I´m actually proud that I was asked to give expert advice on Reputation.com who is the global leader in online reputation management. The subject was the importace of a brand name. You will find the interview here.
Category Archives: personal branding
I want to challenge you to stand out as unique
Peter Stordalen, the owner of Choice Hotels said in an interview: “Worklife is about what you can do in the future, not what you have done in the past”. It is all about potential – I want to meet that guy.
Potential is when your talents, ambition, passion, personal strengths and unique qualities join force to do great stuff. These are also the skills we have such a hard time presenting when it comes to ourselves. One of the advantages when you know your professional reputation is that you can market it in a trustworthy way.
This is also one of my aspirations when I work with Your Professional Reputation – to challenge my clients to stand out as unique. My tagline is:
”Considered a pioneer in his field, Per takes your professional reputation to a new dimension and challenges you to stand out as unique”
This tagline is not what I say about myself, it’s what my professional surroundings say about me compressed into one sentence. I am very proud of mine and every morning when I wake up it’s what I want to accomplish. It’s also a big part of my potential – and it’s great fun.
A hijacked tagline
When we analyze a persons professional reputation, we also compress it into a tagline, your professional reputation in one sentence. It is not what you say about yourself, it is what professional surroundings say about you – your perceived expertise, personal strengths and unique qualities. The tagline should also point towards your potential – what you want to achieve for your customers in the near future. Together with a good picture it will be an exciting marketing tool.
A couple of weeks ago a person found one of our taglines that we made for a consultant on LinkedIn, and she was attracted by it, hijacked it and put it on her own profile. But – that never works out, when you meet her you can immediately feel that it is false. Every tagline is unique.
Can you write your own tagline? Of course, but it will never get the same strength and credibility as when it’s made by experts building on your professional reputation. Wall Street Journal had the other day a fascinating headline ”Your resume in 140 characters”. Of course, they were talking about the possibilities with Twitter but your tagline is a very interesting alternative. It is the exclamation point to your story, and the best way to connect your clients to your professional reputation.
More from Richard Branson on reputation
I have rewritten yesterdays blog with a longer quote from Richard Branson and the article in Young Entrepreneurs. He very often comes back to the priceless value of his professional reputation.
“This is part of a larger question: What’s your most valuable possession? When people ask me that, they often expect me to name some expensive artifact. However, my most valuable possession is also my most valued possession. It costs nothing, and everyone has one: my reputation.
For entrepreneurs, a bad personal reputation will extend to your brand’s reputation as well. If you do anything to damage either your own reputation or your company’s, you could destroy your business. When you make a promise to your customers, you need to walk the walk. While a good reputation precedes you, a bad reputation will follow you for a long time — it takes years to build a strong rapport with people and just seconds to lose it. Those in your industry, from potential investors to suppliers to prospective employees, will take note.”
Our ambition when we analyze your professional reputation is to make one hundred percent trustworthy description of your greatest asset. This is a crucial starting point in our program to develop it further. If you are not aware of how you are perceived in the first place, you will be more or less blindfolded.
Your professional reputation – my challenge
For the last eight years, my focus has been on the vast possibilities I saw back then to work with a persons professional reputation. What really surprised me was that everyone I met agreed upon the crucial value of their reputation, yet nobody had a clue what it looked like. I had never before seen greater possibilities.
I made a loop around the popular concept of personal branding, but I didn’t feel very comfortable with it. I met many people who said – “I am not a brand, I am a person”. I could always reply – yes I absolutely agree, but you have a professional reputation. Since then it has been a truly great adventure, working with more than 800 persons, analyzing and developing their reputation and experiencing the results.
So where do I go from here? My decision is crystal clear to focus further on this exciting and specific area since there is nothing more important than your professional reputation. This is the best way that I can assist consultants to get new and more attractive clients and be even better paid. This is the best way that I can assist entrepreneurs to market the things that customers are actually buying. And this is the best way that I can assist leaders to develop their strongest leadership skills – not their weaknesses. So far I have not met a single person who has become successful on her weaknesses.
Together with my colleague Karin Sandin and partners in Scandinavia we are set out to achieve great things.
We need stories that spread
Stories are immensely valuable, and the art of telling stories is probably one of the most underestimated business strategies today. Your professional reputation as an individual is your story. What story is your professional reputation bringing to the world?
It is not enough to tell a good story, you have to be one. Today it is not enough to be a good story, you have to be able to tell it in many different ways.
How do you tell your story as a consultant, entrepreneur or as a leader? To me, there is no doubt in my mind. When you combine your professional reputation with a description of your potential to solve your customers challenges, you have a highly attractive marketing tool. Combined with a picture that reflects your professional reputation the mission is complete.
What is the real value of your professional reputation?
I often say that there is no way to put a price on your professional reputation, its value to you is priceless. Sometimes we get the question if someone has actually estimated the real value and two things come to my mind.
The Carnegie Institute of Technology has done research on what creates financial success among technical consultants. The result shows that 85% were depending on their personal strengths and unique qualities and only 15% on their technical background. When you know your professional reputation you get hold of and can develop both. Of course this is the situation for all consultants.
Economists in the US estimate that 75% of the value of a company lies in its reputation. To me, reputation is created by individuals in that company. This is the reason why global PR-agencies are stating that individual reputation will be a dominant factor in the future.
Reputation is the number one when leaders in Europe are asked what is most important today. This is the value at stake – and as Rachel Botsman states ”Reputation is your greatest asset – it will be the cornerstone of the 21st century economy.”
The unbeatable combination to be Top of Mind
Two decisive key factors today for success as a consultant, entrepreneur or leader are your professional reputation and your potential. What would happen if those two joined forces when you look for new clients and projects? You will get an unbeatable combination.
Your professional reputation is your perceived expertise, your talents and unique qualities. When preparing the report to the individuals we engage with, we also include a summary presentation of their professional reputation in 10 lines as well as a tagline. The tagline is your professional reputation in one sentence and, at the same time, your ”pitch for the future” – your Next Big Thing.
We worked with the consultants and management team for Qeep Inc. and Aqilles Invest. One of the founders, Anders Holm, got the following tagline, put together from his professional reputation: ”Anders is a genuine and inspiring leader who creates the result breakthroughs that seem impossible to others”
This is his ”pitch for the future” – his Next Big Thing. The important thing is that it is nothing that he says about himself – it is how he is perceived by his professional surroundings – it is genuine, credible and attractive. Who would not like to hire him?
Politicians – your professional reputation brings out the genuine, inspires and attracts voters.
Many politicians hire PR-consultants to build their personal brand when it comes to an election campaign. How often doesn’t a cosmetic surface crackle, we see it happen time after time and we never seem to learn the lesson? As a politician – you are not a brand – you are a person with a professional reputation. You will arrive second, your professional reputation always precedes you. If you do not know what it looks like, you will act more or less blindfolded.
When you analyze and develop your professional reputation you will bring out the genuine, the things that will inspire and attract voters and create success for you in an election. In this way you will show the credibility that is so crucial today.
Which is your Next Big Thing as a politician – the things that you deep inside feel that you want to accomplish. Combined with your professional reputation, it is what customers, clients – and in your case voters will go crazy about. Unanimous research confirms this fact.
Who is blowing your horn?
Today Paul Holmstrom, management consultant and chairman of Bioss Sweden sent us a very interesting article from the magazine Fast Company. In this article, Jonathan Rick says that the problem with your bio isn’t the boasting – it is who’s doing the boasting.
Here, he catches the real strength of Your Professional Reputation – it is not what you are saying about yourself – it is what others are saying about you. In this way, it will be a very trustworthy description of your perceived expertise, real strengths and unique qualities. It will also put words to your potential for the future.
When we work with Your Professional Reputation, we present in a compressed form what 10-15 clients, managers and colleagues are saying about you when it comes to those key factors that form your reputation.
The power of inspiration
What clients care the most about the things that touch, move and inspire them. They make their decisions based on emotions and after that they look for the logical facts that support these decisions.
Inspiration is magically effective and companies that grow more than 15 percent per year do it by inspiring their customers. The question is what creates inspiration since you can’t be trained into being inspirational? It’s hardly the logical arguments that we so often put forward. Instead, it grows out of the magic combination between your talents, passion and ambition. When you know your professional reputation, you also know how to develop these key skills.
Customers crave for inspiration, and they look for people who can inspire them. Do what you love and make the customers love what you do, is probably the best marketing strategy ever. Have a passion of delivering something really good. Stop marketing the things that the customers already assume that you have and market what they are really buying.
Track record or potential for greatness?
Very often we get advice how to land a project, an assignment or a job. Most of the time it is pointed out that your track record is your most valuable asset. At the same time, we see that it is your potential for greatness – the brilliant results that you can create for your client that is decisive. This is also confirmed by recent research (Stanford University and Harvard Business School).
Experience is important, but by itself it guaranties nothing – there is something else at stake here. Your potential is built upon your experiences, your personal strengths and unique qualities.
It all comes together in one place, in your professional reputation. Here, you get the whole picture in a trustworthy way. Please remember that your professional reputation is not what you say about yourself – it is what your professional surroundings say about you. It is without any doubt your greatest asset, considering that you will get hold of “the whole package”.
I want to turn my clients into heroes
To me it is important to reflect upon why I spend all this time working with our concept Your professional reputation and I always come back with the same answer. Whether you are a leader, consultant or entrepreneur, I want to turn you into a hero in your field.
If you start to feel an ongoing stagnation in your job or as an entrepreneur and you don’t get what you want from your talents, passion and ambition, your professional reputation will be affected. Are you where you have to be or where you want to be? If you are not where you want to be, you should do something about it! Your professional reputation is at stake here, it’s constantly valued and your greatest asset.
Today it is all about potential. It is crucial that you should not promote yourself by just historical facts. Your potential makes a greater impact than your experience when you are chosen for a project, an assignment or a job. When you know your professional reputation you will also be aware of your perceived potential. This makes the whole world of difference.
After working with more than 800 individuals, analyzing and developing their professional reputation I see what a great impact it makes. It is simple, natural and it’s effective.
Simplicity and the magic of stop doing
What could be more simple, effective and natural than working with your professional reputation? Everybody has a professional reputation, every one that we meet recognize the importance of it and very few are aware what it looks like. Simplicity opens up so many possibilities in many ways.
Three great management thinkers, Seth Godin, Tom Peters and Jim Collins have, according to Daniel Pink, one thing in common – they state that: ”The secret of high performance for individuals is deciding what not to do”.
The magic of stop doing is about letting go of things that doesn’t work so well and focus on the things where you can combine your talents, passion and ambition. Then you will automatically be set on an exciting journey towards an area where you will be remarkable and have the ambition to be the best in your world.
The problem we see today is that so many are not aware of their real talents, perceived strengths and where their passion is. When you are distinctly aware of your professional reputation much of that is solved, and your “stop doing list” will have real power.
An almost magical individual marketing tool
Today it is crucial that you should not promote yourself by just historical facts. Your potential makes a greater impact than your experience when you are chosen for a project, an assignment or a job.
Your professional reputation is a very useful tool since it is your potential and includes your perceived expertise, your strengths and unique qualities. Combine this with your ambition – what you want to accomplish in the coming year, and it will be an almost magical marketing tool.
New opportunities in 2013 around Your Professional Reputation
In the last few days, I spent time reading articles from Harvard Business Review and Forbes Magazine among others to try to catch up with the trends in the area of Your Professional Reputation according to other experts. Here is some of the stuff I picked up – and more will follow:
Reputation is the number one. This is something I wrote about last week, and you can read about this in many articles. Reputation is your greatest asset as an individual, and it will be the cornerstone of the 21st century economy. You will not obtain anything memorable if it is not valued by others. It is others that hire you, market you, spread your message or applauds you.
The Death of The Resume. Forbes Magazine, who is a leading source for reliable business news and financial information, had this headline a couple of weeks ago. They continue to say that in 2013 the traditional resume will be replaced by the breadth and depth of your professional reputation. MIT Technology Business Review also states in an article that ”Reputation is your Resume”.
”However we do it, we will all have to accept that a one-page summary of our professional histories, expertise, skills, and achievements – that which we think of as a “resume” – will no longer act as our differentiation in the job market”.
Potential for greatness. I see many articles on the subject of how your potential makes a greater impact than experience (which of course is part of your potential). The great opportunity here is to market your potential to your customers and clients instead of your history.
Reputation opens up new perspectives in business
Reputation is today the number one in Europe when it comes to what leaders and consultants pinpoint as most important.
The international PR consultancy firm Kreab Gavin & Anderson focus on the crucial key factor when stating:
”Individual reputation will become a dominant factor in the future”.
This will of course open up completely new perspectives in business, and the profit could be substantial. Among other things it will bring out a completely new way to market yourself to interesting companies and assignments. As a consultant, I would say that your professional reputation is close to one hundred percent of your value. That also goes for you as a leader and as an entrepreneur.
When you know how you are perceived by your professional surroundings you can start to build on your strengths, unique qualities and potential in a completely new way.
How well do you know your professional reputation as an individual? What story are you bringing to the world? This question will decide your professional future.
NEWS. You can work with your professional reputation wherever you are in the world.
Your professional reputation is without any doubt your greatest asset. You can now analyze and develop it almost wherever you are in the world. After the process of analyzing it, we will use Skype for our meetings when we look upon how you can develop your reputation to attract new customers or how to take new steps in your career.
At the moment, we work in English, Swedish, Norwegian and soon probably in Danish. We will in due time try to add new languages and train new partners in different countries who realizes how crucial this is to your success.
”There is no way to put a price on your professional reputation, its value to you is priceless”
What story is your professional reputation bringing to the world?
Storytelling is probably one of the most underestimated business strategies – ever. One challenge for consultants and entrepreneurs is to communicate their value in an effective way and – facts only go so far. Most people care most about the things that touch, move and inspire them. They make decisions based on emotion, and then look for the facts that support these decisions.
This is why potential – your next big thing is so crucial, it talks to emotions, catches our attention and arises curiosity. According to research that I have presented earlier potential makes much greater impact than experience and historical facts.
Your professional reputation is your story and no data based test in the world can ever replace that. When you know what story your professional reputation represents to your clients and colleagues, you can also start do develop it further. What story do you want your professional reputation to tell in six months time, a year and what do you actually have to do?
Credibility – it decides every deal
A while back I started to explain to CEO of an advertising agency about our kind of business. She interrupted me and said: Ah – that’s my credibility – It decides every deal” At that moment I knew that I could not explain it in any better way. Credibility is a vital part of your professional reputation – it is one of the six key factors that form it.
Without trust, the most successful company or individual will be destroyed, and an interesting question is what creates trust. First you should have the passion to deliver with excellence and, as Tom Peters puts it: ”Excellence is not an ambition – it is the next five minutes”.
It is also about being open to new possibilities, constantly learning and not being so sure about things. You have to dare to be on the edge where new ideas are formed, to see new openings and be prepared to be wrong. It is about being consistent, honest and practice what you preach, even if it hurts. To share more what you see, not what you know.
When you know the unique qualities of your professional reputation you should try to live it at every moment in every meeting. To have the ambition of constant improvement since you are never better than your next project
You will always be second to arrive
Everywhere you go you will always be second to arrive – your professional reputation always precedes you. If you want to be more successful than you are right now, you need to know your professional reputation because you will always be valued by others. It is others that applaud you, recommend you and hire you. Of course, you can take your chances or, you can take more control over that crucial process.
Your reputation as a consultant, leader or entrepreneur is your greatest asset. Remember that your reputation is not what you say about yourself – it is how you are perceived by others. It is how your clients value your strengths, unique qualities and potential. In the global market, you can’t afford not to take every possibility to find the things that is unique and give you competitive advantages. The price for not taking advantage of your professional reputation is high.
Hire for potential – and of course I prefer to fly with a trained pilot.
If you are not looking for ambition, passion, sustainability, credibility and the ability to inspire – if that is not on top of your list when you hire, you will never get it.
Today you should seek the irreplaceable that challenge the average – people with passion, ambition and talents, who knows their next big thing. People with potential. For this reason, it is important to consider for a while what individual potential really is.
Potential comes out of the strengths and the unique qualities I indicated above – things that form your professional reputation. Of course, it comes out of your experiences and training. I came into Copenhagen today, flying with Norwegian and when I fly, I absolutely prefer to fly with a trained pilot and not someone who is just interested in flying and has a nice attitude. But – just being trained doesn’t decide how good a pilot she or he is – or has the potential to be.
There are other factors involved here and that is the exciting part and this is something that you really could take advantage today. Soft skills have become hard skills and how well do you know and develop your soft skills.
Soft skills have become hard skills
We hear it from organizations like A great place to work, we hear it from the recruitment industry – actually we hear it from everywhere today, how soft skills have become the hard skills – skills that really matter.
Soft skills like passion, ambition, your ability to inspire, your entrepreneurial mind and your trustworthiness determine your success at work, your career and how you succeed as a consultant, employee or entrepreneur. It determines whom your customers will listen to and whom they will trust. Can anything be more profitable to analyze than this?
Soft skills are a decisive factor, but my great surprise they are something we don´t analyze in a proper way. These are the factors that create your professional reputation together with your perceived expertise and experiences. Remember that your professional reputation is not what you say about yourself, it is what others say about you. The truth is always in the eye of the beholder.
In consulting your professional reputation is everything
As a top consultant you are your professional reputation. It is formed by your talents, experiences, personal strengths and unique qualities as perceived by others. If you are not 100 percent convinced about every part of your professional reputation – how can you persuade your new clients?
Reputation is No 1 in Europe when it comes to what leaders are giving priority to today, and also multinational PR-companies are stating that individual reputation is a dominant factor. It will determine whom their customers will listen to, trust and choose.
Most consultants realize the utmost importance of their professional reputation, but surprisingly few know what it looks like. When you know every corner of your professional reputation, then you have the opportunity to develop it further and attract the right clients. It will open up great possibilities.
Today clients look for the indispensable who constantly challenge the average – and with the courage to act accordingly. Those who deep in their heart think that they can change things.
NEWS – will you help us go international with Your Professional Reputation
Many people that we meet have asked why my blog turned into English. The reason is that we have the intention of also going international with Your Professional Reputation in 2013.
In Sweden, we have completed more than 750 analyzes and and we have also worked with individuals in Switzerland, Brazil, The US, Norway and Italy. We see that the results are as exciting as they are in Sweden. So far the concept is unique.
We are now looking for consultants or consultancies who find Your Professional Reputation an exciting field to work in. Please e-mail me at per@cfpu.se for further information.
It´s on the edge that your real professional reputation is formed.
Many see things as they are, entrepreneurs see things as they could be. An entrepreneur is the difference between getting things done and making things happen. They see the next big thing and are on the edge, where the interaction takes place and things happen. It is also here that your real professional reputation is formed.
On the edge is where the passion is and where change happens. As Tom Peters puts it: “Excellence is not an ambition, it’s the next five minutes“. Here, you find the passion to deliver something really, really good.
In the global market, you can’t afford not to take every possibility to find the things that is unique and give you competitive advantages. The price for not taking advantage of your professional reputation is very high
You are not a brand – you are a person with a professional reputation
Seth Godin, the marketing icon, recently expressed something that I totally agree upon when it comes to personal branding. He said: ”You are not a brand, you are a person with a professional reputation.” Your brand or your name is simply your reputation.
Your professional reputation is your most valuable asset. It’s important however to realize that it is not what you say about yourself, but what others say about you. It can be analyzed and it can be developed and is a process that opens up so many possibilities in whatever direction you are heading. You will not achieve anything memorable unless it is valued by others.
The point is that you will absolutely need trustworthy feedback about your professional reputation – trying to figure it all out on your own is close to impossible.
The key to be Top of Mind is your potential
Your potential to solve your clients problems and add substantial value is always No 1 when we are chosen for an important assignment or project. The main question is – how can you in a trustworthy way introduce your potential to important customers.
In order to market your potential in the best possible way you should divide it into two different parts.
Your professional reputation. This is how your potential is perceived by your clients, colleagues and your professional surroundings. It is your perceived expertise, strengths and unique qualities. The truth is always in the eyes of the beholder. There is no way to put a price on your professional reputation, it´s value to you is absolutely priceless. Surprisingly few are aware of the content of their professional reputation, which opens up great possibilities.
Your ambition. Your talents and experiences are of course valuable, but it is your ambition that takes you all the way. An important part of your potential is what you really want to accomplish for your customer, what results you want to create within the next six months to a year?
Your potential is without any doubt the key factor to be Top of Mind – to be the person that your client first will think of and choose.
Your reputation is your resumé
Your reputation is your resumé was the interesting headline in a Business report from MIT Technology Review recently. Your professional reputation has come into focus in every corner of your business and work-life.
Your professional reputation is without any doubt your greatest asset and when you have analyzed it, it will open up completely new perspectives in your business and in your job, and the profit will be substantial. Individual reputation is already a dominant factor today. Richard Branson puts it like this in an interview: “Your brand or your name is simply your reputation, you have to fight in life to protect that as it means everything. Nothing is more important.”
Today it is crucial that you should not promote yourself by historical facts. Your professional reputation is a very useful tool since it includes your perceived expertise, your strengths and unique qualities. Combine this with your ambition – what you want to accomplish in the future and it will be an almost magical marketing tool.
90% of the decisions about you are made when you are not present
90 percent of the decisions about you are made when you are not present – the only thing present is your professional reputation.
These are the moments when your customers discuss if they will offer you that exciting project or job, or when they consider you for new possibilities within the company. These are the moments when you are valued – all these decisive moments in your career and in your business life.
The important question is: Do you want to take control or take your chances – do you know every part of your professional reputation – the things that decide?
You will either be valued or you will be ignored and you will never obtain anything memorable if it is not valued by others. It is others that hire you, market you, spread your message or applauds you.
