, May 19th
$125. Register before 4/30 for $99
May Group Teleclass
The Power of Positive Self-Talk
Our thoughts have the ability to create our reality and it is our daily challenge to put aside negativity and focus on a positive attitude.
There are many techniques that people use to re-frame the negative into positive affirmations and with consistent practice, these methods help us to create the positive life we desire.
Controlling our negative thoughts is not an easy task. One method I suggest is the use of language. When we use positive powerful words, these words can affect our subconscious mind and help to reprogram our negative beliefs. Word choices such as “I will” instead of “I’ll try” for instance make a powerful statement of intent.
Positive self talk is an important vehicle to building self-esteem and self-confidence. Often we are more comfortable dismissing praise and putting ourselves down. What do these negative statements do to our self-esteem? Why not practice positive self-talk instead?
Follow this routine for 30 days and I guarantee that you will begin to see the difference in your self-confidence.
- Begin with journaling. Make daily entries about your accomplishments, big and small.
- Answer these questions. “What makes me unique?”. “What are my strengths?” “How have these strengths helped me in the past or in my current job?”
- Review your journal entries of recent accomplishments to connect with your talent and value. What can you truly brag about? What do these successes say about you?
- Create a personal “bragging” statement. Be authentic and positive. Print out the statement and keep it visible so that you can refer to it often. Recite it out loud daily. “This is me.” “This is what makes me special.”
Positive self-talk is an important component to successful self-promotion.
Practice the above mentioned routine daily for 30 days and see the difference it will make in your self-esteem and self-confidence.
May Group Teleclass: The Power of Positive Self-Talk
In this fun and interactive group class series you will:
- Explore your limiting beliefs around positive self-talk. What holds you back?
- Connect with your own value and talent. What makes you unique?
- Practice positive self-talk to build self-esteem and self-confidence. It really works!
Classes will be held consecutive Tuesday evenings 7-8pm EDT starting May 5th.
$125 for three one hour sessions. Workbook included.
Register online: http://womenssuccesscoaching.com/services/group-coaching
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20 Minutes For $20
20 Minutes of Interviewing Coaching For Only $20...
Present yourself with confidence!
