Personal Branding: Leveraging our Strenghts

Today I was privileged to attend the annual business meeting of the African American group in the company that I am doing my internship program. The theme was "Partnering for success: Unleashing the Leader inside you." The guest speaker was Lethia Owens and her presentation was dynamic, engaging and filled with food for thought. As part of her presentation she had us watch a video presentation by Mark (I’m sorry I don’t remember is last name) but he comes from the Gallup school of thought. His video presentation was about three (3) myths that we have that hinder us from achieving success, I will discuss my paraphrased version of the myths.

1. As you grow you change: Before you start deciding whether you agree with this or not, let me clarify a few things. This is base on the philosophy that we have some core things that make us who we are. When we grow we refine these core things. Even if we adjust to fit situations the core things never really change. One of the participants compared it with an oak tree; even though the tree grows gets more branches, larger roots etc it still has the characteristics that make it an oak tree.
2. You learn/grow the most in the areas that you are weakest: Mark did a survey and asked parents if their child came home with grade 'A' in English and a 'F' in Biology which subject would they pay the most attention to…and most parents said biology. However, he posits that we will grow the most in the areas that we are strongest. He is not saying that we should not try to work around our weaknesses but we should focus on our strengths.
3. What the team needs is for us to put aside our strengths to make the team successful. You may not find a job that utilizes all your strengths but we should aim to utilize 80% of our strengths. We should find avenues where our strengths can be utilized and volunteer our strengths.
   

Lethia made a very important point she said sometimes what we think of ourselves is not necessarily the perception that people have of us. Therefore, we need to be aware of our personal branding. We need to make sure that our motto and our delivery are congruent.

• What are your views about the myths?
• What are some of the ways to manage personal branding and still be your true self?
• How do you leverage your strengths?
• How about re-branding?