Look Ahead in personal branding

I’m the type of person who likes to have an end goal in mind whenever I do anything. Sometimes, I catch myself doing things just for fun, but I can usually find a way to work it into my life based on some sort of commonality.

Yesterday, I led a discussion on Talent Talk Cafe about personal branding. It was the second of a series that will likely continue until I get a few points across. I had an outline of sorts to lead the discussion along. It looked like this:

Strategy: I happen to think this is the most important part. (all the other points should really be subheads if I was any good at outlines) Do you know who you want to be? How you want to be perceived? Transparency is a HUGE part of social media which is, in turn, a very powerful tool in building a personal brand. Having an end goal in mind is very important on the days when you are sure you could be a great travel writer or whatever. (You probably can and if that’s your goal work towards THAT.)

Groups: Okay, who are your groups? I say this because it sounds less cheesy than “target markets”. For many talent acquisition professionals it’s as simple as clients and candidates. But penetrate further into the space and you’ll find that vendors have their own target markets, consultants are chasing their own fish, bloggers are trying to reach a specific audience (if trying to monetize). Even if it is as easy as clients and candidates, you have to make sure you are WHERE they are. So really dig in and figure out who your “audience” is.

Schedule: The tricky part of navigating the kinda new waters of personal branding (as it relates to online stuff) is that your boss probably thinks its ridiculous. It’s okay, for years insurance agents and sales pros have known that going to netowrking events and creating a “story” or pitch is all part of the job. But it’s only PART of the job. SOcial media has a scary little habit of pulling you in. That’s why having a schedule that you can more or less stick to over a week’s time is so helpful. Make it a part of your overall strategy. You  (and your boss) will thank me for it. Go ahead and add face to face mixers and unpaid speaking engagements to this allotment, which I think should be between 5-10 hours. Don’t take this out of your company time, take it out of your time, unless you own the company or like this woman, your boss wants you to get out there and engage.

Feedback: I think a lot of people miss the boat on this one. Fortunately, there are lots of tools that are helping with the conversation part of relationship. Allowing clients, customers, and colleagues to critique you or praise you in public is huge. Another benefit to be perenially available is that many times, a problem rarely gets too big. At least in my world. Recent example of where a company could have used feedback to its advantage. Lesson? Take your licks, make it right, get better.

Portfolio: Again, this is becoming too easy NOT to do. Tools like LinkedIn, Google Profile and Visual CV (hat tip to Michael Marlatt for really pushing me to do one, and to Joel Cheesman for trying to get me to do one a while ago. . .still definitely going to do one) make the sometimes exhausting task of assembling all your professional scorecards in one place. If you have any collateral, put it there, or link to it from your blog, or use slideshare, scribd or box.net. Both Box.net and Slideshare can be imported directly into LinkedIn. Even FaceBook can be a place to load up videos, likewise flickr for pics.

Pictures: Speaking of pictures, all your pictures should be the same and look like you. For your personal brand, you should have a personal picture. If you are blogging, tweeting or otherwise acting on your company’s behalf, a logo is great, but people will not recognize you on the street, come up and talk to you at conferences or feel like they know you unless you use one consistent picture across your networks.

I am kinda tired, so let’s go through input, distributions and cross promotion after the big turkey day huh? I am thankful for ALL OF YOU!

How you see the world and how it affects the hiring process

As our country gets nearer and nearer to some financial black hole that no one is even daring to name ( we name storms and cars, why can’t we name financial crises?) I am noticing a pattern in friends and family. Since I work in a financial firm, there is no lack of professionals whose minds I can pick around in, trying to discover root causes, kicking therories about the future about and generally trying to decide what the heck to DO.

People (and employers) are faling into three camps:

We’ll be all right. These folks have generally never known anything but moderate prosperity and cannot actually comprehend the idea of depression-like times in these modern eras. They understand that “we’re in a bit of a slump” but figure now is the time to spend less, pay down debt and hunker down. If this person is an employer, they will keep the employees they have, attempt to freeze hiring and make the company do more with less.

It’s a big buffet. These folks understand that in times of fear make people do odd things. They might be more well versed on how SOME people made quite a lot of money during the Depression and see our current situation as more of an opportunity than anything else. Employers like this will hire the best for less, use this time to switch from legacy tech over to something more versatile and generally handle tasks like employer branding and long-term workforce planning with their current talent acquisition team (since they likely will not be doing any mass hiring either).

AAAAGGGHHH! These folks are channeling the REM song “It’s the end of the world as we know it” and cannot help but spread the word of panic everywhere they go. They worried, scared, not sure if they should pay down debt, save money, sell their house or stockpile canned goods. As employers, they are freezing hiring, firing as they can, slashing budgets and doing all they can to stay afloat. All new spending (with the exception of sales, if they’re smart) is trounced.

The scary part is, few know the right answers for employers in today’s market. Recruiters who went through the dot com bust swear that now is the time to rally your candidate base, others say getting the wrong folks out and the right folks in should be the focus, still more insist that the talent war (if it ever existed) is for sure gone now as employers have their choice of top notch candidates.

What is YOUR employer doing? What are you doing if you are an employer?

Simple but not easy

Making your way in the world today takes everything you got. .

Okay maybe I am showing my age with that one. But I wanted to sort of highlight the awkward but beautiful position I find myself in almost daily. As someone with a good deal of experience in ONE area (marketing and communications) making inroads into an entirely new field (recruiting), I am often humbled, frequently wrong, seldom comfortable and always unsure.

Never more so than when I hear truly experienced practitioners, veterans of the industry and accomplished business people speak. This happened on more than one occassion at the recent Kennedy Recruiting Conference. First off was a presentation that had everyone buzzing. I had the honor of hearing Arbita’s Don Ramer speak at a Minnesota Recruiters event earlier in the year. However, this presentation made an even bigger impact ( I thought). Perhaps it was the economy, the size of the crowd, the small but distinct tinge of fear in the air among the recruiters assembled there. Ramer’s presentation, visually beautiful (hat tip Seth) and powerfully orated, contained a simple question: “How dare you?” At the end, as if in response to the questions bouncing around in a cynic’s head, Ramer explained that the foolhardiness of choosing one dollar over 7 billion was compounded when you changed the dollars to human beings. It occurred to me that it is a shame that it wasn’t manadatory to attend that session. I guess the people that needed to hear it did.

The “Two Steves” from Adidas presented a powerful and moving presentation on employer branding. It was truly stunning. As I might have mentioned, I don’t like sports, I don’t even really like walking that fast, but the images, music, words and processes these gentlemen had implemented made a huge impact. I doubt there was anyone that didn’t want to work for Adidas after that. Some in the audiece argued that with sports, Adidas had a bit easier time of it than say. . .transtlantic shipping. However, it reinforced the now more prominent notion that marketing should be and is becoming a much more vital part of the recruiting and retention function. It also made me realize how important the marketing function can be and how many recruiters just don’t understand it, although they want to.

One presentation made a huge impact on me, even though I could not be there. Shannon Seery Gude and Jason Buss led a panel on best practices which had eveyone talking and people literally spilling out of the room. Their ideas were so simple, yet so innovative ( I saw the slides and caught the tail end) career vets like Gerry Crispin and presenters like Steve Fogarty were singing their praises. Knowing that both Shannon and Jason have young busy families and intense careers made the in-depth research and well-thought out layout of the talk even more exciting.

I always tell people that I am an idealist. So when an entire panel gets up to talk about ethics, I am loving it. Kevin Wheeler, Susan Burns, Dennis Smith and Steve Rothberg. Hearing people talk in simple, obvious terms about what the right thing to do was, in a word, refreshing. As Kevin Wheeler said, “Guidelines are the floor, not the ceiling”.

I continue to be impressed by my peers and conferences that focus on real depth of the industry will always be my favorite to attend. I realized as I sat down to write this post that I couldn’t even decide what to focus on. That’s not really a bad thing at all!

Tagged by the bartender

Hey all, I have been so busy impersonating Jason Davis at the Kennedy Conference that I completely neglected to do my six random things about myself tag post. Ms. Sharyn Lauby tagged me and I must say I am honored (read more about bartending goodness here).

So the deal is, I have to say six things about me, tag six people and link this back to the person who tagged me. Le sigh. As you all know, I just HATE talking about myself (insert evil grin):

1) My head was so large that as a child, I could not fit my arms around it. My mother told me I had a big brain.

2) I love swimming in the pool and in the ocean. I HATE lakes.

3) My husband and I met at Chili’s restaurant.

4) I rarely get things stuck in my teeth.

5) I love red nail polish but cannot wear it because it clashes with my skin.

6) My signature dish is pot roast served on a bed of chipolte sweet potatoes.

7) I frequently forget how many things I am to post about myself in this tag game.

People I am tagging:

-Kari Quaas
-Susan Burns
-Josh Kahn
-Lance Haun
-Molly Sly
-Gordon Lokenberg

The end.

Sweet Spot: AKA Crossroads

Sweet Spot

So I’ve found my sweet spot, my place in the sun. But as some observers pointed out, how do I stay there? Would I want to stay there? Is it reasonable for me to expect to stay there given:

–my personality (total activator, which means I love starting NEW stuff, total adaptability, which means I love rolling with whatever comes my way and total WOO, which means I like to win people over?

–my generation (acc. to Penelope Trunk’s book I’m to have 8 jobs by my 32nd bday, so I better get crackin’ PS Thanks RecruiterGuy for generously “donating” your copy)?

–the current market?

See the scary thing about a sweet spot, is that once you’ve found it, it’s oh so hard to go back. So, and I am no expert (Paul, don’t beat me) I think the trick is finding ways to keep yourself fresh. Seeing the sweet spot as less of a place to hang and more like a crossroads, a changing and dynamic place.

Yes, yes Maren but how do we GET there? How can I get a job doing what I love and leveraging all of my strengths! I don’t care about your inner soul searching.

Not to worry heart crushing opportunist, I do have handy tips. And if reading about writing an awesome blog for days (DAYS!) on end before starting this on taught me anything it’s this: bullet points. So without further ado:

- Volunteer. I used to do everything I could get my hands on. I remember when I found out someone else had designed a logo because I had done ten in a week. I was completely offended and diva-ish. My husband was appalled ‘You really need MORE jobs that pay you nothing?’ True it was tough going but in the end, those volunteer opps turned into portfolio builders (and experience staying under budget) and I got a great job (my first post mommy big girl job) out of that portfolio.

- Keep doing side projects after you’ve landed your dream gig. Unless your employer specifically forbids it, this is a great way to make sure that people are still hearing about the work you do. Obviously be smart about conflicts of interest and NEVER do sidework while on the clock. Big FAT bad idea.

- Vocalize. This is a hard one. When you’re the type of person who’s interested in a million different things, you can feel a bit scattered when talking about your interests (check out my google profile for an example of how I cannot stop typing when this question is asked). I also tend to think (from a recruiting perspective) that a “jack of all trades” resume is a bit of a no-no. That’s why I think you should be job specific with your resume and simply vocalize the other things you would be interested in AND (and this is important) can do well and have the equipment to do well. Don’t run around saying you love mowing lawns and then when the stadium calls you say ” I don’t have a weedwhacker”.

- Have the equipment. This is also tough for people (specially young uns). Why invest in equipment for a job you don’t have yet? Because when the call comes, you’ll be ready. And that’s what it takes to look like a pro. Or a semi-pro. Or just a chick hanging out in a sweet spot AKA crossroads.

Make time- People tell me a lot that they just don’t have the time. And that’s okay, but if you are working toward a job you will LOVE, a job that will pay the bills and make you happy, then you will make the time. I say this as a married woman with three children, extended family in town, an active church life and several outside projects (BESIDES this one). Turn off the TV, it helps.

Blog yourself first- This sounds weird, but it’s a riff on paying yourself first. Reading experts in the field is great and when you’re new at blogging it’s a really good idea so you don’t go off sounding half-cocked like I did LOTS of times when I started this (Big O) blog about a year ago. But if something has to give and you are coming up with blog ideas and good material, do your writing first and then catch up on your RSS feeds. Conversation is the new content. Once you’ve gotten YOUR post out there, then engage wth readers, commenters etc.

Don’t be a NOOB- Everyone hates it when people go around tooting off about your blog. My little sister at one point wanted to buy a t-shirt that said “I don’t care about your stupid blog”. So, that’s pretty much sums it up.

My Sweet Spot. . .Finally!

My Sweet Spot

So, fourscore and (well two). . .carry the one. . .okay so TWO years ago when I started being interested in recruiting as a profession, most of the pro recruiters I contacted for advice or assistance didn’t say a word about social media. None of these smart, successful, third party recruiters even knew what a blog was or cared, had a twitter account or even a faint idea of what lifestreaming might be.

However, as I sorted through some information online (as my generation is prone to do), I got sucked in to the endless amounts of information out there on blogs, pounded out microposts, gave myself blackberry thumb from scrolling resumes on my phone and started a vlog (very hard to maintain when one doesn’t always look the way one would wish to look). I found the value of my “social capital” rising very quickly. Woo hoo! I got a twittergrade of 99. Yes! I was featured on ABC show! Rock on, I am a writer at thus n such! Awesome! But when the dust settled, I realized that social capital is not actually, so much, capital.

Now I’m no money hungry woman but my little brain started to wonder why it was that so few succesful recruiters (particulalry in my town) were using this social media. Why hadn’t they heard of the people I was so excited to meet? I was distraught. I felt used, abused and overworked. Being a social butterfly isn’t easy you know! Had I traded a year of my life for chatting, linking, blogging and networking?

I was ready to give up. While there seemed to be some out there who could do the social netoworking thing AND be great recruiters, I obviously was not one of them. I didn’t NEED the tutorials on how to brand yourself, I NEEDED the tutorial about how not to laugh like a donkey and say inappropriate things on the phone with a client. (Don’t look for it, it’s not there.)

Human Capital was a field I had grown to love. I enjoyed the people, writing about the subject, grabbing every morsel I could find regarding recruiting and diving into deep conversations with leaders in the field. People were even asking me to speak. Only thing was, I was a really bad recruiter.

Was this sort of non-expert expertise base I was building even sustainable? NOPE. But then a funny thing happened. I made a (actually two) placements via Twitter. I snagged a contract from my blog. Someone told me I was changing the face of recruiting. A woman called and asked for coaching help and someone offered me a great gig. Whoa! Where did that come from?

Then I started meeting people in the industry that were plenty smart and engaged but not pounding it out on the phones. Maybe they were in UI and employer branding or part of a vendor team or supervising a team of recruiters. I’m not the only freak in town!

It was then that I realized (and this is the point of the entire blog post so please read it carefully) that I had located my sweet spot. That critical juncture between what you want to do and who you want to do it with and where you want to be while doing it ALL come together. Some people never find that place. I used to market for a railroad. It never revved me up the way talking about recruiting does. I love this industry and I love marketing and strategy within it. What’s wrong with that?

Nothing.

thank you for helping me find my sister

thank you, I know this doesn’t even begin to cover everyone who helped. You guys are amazing. If I have forgotten you, please dm me at @marenhogan or through the blog!

more about "thank you for helping me find my sister", posted with vodpod

HILARY McGANN HAS BEEN FOUND

Thank you so much everyone that helped search for Hilary McGann. She is now safe and with family. I cannot express my gratitude that the social media community and friends across the country helped to spread the word that my sister was missing. You are amazing.

POST THAT WENT OUT LAST NIGHT (SHE HAS SINCE BEEN FOUND) Hilary McGann missing. Went missing at the NE Huskers Game, 2nd Quarter. She is 22 yrs old, 5 foot 2 inches, 115-120 pounds, brown eyes, dark brown long hair but was up in a ponytail today.

She was wearing white zip up hoodie with red NE lettering, jeans, and brown mules. She did not drive herself to the game but never showed up for her ride home or her nephew’s birthday party, which she was planning on attending.

If you know anything about this woman or can help find her, or saw her at any point, please do not hesitate to contact us at (402) 212-8504 or (402) 215-4440

HILARY MCGANN MISSING

Personal Brand

Today I hosted Talent Talk Cafe on Recruitingblogs.com. It was an amazing experience and one I was grateful to have. The topic I chose was “get your brand on“. It was kind of intimidating, to say the least. After all, I have been pretty open about the fact that I am a new recruiter (newbie + recruiter= recrewbie) and that most of my decade long career (really??) has been spent in the communications arena, meaning marketing, PR, journalism and the like.

So for me to tell a bunch of accomplished recruiters how to brand themselves was scary. Surprisingly, the turnout was good and the conversation flowed like good wine. I had originally planned to talk about three major issues:

How do you want to be seen online and off?

What qualities are necessary to prominently display in order to overcome some of the present biases leveled at talent pros on the social media scene?

How can you “dive deep” into relationships started online and create lasting value for you and your firm?

While we touched on some of those topics, what came out of the discussion was more of a study of great personal brands and the common characteristics of each:

Bill Vick

Maureen Sharib

Dave Mendoza

Paul De Bettignies

Of course, there are LOADS of people I could point to with great personal brands outside of the recruiting scene and PLENTY we overlooked within it. But these are the folks that people pointed out specifically. Commonalities included: giving back to the communities they were a part of, consistency in blogging or sharing, a body of experience and the ability to mentor or “feature” other people within their spaces.

We talked for a while about specific rules etc and I will put a video about the chat soon. However, I did want to mention that a great way to turn this into something that actually attracts clients is a nugget o wisdom contained in Bill Vick’s own recent video interview with Jason Davis. If you don’t have time to watch the video, I’ll break it down for you:

2 posts per week of original content
1 post of “sum up” news from aggregated stuff relating to your industry
1 interview (whatever medium) with someone who is NOT a client (a hiring manager)

The key that ties this all together is the interview portion. When you take time to feature people that are doing good work, regardless of affiliation or even competition, you do yourself a service. (best link here, why it’s so long, click it)

Personal Branding has many elements, but that’s the one I thought I would feature today.

Passed Over? Deal with Dignity

Deal with Dignity

Performance reviews and promotional interviews are difficult. No one likes to to be graded, have boxes checked that cannot begin to account for all of their work, feel rejected and worst of all be passed over for a promotion or refused a position.

Oh, there was so much to learn Tuesday evening about being passed over. A man more qualified than the current position holder was passed over for someone with less experience, fewer projects completed and a relative newcomer to “the company”.

In McCain’s concession speech there was simply pure class. After running a good campaign and working very hard (for a 72 year old man) he stood up, accepted the fact that America had chosen another and pledged his support to the candidate that had soundly defeated him. It was a classy speech when one might have expected a “rage against the machine” type speech, especially because this man knew in his heart that this was the last time he would ever be able to run for president.

And although his decsion to add a young, relatively untested person to his team may have hurt his chances with some of the “hiring managers”, he boosted her up and refused to blame her for any issues, and most importantly took all of the blame for the failure to obtain the elect status on himself.

Now, the parallels stop when you realize that many promotions are not as inspiring as running for the highest office in the land. But when you love your company, believe in the product and have built community, and THEN you are passed over for a promotion (for someone younger and seemingly less experienced) it can be hard to keep your cool. So take a page from McCain’s playbook:

- Don’t deny the inevitable. If you’ve had the chance to plead your case (and if you’ve been working there for a few months YOU HAVE) and someone else has been chosen for the coveted leadership position, don’t deny it and don’t try to explain it away. Congratulate the winner.

- Get back on the bus. If someone has been chosen to assume a supervisory position over you, then make sure you deliver. If you promised or committed to specific projects, complete those. Work with your new supervisor instead of against them. Make sure that no bad talk escapes your lips. Get behind your new boss and make sure everyone knows you’re there. (You’re behind them anyway!)

- Assume responsibility. When you are in the running for a leadership position, it is crucial to ACT like a leader. McCain did that admirably in his concession speech, although it did not seem like the crowd agreed with him. If you can take responsibility now, in the worst of times, you are poised to be granted progressive leadership roles in the future.

- Give credit where it is due. Both candidates acknowledged one another in their respective speeches as great leaders, worthy opponents and potential teammates. This is crucial when heading into a leadership position or whether you are positioning yourself for future leadership roles.