Borderless Executive Live: The Podcast

Career Transition: What’s your brand? Do you stand out?

December 02, 2020 Borderless Executive Search & Leadership Advisory Season 1 Episode 9
Borderless Executive Live: The Podcast
Career Transition: What’s your brand? Do you stand out?
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Building a personal brand strategy for CEOs and ambitious executives, and the importance of personal branding and storytelling; the focus of this session in association with Anthony Harling of Not Actively Looking in conversation with Els De Cremer and Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi of Borderless.

Anthony Harling:

Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to the latest from borderless live in conjunction with not actively looking. My name is Anthony Harling, we're here talking about Who are you? When is it time to move on. So we're tackling the topic of personal branding and personal branding in relation to career transition. Thank you very much for joining us. What we're going to do today is I'll give a brief introduction to myself into not actively looking. And I'll ask my my two fellow panelists here Els De Cremer, and the Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi , I'll ask them to introduce themselves as well. Then we're going to ask her a number of questions. during the session, if you'd like to comment, or if you'd like to ask us any questions, please use the q&a function at the bottom of your screen. If you type in your question there, then we'll be able to read your question. And as moderator, I'll try and direct that at the most appropriate person. And anyway, we hope you enjoyed the session, what we're going to do at the end of is going to send you a link. So you can find out a little bit more about Borderless Executive Search, and a bit more about Not Actively Looking. So just very briefly in terms of myself and our background. So I'm a founder director of Not Actively Looking, Not Actively Looking is a career management platform for senior executives. So really, we do two things. One is we run a number of events like this on behalf of various executives covering different topics related to career management. And today we're working with Borderless Live. The other thing we do is we allow executives to store their confidential information and share that on a selective basis with a number of top level executive search firms such as borderless. So we have over 200 affiliated firms on our platform. If you'd like to find out more about not actively looking, you'll find that on the link that we're going to send you at the end of the session. So very briefly to myself, I have a background in Executive Search. I've been in the industry for 30 years, I spent 13 years with Heidrick and struggles one of the big international companies. And during that time, I calculated that I've done about 15 to 20,000 Executive interviews. And today I'm a founder and director and not actively looking. So if you want to get in touch with me or connect, you can do so via LinkedIn. Happy to connect with people. So without further ado, let me introduce my colleagues as tecoma. else would you like to tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do at Borderless?

Els De Cremer:

Thank you, Anthony. And for all of you who joined us today, a warm welcome. My name is Els De Cremer. I'm the co founder of Borderless Executive Search. And Borderless Executive Search is a global executive search and leadership consulting firm. We primarily deal with clients who are in the chemical value chain in life sciences and food and drinks. As to myself my my background prior to founding, Borderless Executive Search lies in the chemical industry, where I held low roles in HR and in business management.

Anthony Harling:

Super, thank you very much. Renu, please tell us a little bit about your background, which is a bit different from ours.

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

Good afternoon, everyone and thank you for the opportunity to be here. My name is Renu Hannigan. I have spent close to two decades of my life with essays calls and embarrassing Hotel Group primarily luxury lifestyle segment. Working on brand creation brand launches, go to market strategies with having see your reputation at the core of everything that we did in the business, establishing it as a responsible business. So some of my recognizable work as you may have heard of it is creating the Radisson Blu and taking it to the market. Radisson red is one of my babies. So I'm very, very privileged to be here today. But also to have joined borderless team literally a month ago to expand my work in executive reputation co branding, working with key decision makers of our businesses to make an impact on the society. Thank you for the opportunity to be here.

Anthony Harling:

Super, thank you very much. Okay, what I'm going to do now is I'm going to stop sharing slides and have an opportunity now to talk a little bit about what we're doing. So if you'd like to put it on gallery view then you can see all of the all of the speakers here today. So the first question which I want to really address to both of you, I guess I'll start with you. And I know what is what is a personal brand. What do we mean by personal brand?

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

So enter this is Anthony. There's a lot of conversations already on personal branding and everybody has their own interpretation of it for me. It's It's our ability and courage as leader to make an impact on people. In my experience of working in hospitality and lifestyle sector, I've been privileged enough to work with some great leaders who have used personal branding as a moral compass, to define, you know, the kind of leadership they want to establish the kind of leadership and culture they want to create in the companies and it has followed them, quite possibly unconsciously, because they were very aware of it. Now, that moral compass needs to start at a very early stage in your career when you start to define or frame or mold your personal brand. In many conversations I have with as I always say, personal brand isn't something tangible, it's it's deep rooted in who you are, how you need, and how you make your people think. And people are not just your employees, but everybody that you come in contact with success, essentially about your capability of making an impact and making your mark. At the end of the day, it's all about how you tell your story, right? Everybody has has a story, I believe it's their ability, and also their confidence to be able to step out of it and be part of a public debate. And once again, I come back to the courage and the confidence, but also, the deep rooted DNA of Am I able to walk the talk and defend what I stand for. the kind of work that I'm doing with borderless is a good reflection of how we see personal branding, helping chief executive officer who we I personally believe, isn't just about, you know, today, leaders are not just supposed to do their job, they're supposed to stand for something bigger than that, especially when you're in a top job, my chief executive officer, in more times than one I often call the CEO, a Chief Innovation Officer, they need to elevate the business, they need to elevate their people, and they need to elevate the society. So there's a lot of responsibility. And I think the role, and the picture that we call the CEO is changing, because it has a lot more expectations from the society. That's my personal branding, or let's call it reputation plays a very, very important role in how you shape your career, and be in control of it. So to maybe summarize, it's about managing perceptions, because we know perceptions are reality, especially when you're going through a career transition, especially an executive transition. Most of the time, once again, coming back to the new leadership, the new ways of working the new norms, this societal transformation we are going through, people are looking for different kinds of skill sets. It's easy to find candidates who fit the profile of doing the job. But what makes you that what gives you that extra edge which will make you stand out of the crowd. It's in a nutshell, brand reputation and executive reputation for me is managing people, managing perceptions, processes, but also managing the person managing yourself, what you stand for what you believe in. Is your messaging consistent? Do you wake up in the morning, look at yourself and you say I'm on the right track? That's what essentially it is.

Anthony Harling:

Okay, else I think Jeff Bezos famously said that your personal brand is what people say about you when you're not in the room. And I think for for executives that you and I meet in the course of our executive search work, that's obviously very true. How do you see personal branding when it relates to the executive careers?

Els De Cremer:

Well, you know, if you look at personal branding, and really look at why it is important, or why it should be important, it is. As Rino said, it tells a story and it tells as an executive, it tells your unique story, what makes you different, it's a little bit your USP, you know what makes you stand out from the crowd. If you look at the times we live in, everything becomes very transparent. We live in a digitized world. And I think the current crisis that we're living through, is only going to make that more visible and more transparent. So leadership, good and bad, is becoming extremely visible. A personal brand is actually a vehicle for telling for telling your story. It's a vehicle that tells your story. I don't think there is a personal brand without authenticity. For me, it's a key word, authentic. It's not about creating a nice image for yourself. smoke and mirrors, it has to relate to who you are, what you stand for, what are your values and of course, over time, that there's an evolution in that when you're 50. You're not the same person, hopefully then when you were 20. I mean, the poor will be there. But we go through a lot of evolution, we see different situations. I always like to take the example of Jim fiddling, I don't know whether you know everybody in the audience will know him. But Jim is the current CEO of Dow Chemical. And dow is close to my heart because I did my early career in the company. And Jim became the CEO in 2018. But before he became CEO, when he was rising in the ranks of dow, in 2014, he used the National Coming Out Day in the US to make public very public that he was gay. And, you know, we might all say, so what, but in the chemical industry at that level, you know, chemical industry is reasonably conservative. At that level, you know, that was reasonably unique. He has created that personal story that is extremely authentic, because it's linked to who he is. And he's expanded from there. And he's driving the message, not only the message, but also the action of diversity and inclusion and equality. So if you see him speak, if you hear him speak, you will always hear some message about diversity, inclusion and equality coming out. And it has reaped a lot of benefits not only for Jim fiddling, because he has his story is USB, but also for dow, because dow has received already rewards on being you know, a just place to work a good place to work. And that spins off in terms of the type of talent that you can attract. It also has an influence on how do you do business? How do you How are you in the market. So it has a real ripple effect into everything you do in in the business. And I think it's a great example on how a personal brand is linked to authenticity, and it needs to be otherwise it's, you know, it's hollow, and you're caught out immediately. It's it's smoke and mirrors. The other thing I think that makes it important when you stand out as a leader is that when I use a marketing term, it creates a pool for yourself. Yeah. Which is and we'll talk later a little bit about transitioning and you know, why is it important in transitioning times. But if you create a pool for yourself, you you send out the message, this is what I stand for in terms of my capabilities, but also my values. And I think that was a good example, when Solvay, when the board of survey went out into the market to recruit their new CEO, they had a clear mission, they wanted to actually redesign Soviet as a company, making it more modern and a lot more customer centric, which, you know, in the chemical industry is not always easy to do because you're in a real b2b pattern. And they attracted Ilan cadre, Ilan was at that time at diversity, and had actively done a great job in building her personal brand. She's completely different from the mold when you hear her story from her Moroccan roots. She's completely different. He is female, and also from an ethnicity she's you know, and the hurdles that she had to overcome. It's a great story to listen to. And she had a diversity already built that story of being able to not only be customer centric, yeah, but also make sure that you interact with all stakeholders. Yeah, so it's not only customers and employees and shareholders, but also the wider community, also suppliers. And so she created an intimacy that was helpful mark. And by choosing her Yeah, he created the pool for herself. But by choosing her Solvay gave a great message into the market saying, we mean business. You know, when we say we want to transform, we mean business. And, you know, the CEO actually personifies that. Of course, at that time, the hard work starts Yes. Because you always have to live up to the personal brand that you have, and the more shiny your personal brand is, the more pressure is on you to perform very well.

Anthony Harling:

Is it? There's a good question here, actually, which one of our audience asked which is, I assume we're referring to all senior executives, not just to CEOs, which I think goes without saying, I would say for me, the personal brand is really the it's the foundation of who you are. And I think the personal brand starts really at quite an early stage. And the earlier in your career that you can start to develop consciousness around your personal brand, the better because that's going to help you direct your career in a certain way. And it's also going to help influence how others other people see you. Yeah. So if you position your personal brand, as a, an HR leader or as procurement leader, or whatever it may be, your personal brand is ended. You are who you are externally to the marketplace. And the stronger your brand, the more effectively you can leverage that brand in terms of managing your career.

Els De Cremer:

Yeah. And just to pick up on that question, if I may, Anthony, it's, for me, it's also not just for people in leadership. Leadership has different forms. So it's not only leading people in organization, but it could also be a thought leader.

Anthony Harling:

Absolutely. Yeah.

Els De Cremer:

Yeah. And Reno and I had that discussion. You know, you see that in daily life that, for instance, actors are great examples. writers are great. People in the arts, you know, they have publicists working for them, and they create that brand, that persona for the individual. For me, that's the same for somebody who has 25 years of polymer experience. Yeah,

Anthony Harling:

I think I think your personal brand can start at a very at a very early stage stage, very early stage. And I think the earlier you start to work on that on developing that brand better, because it's part of your career story. And I know career story is something you know, that you're very keen on, and curse a little bit about, why? Why is that the personal brand, so important, because for those of us who've worked in executive search for a while, like Ellison myself, we kind of understand that it's it is an intrinsic part of your kind of career management strategy. But why is personal branding important? Why do you see that as being important?

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

It's, it's a, it's a very, it's a very detailed question, Anthony. I think deep down, we know why it's important. And coming back to what else said, right, and quoting Jeff Bezos, you make your reputation by doing hard things. Well, he said that too. So when you come into a role of value, where your decisions matters to people, your employees, society, stakeholders, you know, anybody that you come in touch with, personal branding becomes important. And I'm often inclined to rethink, you know, the phrase personal branding, because it sounds very egoistic. That's not what it is. It's about helping you once again, coming back to that moral compass thing. Anthony is to keep you on track as a person, because there are so many distractions, and there are so many issues that you need to deal with. When you're a decision maker. It's important because you want to stay relevant. You may or may not want to have another job. But maybe you want to become a writer, maybe you want to start your own company. Maybe you want to write a book, maybe you want to become a coach, maybe I don't know, just just somebody sitting on the beach sipping cocktails. The fundamental question is, do you like what you see when you wake up next to you, frankly? Yeah, that's the personal branding. And it's not only about the professional aspect of it, but as a human being, have you touched anybody's life? Have you made an impact? Have you helped people along their journey to go? In my experience? Also, Anthony, I think a lot of people, a lot of leaders, senior leaders also don't manage their succession planning very well, because they're very comfortable. And they sort of say, yeah, I'm good here. And I don't think anybody else can do my job better than than me that personal branding helps you to ask those good questions. And I think else is going to talk a little bit later about feedback, you know, not just the 360 degree review, but just having the ability to listen to people, and to hire the right people to work with you who can challenge you who can, who can test your ability to make sound decisions, who can be there for you, when there is a challenge when you know, people, and not just your internal people, but external audience, take media influencers, key opinion makers, who are all a part of your journey, and that branding, they can be a very good ally, when you're in crisis.

Anthony Harling:

I think also, what we were saying earlier else is that it's not just at the CEO level that personal branding kicks in, I think it's very much it's going to be the guiding light of your career. And, you know, in terms of why why it's important, or else it strikes me that, you know, there are, I think 10 million senior executives in the world. You know, there are over 700 million profiles on LinkedIn. So the personal branding is based very much on being a very clear, very crisp definition of who you are. And as you say, it has to be very authentic, doesn't it? But I think if you're going to get noticed, if you're going to stand out from those 700 million people on LinkedIn, you've got to have a personal brand that is you haven't you?

Els De Cremer:

Yes. In part is self serving, especially in times of transition, it will serve you. I'm often amazed that in our jobs when I talk to senior executives that are at the point of transition, and especially transition that is not planned. A lot of them are helpless and I can't call in another term than that because they're focused hasn't been on the job in the company is often inward looking. And they are no longer in the habit of how do I look for a next opportunity? What is my next opportunity? And if they're at the age range where there is a next CEO job or a next high level profile job there for them, they're often quite helpless. And, you know, it ties into a little bit too. When do you start with with a personal brand?

Anthony Harling:

It's a great because it's a great question. I think one audience is asking about, you know, how do I go about building my personal brand?

Els De Cremer:

Yeah, I see, I see it as a constant evolution, actually, it's a constant evolution into a better form of yourself. Yeah. And it's never ending. It's also never static. When you start your career is very much about learning. Yeah. And you always involve others in that learning, you're never on an island, involving your boss, your colleagues, if you're lucky, in an organization, you will be provided with a mentor. And it's always a feedback loop. Yeah. And, and feedback is what it will be for the rest of your life. When you go a little bit further down the line in your career, it's about applying and starting to manage. And also there, you will look for feedback. I mean, companies have things like 360 degree feedback, feedback is very, very valuable in in making sure that you fine tune that personal brand. And let it evolve. No, nobody is said at the beginning, nobody is the same. So 25. And then later on in your career, it's all about leading and envisioning. Yeah, it's vision. And I think how you establish it, and who do you use over that transitioning in your career is what makes the difference. At the beginning, you will rely on the people around you, as soon as you create more impact not only on the company, but on the wider ecosystem where your company operates in, you will rely on different types of professional advice,

Anthony Harling:

a lot of a lot, a lot of different ways in which people can build their personal brand. And of course, it depends what function you're in. It depends at what level you're operating. But the personal brand often starts very, very early on. And it seems to me that one of the first things is you need to be aware of your personal brand. You need to be aware about how what is my career story? What is the what is the main theme of who I am. I remember in the UK, we had some television advertising, which started 40 years ago for Audi. And they use the words for strong Deutsch technique. And they still use the same phrase to

Unknown:

use it, I think

Anthony Harling:

it's very, very powerful. Because when you drive an Audi car, and I have an Audi car, which has 127,000 miles on it, you know, but you know, it's a strong engineering car. It's good. It's a good technology. So I think it's kind of like in terms of how you develop your personal brand. What kind of advice can we give people about? How do they develop that brand? I know, for me, the first thing is you need to sort of be aware of what is your personal brand, because you've got to get that impartial feedback from other people that will help you to understand your own brand, clearly.

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

And through the personal brand. And Elsa has said it, quite rightly, it's not a status quo. It's not a given state or a stamp that you put on yourself, I stand for that. It's it's part of your evolution as a professional, but also as a person. And I think that feedback loop is so critical. It's also if the advice I can give to the audience today is if you are in that in any role, where you have interactions with the wider ecosystem. You know, as the Lai Lama says, I'm a Buddhist, Anthony, he says, if you're only talking, you're repeating what you already know. But if you listening, you learn something new. That's a very important process and an element of growing as a leader, make sure you're surrounded by people who give you that feedback, because that helps you shape up your brand as you go along. And that ecosystem of feedback doesn't necessarily all have to come from the internal people or you know, people who agree with you find the chapters in your ecosystem, find people who have a tendency to disagree with you, who who don't like what they see, frankly, Anthony, who can be a good catalyst to you to say, this is something I really need to you may disagree with that person. You have to think that you will think about and say, that's something I really need to see I'm very good at doing my job. But how do I make people feel right? The famous phrase, people don't remember what you did, people don't remember what you said, People remember how you made them feel that that's essentially how you shape up your brand in terms of roadmap to build Brian, yes, get your story. Everybody has a story, write it down, write it down, tweak it, add stuff to it, get external people to review it, and keep shaping it up. And sorry. And then go ahead,

Anthony Harling:

say develop your story. I met at the very, very beginning of my career, I met a young man called Philip. And Philip had left school at 16. And he'd later worked on in a factory on a production line, he went to night school, and he learned some computer programming. And he came to meet me for a job interview. And he told me, this is my first time stepping outside of Yorkshire when he came to meet me, but he had this big smile on his face. And he'd worked very hard to get some qualifications. Anyway, I remember this story 30 years later, because it's very impactful story, it was something about him and his ability to lift himself out and work hard. And we're still in touch today on LinkedIn, 35 years later. And he rose to be the top CIO for a big insurance company in Canada. So he's done fantastically well. But I think somebody is asking a question here about mentors, and how to find mentors. And I think mentors can play a key role in in developing your personal brand. Because similarly to your your line about speaking and listening, God gave us one mouth and two ears, and we should probably use them in that proportion. So if you can find a great mentor, that will help you to discover your brand, and it will help you to develop your brand, I think. And so the question I wanted to ask else is, how do we find great mentors? This is coming from one of our audience members. And my own observation is that, you know, great mentors and put themselves forward, you have to go and find them, but that they do stand out. Else, do you have any thoughts about how people can? can find great mentors?

Els De Cremer:

Um, yeah, I mean, from my background in in the chemical world, I've, I've seen a lot of programs that kind of insisted, of matching people with mentors, and I've seen it, unfortunately, I've seen it fail more, more than I've seen it work, because of the forced nature of it. I think it as you will rightfully say it has to come from yourself. There's a lot of people that will not actively promote themselves as a mentoring and organization. But that definitely when asked and prompted will act like one. Yeah. And I think coming back to what was said earlier, as you progress through your career, you will have the time and sometimes also the budget to make that more professional to reach out to, to professionals to coaches, who can help you overcome some of the hurdles that you face in order to develop as a person and as a professional. If I may, Anthony, I see a lot of I'm glancing actually other all the questions that are coming in,

Anthony Harling:

well feel free, oh my god.

Els De Cremer:

I see a lot of questions that deal with, you know, how do you go about it. And I would actually like to turn to give the mic back to Reena. Because I think she can inform quite a lot of the attendees about, you know, what actually do you do when you want to build a personal brand? What is this about? What's a good starting point? Yeah,

Anthony Harling:

that's a good starting point. Hello,

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

I think Anthony, you know, to continue finding that story. Frankly, purpose is an overused word right now that your purpose as a professional and as a person. And if you have the ability to combine the two from a very early stage in your career, you're able to stay on track. Because then you It also helps you think these are the things I don't want to do, which are important than knowing things that you want to do. In terms of, you know, it's a it's not rocket science, building a brand. It's just understanding who you are as a person. Get your story, right. Engagement internally is an important one, I always say to ELS and also to our clients that we work together, they need to start building their brand from inside out. When they enroll in a position. It's important that internally, people understand who you are and what you're trying to do. I think a lot of again, coming back to the executive transitions. I've seen it also in my life, Anthony, a lot of CEOs come in and I don't want to use the word CEOs, but any sort of Chief decision maker would come in and they feel this innate need to change everything. Yes, because they want to make their mark. I mean, that's not necessary. It's important to understand the existing culture in you know, what sticks with people, what makes people upset. We also often have the discussion, you know, when you leave an organization and are people going to jump out of joy and throw a party, thank God or are they going to say what a loss for us and I'm really going to miss him or her and then coming back again, to your point, how do you find a mentor? If you have built if you made the impact on the lives of other people, you know, in an emotional way or a professional way, they will seek you out as a mentor, they would want you to coach them. Because you have changed the life of so many people, I've been privileged enough to work with great leaders who have. And I'm not saying they consciously build their personal brand, but because they lead, they lead by their actions, right, and they spike their actions spoke louder than the words they are today, you know, highly desired as mentors as speakers as a thought leaders as sort of coming in and shaping the strategy of a company. That's where you start get the internal buying. And then of course, the most more sophisticated phase probably is the external visibility or the external profiling, which is when we start to do some serious work with, with media with key opinion leaders with, you know, thought leadership platforms like Fortune Magazine, Forbes magazine, Financial Times Harvard Business Review, that it becomes a bit more sophisticated. And coming back to Alex's point, that's when you not need to sort of allocate that that's why you need to take it seriously, probably, and you get experts like me, to help you out. Or you get experts within your team who can help you out? Yeah, your, your communications department is highly skilled. To do this, all you have to do is ask and integrate it into this doesn't need to be a standalone activity. And to me, it needs to be embedded into the holistic reputation strategy of the entire company and the brand. You took the example of Audi go back and take the example of World War II was one of those, you know, sort of being phased out and not attractive and just losing the battle. They had just come in and reinvented themselves and position themselves as a company, which stands for one thing, and one thing only that safety.

Anthony Harling:

Yeah. Yeah, that's right. I think I think I think the, you know, the point about the personal brand, I think there's two things which are linked here, which is, one is why is it important, and the other is how you develop it. And I think, you know, for for us in the executive search world, we meet so many people, and meet so many people, you know, if I've met somewhere between 15,020 1000 people, why do I remember Philip Armstrong? Well, why is it important? Why is it important? Because the next time I'm looking for someone like that, I'm gonna call you. And it's really important. So because what we do in our job else is we call people, don't we? And I will call you out. And I'll say else, do you know somebody who could do this job? You know, somebody who looks and feels like this? And you would say, oh, Anthony, I've got a great person for you. This lady here. She's fantastic. And that's because the brand has left an impression on you. And that's, I think, why it's important. And I think the first step for me in brand building is all about, understand what people see in you.

Els De Cremer:

Yeah, absolutely. But I would hate the audience to think that this is all about charisma. No, because you have people who are born with a natural charisma and who don't need, you know, too many professionals around them to to create that personal brand. For me, it's really a connection with authenticity. Yeah. And, and boring. I'm now using a judgment could can be authentic to as long as there is a message in it. Yeah. Why? Boring can be a judgment for stability for instant for being grounded, you know, for doing the right things at the right time. So it has nothing to do, I think not necessarily something to do with charisma. It's its authenticity. And it's also consistency. Yeah, those are two key in two key factors in what it takes to create a personal brand.

Anthony Harling:

And so in terms of how we how we begin with personal branding, in general, you know, at what stage, you know, because I think it's something people are not really sure. Is it just the CEO level? Or should I start building my personal brand, but I'm in my 20s, or my 30s? I guess it doesn't really matter, does it? You know, if you, if you're if you're open and you're listening, and you're talking to people, then you start to develop your brand.

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

I think the simplest question to ask Anthony is by actively building your brand and being visible. Are you helping the business you're in? Yeah. Are you helping the people you're leading? And are you helping your own career planning, if you're serious about your career planning, I think you will see the value in it. I also often see and meet a lot of executives, let's not call them see you but the leaders they they're active here, they will say something on LinkedIn. Then they have this odd of post or a video which shows up on YouTube. And then they have a memo which is going out there. That's not personal branding strategy. That's just a tactical communication activity. And I come back to that strategic narrative and you can do that work for yourself, or all of the sort of people on the audience, start with yourself to ask that simple question is my narrative, what I share how I share it, where I speak, how I speak, how often I speak, is it helping the business that I'm leading, everybody who's working for a company or is in a job is responsible for driving the business, it's not just the chief executive officer, know, if you're helping build that reputation of the brand, you can start as simple as just endorsing what the company is doing, you know, expressing your, your pride, expressing your support and expressing you know, how you contribute into it, it really is coming back to elses point authenticity, it needs to be you. And that's, that's the hardest part of being a professional like me, you need to create a brand that's, that's truly about the person. And it's not just some imposter that they're creating or a character. And, you know, it's basic things really, continuously consistency and clarity is important. What are you communicating? And will it have an impact on your audience? Or are you just randomly sharing posts for the sake of doing it? I mean, is behind it. As long as you understand that, and I think, again, like everything else, Anthony, you get perfect at it by practicing. So the more you do it, the more you feel comfortable with it, the more you see people are engaging with you conversation, what you cannot do is just one off here and there and get to it, you have to stay committed to it.

Anthony Harling:

Yeah, but one of the things else that I always notice in executive search is, whenever we do a search, one of the key criteria is always the same. And that's authenticity. We're looking for people who are authentic, we're looking for people who know themselves who have that self awareness. So one of our questioners Andrew, I think it is is asking, you know, should a personal brand be a list of items? And and how do you promote that? I don't think personal brand is a list of items, is it you know, when we when we're recruiting people personal brand is, is much more holistic, isn't it? It can be as somebody who's just good at finance, or or good at procurement or, or good at HR, they don't need to be charismatic, do they

Els De Cremer:

know. So it's a full story. It's a full story. And it's not a list. Of course, there are some key elements in that story. And those key elements will be the anchor for promoting that story or making that story visible, internally and externally. Yeah, you will take those anchors forward. But it's certainly not a list of items. And there's some variation over time. So you need to be flexible about, you know, how do you look at it and and readdress that. I think what we've seen in terms of personal branding, especially with senior leaders is that often the help internally is lacking. There are they have great professionals, that a system in communication, both internal and external, public affairs, all of that, but they work for the corporate brand. And they and often you see that they fail to attach the story of the CEO to that brand. Yeah. And it's actually not so difficult to do, but it's often missed. And that's why I think, CEOs or others in leadership, look for external help to do that, very much like a publicist does that you work one on one with somebody that you can trust, that understands your story can bring the nuance delphinus and can promote, you know, help you to promote who you are both internally and externally for the right reasons, at the end, always for business success, you know, not for personal glory. If it's only for personal Crawley, you're going down the slippery slope of end up in arrogance, and you know, you know, that kind of arena, which will not pay dividends for you.

Anthony Harling:

It is about managing your career, because I think at the end of the day, you know, if you are proactive in managing your career, then at least somebody is doing it. Because the reality is if you don't manage your career yourself, nobody's going to do it for you.

Els De Cremer:

Absolutely. control of your career that is important. And it's gonna be a vehicle that helps you do that.

Anthony Harling:

It's got a fundamental, I think, isn't it else in terms of how you how you build your career is based on having a really solid understanding of who you are, and how other people see you. What about this, the idea of the word legacy, we talked a bit beforehand about the word legacy and that, you know, being talked about in leadership, but actually legacy can apply to people at any level in the organization content. You see, Elsa legacy is a really key part of the personal brand and how people develop that reputation.

Els De Cremer:

Yeah, it definitely is. I'm gonna throw it back. To renew because I know she has a

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

lot to say about legacy. We had, you know, while preparing for this session, and we had a very interesting conversation with one of our clients, and if I can just quote this person, when we talked about legacy, this person said, Yep, I don't have any children, what is. And I said, it's not, I genuinely believe, Anthony that your story can impact somebody's life. Yes, good story. Also, if it's really bad story, because it can impact the life of a person in a very meaningful and spiritual way to say, I never want to be like that. Never. Especially when you are in a prominent public role of representing a business or a promise or a brand. You have this privileged position to be able to influence the lives of young people, people who wouldn't otherwise have the courage people who have inferiority complexes, you know, people who wouldn't stand up or have the courage to sort of say, Yeah, I can dream about that next level, in my mind. I mean, I've had that session, also a lot of times with with women who don't tend to not all of them, the world is changing. So I want to be careful what I say, but who don't dare to dream big, because they'd like I'm happy here. I don't like what I see there. I'm just going to stay in. So it's, it's legacy for me is once again, coming back to what will you be when you are not a leader? When it's all over? What will you be when you walk out of the room? What will people say about you? Now, you may say, I don't care, you know, I'm retired, I'm just going to sip cocktails on the on the on the beach, or I don't know do gardening. People will come up to you and say, you know, you've had such a high flying career elss is a very good example. People come to her for advice, there is a reason I have chosen to work with borderless, yes, out of my you know, sort of choice of of different companies, is because there is this legacy that that both Andrew and Elsa have built of working with leaders who have a personal purpose. So I think more and more people are making the new world for forces making conscious choices about how they want to work, but also who they want to work for Anthony. Yeah. And then the question comes back to who personal branding becomes really important, your legacy becomes really important. Once the crown is Oh, who will you be? Right? when people call you and say, What can I do for you?

Anthony Harling:

I guess we all we all have great memories of some fantastic colleagues, which we worked with in the past, not necessarily the the leaders of those organizations, but some fantastic colleagues that we work with.

Els De Cremer:

And you you never forget them. You never forget them. And you know, if I go back to the example that I shared about Jim and Ilan, I think they are creating their own legacy. And if it's done with business success, as a result, you know, that will tell their story in there will be at a point where they don't need to tell it themselves anymore. Their legacy. And people around them who knows who know what they stood for will tell their story

Anthony Harling:

is that there's another very good question here from one of our one of our listeners here is asking about, you know, is rather than just asking people about what, what they see of me, how can I How can I understand his How can they understand, properly check what his personal brand is, without being affected by his own preconceptions rendered, you want to try and answer that

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

interesting question, rather intertwined. Question

Anthony Harling:

is, is that as part of sort of the function of people like you? No, it's just that,

Unknown:

you know, when

Anthony Harling:

we when we work with executives, and we, we help them we go through a process and we help them really understand the personal branding issues.

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

I think that again, coming back to the feedback loop, having that that ecosystem of people who can give you that continuous feedback, not not on your annual reviews and everything, but who can just continuously give you that feedback of what you're doing good, what you're not doing? Not doing good, but what can you improve? And, you know, I think that's where coaches and mentors can play an incredibly important part in your career development. Because they're there on the journey video, they keep flagging, you know, points of improvement, I call it. If I can use the analogy of one of my former bosses, he was a mountaineer. And you know, he, he often talked about the base camp. He says, You need to lay the foundations on the base camp, to plan your journey and celebrate each summit. But make sure that you have checkpoints on eat solid.

Unknown:

Yeah, right. are good. Are

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

you are you are you going up first or are you going to a completely different mountain is incredibly important.

Anthony Harling:

The important The bottom line is that There are external coaches like yourself that people can work with on there who can do that? And there's a question here from, from Paul, and it's one I want to direct to you else. As you interview senior executives, do you recognize personal brand very quickly? And what are the characteristics of a strong brand? When you recognize early in the process?

Els De Cremer:

Yeah, we work. I mean, we don't always work with people who have a high public profile, we work with a whole variety of people. But I saw personal brand is not always visible as such, what what is visible is what it connects to. So the authenticity and the consistency, and that is very easy to, to, to judge in, in interviews, it's very easy to recognize in interviews, because the stories they will tell of what they have done, but more importantly, about how they've done things. There will be a line of consistency and authenticity, and everybody is different. So there's no, there's no really right or wrong. Of course, there are boundaries to you know how to do things. But it's what makes you unique in how you've done it and the story they could that you can tell about that. In terms of actually, what have you achieved? Where what was the situation? How did I approach the situation? And what was the result? If you can talk in a meaningful way, and there's good consistency and reflection, constant reflection on who were Who am I? How am I doing things? How can I improve people who who are open to that and are open to new challenges for that same reason, they are very, very easy to, to, to pick up from the crowd, very easy to do.

Anthony Harling:

I think the you know, what I what I come across is, you know, when I'm doing these interviews, I do find people who've got very strong personal brand. And the strong personal brand, for me is a bit like the Audi brand. Very clear. It's very crisp. And it's very distinctive. Yeah, so I can describe it very quickly. So I met somebody called Justin Penny is a procurement leader, operations leader in industrial b2b. And he has a track record of fixing operations, and then turning companies around so that they can progress. And he's got a very clear brand, because you can see the track record of what he's done is a very clear theme of how he's done it. And he's very, as you said, very authentic, and very consistent. So I think that authenticity and consistency are kind of the key words that you've identified there else.

Els De Cremer:

Yeah. And it's not about ego, by the way, I see a lot of personal ego, you know, and a lot of be big egos. But that's very, very different from having a personal brand. You are very different from each other.

Anthony Harling:

Yeah. And I think personal brand, a big ego. I mean, that's not a good brand. If you have a big ego, it's not a good brand to have is it?

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

No, Anthony, we in, in sort of corporate communications and reputation word, world, we use a terminology called elevator pitch. Right? So if you get this 30 seconds in an elevator with, say, George Clooney, and he asks you what do you do? Yeah. Hey, I'm comms person. It's it's, it's getting your elevator elevator pitch, right, but also then having this substance to prove it. And that substance comes with the career planning, right? And Alex is absolutely right. It's not about it's not about you, personally, wisely. It is about you personally, but it's about the, again, the impact you're willing to make. And you are, you're able to be on the business and on the wider world. I keep saying it, also to our clients. And you know, with the team, a lot of CEOs or executives today are so busy doing their job, they forget the importance of connecting with their people, especially in a world of zoom life that we're living in. It's so easy to get isolated and to not interact with your team. And I think that's such a missed opportunity for great leadership. Because digital makes it so accessible for us to be visible. Yeah. Often internally and externally, you know, pick up the phone call organize a meeting, even if it is just to say, Hey, guys, how you doing everything? Okay, you know, just to have a, I don't know, a cocktail hour online,

Anthony Harling:

whatever it may be, whatever it may be. Else. There's a question here from you from Joanne, how often do you come across executives who can't articulate their personal brand, I wanted to kind of turn it around a little bit because I think I remember certain executives that I've met, some of them very, very senior, some of them, kind of at the middle level, I would say. Some of them really stand out, because they have a very, very clear brand. And for me that the most enjoyable meetings are the people who have a very clear brand, regardless of level. So how often do you come across senior executives who cannot articulate a brand? What's your experience sales

Els De Cremer:

come in a test case is always a transition. And we see, you know, apart from interviewing people for specific roles we had boltless also do a lot of career development discussions with individuals. And I think we only have those conversations when there is thought of transition. Yeah, I'm not, you know, I'm not feeling okay, where I am, I have other aspirations, whatever it may be that triggers that. And I think at that time, you see how well developed somebody is in terms of their personal brand. And as a result, also the control they take over their career. And I must say, more often than not, that personal brand is not expressed, or it's not thought through or, you know, the soul searching starts at the moment of transition. Yeah. And it's late, when you have to start at the moment of transition, you are not in control. So it's, it's easier, as Renu also said, is to start early. And I liked one of the questions that I saw, you know, are younger people better at this now, than the ones that are helpers that are at the top sometimes, when they're in transition, I would say that it's going to be the journey, the same journey for everybody. But what I do see and really appreciate about the younger generation is that they are much more in touch with themselves at an early age. They are open to soul searching, they're open to feedback. And also when they take a stance, they take it and it's there's a rationale behind it. I love that about the younger generation that I see coming through.

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

And also willing to take more risks and right, much more open to trying things and you know, failing at it, failure is a big word, I think if you're quite far ahead in your career, and that's when you start your personal branding, you will always have that fear of failure, whereas the young generation would be like, you know what, okay, I made a mistake, I'm going to fix it or not fix it. But I'm just going to get out of it and explain myself a lot of, frankly, a lot of good actors do it in a responsible way. They don't be don't have all the answers, nobody does, it's bound to fail, they're human beings. Whereas the younger generation, I think, is much more acceptable, have their own failures and learning from it and moving on. Whereas maybe the slightly mature generation is a bit more reluctant to it. And that's why they also don't take personal branding very seriously. You know, I

Anthony Harling:

think people kind of do understand the importance of personal branding. And I come back to your two words, authenticity and consistency else. And I did a recruitment, quite recently for for a client, and we were looking for somebody who was head of HR operations. It's not a glamorous role. It's not a CEO role. It's not the C suite. But but it was a very, very important role in the organization. And it was a relatively young guy that we hired in the end. But, you know, I would say, personally, very good self awareness, very clear about what his role was in the organization, very clear about what his contribution had been in previous roles, and this clarity, and the consistency and the personal authenticity. For me, these were the sort of three key ingredients of building his brand. But it was a fantastic example for me if somebody had a very, very strong personal brand. And when I talked to people in the company, where he's been now for about a year, they know exactly what his personal brand is. It's very, very strong. And I think actually, you're right. No, I just been seeing your observation about the sort of young people but it does seem to me that they're much more conscious about brand, because of this authenticity thing.

Unknown:

Yeah, yeah. product.

Anthony Harling:

It's a key part of key part of their careers. And what about some of the other issues, we talk about? The importance of personal branding? And I guess one of the things which I'm thinking about is, is it? Is it too late? Or can somebody always kind of work on that personal branding? I know what's, what's your what's your

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

answer is always. And I think Elsa and I also discussed, the different stages of executive transitions, right? If I can, you know, ask yourself the question, if you come to that stage in your life or in your career, where you say, should I jump or will I be pushed, right? If you're at that critical junction of saying, I need to do something or I need to make this this fundamental choice of my next step. Yeah, that's when your personal brand becomes really, really important because you don't, and especially in sort of looking for a new job or even starting out a new business. It's incredibly important that you have a good foundation. To start with, how intense Do you want to build it? You know, again, coming back to media relations, thought pieces being visible speaking at panels becoming, we haven't talked a lot about the non executive director roles. Anthony, I know you do a lot of work there, too. A lot of the executives that Elson I work with today are also looking for that non executive directors transition or path. Because they're very happy with what they do. They have reached a certain seniority, but then they say, I can guarantee you, Anthony 90% of those executives are saying what's next? Yeah. And that's not a new job. That's not hire job, there's not a higher pay. They're really looking for, like, how can I make an impact. So it's never too late to start. But it's important to be in touch with yourself and you use the word self awareness. Again, being a Buddhist, it's an important word to remember as a professional, being conscious of your actions and being conscious of the impact you have on the bigger ecosystem. And people.

Anthony Harling:

I've got a conscious of the time and I want to just bring in a couple of questions which were asked by our audience. One is from Rosalie here is personal branding, a proactive vehicle for career succession planning, I want to word it slightly differently and address it to you is how important is personal branding, in terms of proactive career management,

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

it's absolutely essential. It's it's a critical element of it in in case, I think, in fact, the two of two of them could be zoomed as almost synonymous to each other. If you're in control of your narrative and your planning and where you want to, not everybody's there. I mean, when I started out, Anthony, I had no clue I would be talking to the audience today I was in India. But you know, it's it's a matter of again, being consistent, but also change with time, stay relevant, that's important, staying relevant to what's happening in the world, being connected, having a point of view, but also taking actions to prove that point of view. It's not fluff, smoke and mirror as else's, you need to back your branding. So yes, it is incredibly important that it's not just all pretty picture and a nice Billboard. But underneath it there is there is just two sticks, there is nothing else it needs to be Foundation, there needs to be evidence behind it.

Anthony Harling:

So one here for you. How should executives manage the mismatch between personal brand and the corporate brand? I'm gonna kind of give you a quick response marriage bonds, ELLs, but I really want to ask you about our sponsors. If there's a conflict between your personal brand and your corporate brand, you need to do something urgently. Yes.

Unknown:

Yeah. Often,

Els De Cremer:

if it's, you know, if it's that visible, you're obviously not in the right seat. If you if you're there to change things, that's different. Yeah, there can be somewhat of a mismatch. But you're there with a mission to change things. And then we talk about, you know, what do you do in that early phase of transformation, which is a different, you know, we can spend another hour on that. But if you feel that there is a mismatch between your authenticity, what you stand for, and what you can deliver for an organization, and what the organization either will allow you, too do or is expecting of you. You need to make some some, you know, some critical decisions about whether you want to stay or not.

Anthony Harling:

I have one last question, and then I'm going to have a final comment from each of you. What is the best way to differentiate brand from role?

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

It's an, it's a fantastic question. I'm hoping I can probably write a book about this, but I think role is what you do. brand is how you do it.

Anthony Harling:

Yeah. That just kind of who you are, isn't

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

it the essence of how we lead matters is very, very important, if the how that makes all the difference. And you know, and once again, Elson, I have seven discussions is most of the time when you apply for a job. Almost all candidates qualified for the job. Yeah, yeah. They fit the fit the package, no, they wouldn't have apply. What's the 1%, which will make you stand out? That for me is a brand. I want to just do it for Nike, you know, vorsprung, to technique for Audi, it's all of that. It's the Hi,

Anthony Harling:

how you doing? How you doing? I just got to come to a final comment. I mean, one of the things for me, else that I'm very conscious of is that personal brand has to work at sort of three levels. I think it has to work at the at the verbal level. So what's your verbal narrative when people are describing you and you're not in the room? Secondly, is what I call the digital level. If you type your name into a search engine, what comes up? And does that reinforce your verbal narrative. And then the third level is kind of your, your written resume or whatever that may be. And I think it's really, really important to focus on getting your personal branding, right, you know, and if necessary, work with some of the external who can help on that, but it's got to work at those three levels, the verbal, the digital and the underwritten. But absolutely

Els De Cremer:

with absolute consistency between all three.

Anthony Harling:

What's your final bit of advice else? For people who are listening to us today?

Els De Cremer:

Well, I hope we gave the message that you know, the importance of of personal branding, but also that this is not a thing to do only for senior executives. Yeah. And that is something that you you, you need to be conscious of when you start your career. I think the single bit of advice that I hand out the most is to young people to stay in the driver's seat of your career, marriage, do not let an organization or somebody else, you know, determine how you're going to progress, what you're going to do, stay in the driver's seat, and something like understanding your authenticity, what you stand for, and what you can contribute to an organization will help you to stay in control. Absolutely.

Anthony Harling:

What's your passing? Final advice for I

Renu Hanegreefs-Snehi:

couldn't have ended it better than what else has said it's being it's being in charge of your own destiny. Sounds like a big phrase, but it's being in control of your career is being in control of your narrative is being in control of how you want to shape your life on this planet. Frankly, you're here you have a role, you have all the right skills to make an impact. How do you use that position that power that resource to change somebody else's life? that's what that's what it matters. I mean, everybody can do a job, anybody can be a great leader in times of happy times, it can lead in times of crisis. That's important. That's what that's what makes you memorable and sort of become a legend. And that's where I think personal branding, once again, I want to say it's not it's not a thesis or a billboard that we have. It's it's the fundamental personal work that we do with people, with leaders, aspiring leaders, in leaders to say, how do you make an impact? What do you stand for? Again, come when you wake up in the morning, look at yourself in the mirror, do you like what you see, it's as simple as that.

Anthony Harling:

Super ladies, and thank you both very much indeed, I've learned a lot. And I'm sure that some of the comments here reflect that other people have also enjoyed that. So what we're going to do afterwards is we'll send out a link if you want to find out a little bit more about about the handle and a bit about Elson, and what we do not have to be looking we'll send out a link and you'll have access to the slides and also to a recording of the event but just reminds me to thank you both else. Thank you. Thank you and please follow follow borderless live. There's lots of great events for you to join in and benefit from. Thank you very much indeed everybody. Bye

Unknown:

bye

Sharing Started
Sharing Stopped