By Steve Beseke, beseke1@earthlink.net

As I mentioned in my last post, I will be sharing excerpts of my personal branding series that I am presenting to individuals, corporations and other organizations. Please let me know if my personal branding thoughts resonate with your life. Just remember to not try to create/reconfigure your personal brand all at once. I suggest you think through it and take one step at a time.

All of us want to control how we are seen and remembered by others. Barack Obama wants to be seen as a strong, yet compassionate leader. Warren Buffett likes to be viewed as a financial innovator for the ages. Tiger Woods wants to project cool emotions and wonderful concentration skills to his help propel his golfing mystique. How are you viewed? What sets you apart from others?

The definition of resiliency also means taking charge of who you are, instead of letting other people (e.g., co-workers, friends and even family) define you.

For me, over the next decade, I want folks to remember me (a.k.a., my personal brand) as someone who is helping others find their resilient “sweet spot.” All of us have this spot and we deserve to find it for our health, happiness and resilient well being.

As we continue our personal branding discussion, please think of yourself as a corporation selling a product. While you may not have millions of dollars to promote yourself like Coca-Cola or McDonald’s, you do have your wonderful skill set, personal experience and integrity to offer a company the “best deal in town” – yourself.

Here are a few things I have considered in helping me define my personal brand. I hope these comments will add to your branding toolset:

Avoiding the Clutter of Life

- All of us have unique talents and capabilities that sets us apart from anyone else in the world. Like a fingerprint, these personal brand components identify and define us in all facets of our lives.

- Too often, however, our uniqueness gets cluttered by your job’s limited expectations or your life’s endless commitments.

- To clear away this clutter and find your true-self, I agree with branding expert Catherine Kaputa and take these 9 actions to understand/establish your personal brand:

Celebrate yourself and your uniqueness.

- Complete a self-brand audit. How do you ultimately want to be seen by others? As you assess your brand, I suggest focusing on your true strengths and talents that you can offer other. This resiliency strategy has definitely helped me think through my brand successfully.

- Keep tabs on your big picture

Do a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats). You’ve probably done such an “analysis” in your work life. It is truly not out of the imagination to apply this method to your personal brand. I’ve just taken a sheet of paper and drew four columns. I learned more about my tendencies doing this exercise. As I thought through my results, I realized that these tendencies are what folks see everyday about me.

I suggest taking fifteen minutes and truly writing down the tendencies everyone sees in you. For me, it was quite revealing and rewarding – and helped me understand my personal brand.

Don’t avoid the competition of life

- Go to school to beat your competition. Volunteer for community boards. Help your local emergency shelter or humane society. Your personal brand will be enriched, and your colleagues, friends and family will notice other facets about the true YOU.

Find the sweet spot

- Focus on the right strategy to achieve your goals. You may not like to volunteer or get involved in community events, but look for something that you truly like to do. This passion will show through to others and help be one of your defining brand statements. I recently bought a new Mustang GT with all the toys, and I want to get involved in Mustang clubs. I’ve never done this type of activity before, and my friends are saying to me, “This is the ‘new’ you.” It’s always nice to add another (sometimes unexpected) dimension to your personal brand. For me this shows flexibility, adaptiveness and being willing to excel in new situations. Or, in the working world, the three measures of long-lasting success.

Harness the power of self-presentation

-  Learn the principles of visual identity. I’m not one to talk about my strengths to often. I’m sure you’ve been there, but sometimes I focus more on my weaknesses internally. This internal discussion sometimes spills over to my attitude, which folks can see. This affects my personal brand, so I have learned to harness my strengths and (at least subtlely) promote these to the world. I was brought not to self-promote but in these tough economic and personal days, it is almost essential.

Tap into the power of words

- Similarly, learn the principles of verbal identity. Positively or negatively, the right words can be absolutely critical to your personal brand. If the wrongs words get out about you, your brand could be detrimentally affected. Sometimes, then, perception can get in the way of reality. Maintaining your personal brand is trying to control the words folks say about you. While you cannot affect all of the conversation, you can show folks how great a teammate you are and how you are willing to step up to the plate to help others. If your colleagues and friends see these qualities in you, the conversation will stay on your side and you will be seen as someone reliable, friendly and resilient.

Expand your network and visibility

- Become known for something by somebody somewhere. Please check out one of my previous posts on networking. Expanding your network may mean the difference of more or less success in your work or personal life

Execute a self-brand action plan

It’s one thing to craft a personal brand but this means implementing the plan for your best results. 

I will talk about how to execute your brand action plan next time. Until then, stay resilient!

By Steve Beseke, beseke1@earthlink.net

Over the next several weeks, I will be posting excerpts of my personal branding series that I am presenting to individuals, corporations and other organizations. Please let me know if my personal branding thoughts resonate with your life. Just remember to not try to create/reconfigure your personal brand all at once. I suggest you hink through it and take one step at a time.

Firstly, a little about my own personal branding journey…

When I assessed my career a couple years ago, I wanted to take a critical look at what I offered companies and, really, myself. At the time, I said to myself, “You are nearly 50 now and what is your career passion that will make you happy for the next 15 years.” It was not like I was struggling in life or anything.I’ve had a very successful career making money to buy a nice house, afford periodic vacations and live a quiet upper-middle-class life.

But I wanted more. I wanted to be reenergized again at work and actually feel more work passion than the everyday humdrum of job stress. I am sure many of you have gone/or going through the same reflection.

I asked myself, ” Does my career resiliency and legacy only depend on how much money I make?” I am a materialistic guy but after considerable thought I had to admit that it was not.

This started me on my journey to identify my personal brand and passion. The fascinating ride has taken me down some interesting turns and has led me to my resiliency business, motivational speaking and personal brand consulting. As I’ve become more mature as I hit 50 this year, I wanted to use my life experiences as a person with a disability (Cerebral Palsy), a local leader in internal/employee communications for companies and an average person like you to make a true difference.

Over the next decade, I want folks to remember me (a.k.a., my personal brand) as someone who is helping others find their resilient “sweet spot.” All of us have this spot and we deserve to find it for our health, happiness and resilient well being.

As we begin to discuss finding your personal brand, please think of yourself as a corporation selling a product. While you may not have millions of dollars to promote yourself like Coca-Cola or McDonald’s, you do have your wonderful skill set, personal experience and integrity to offer a company the “best deal in town” – yourself.

Let’s get started:

o     Personal Branding is Your 21^st Century Key to Standing Out From the Crowd

- Today, branding isn’t just for companies, Hollywood celebrities, or highly-paid athletes. People in all walks of life are starting to use personal or self branding to get ahead in the game of life.

- The single factor that often explains the difference between a professional who is competent and doing okay and one who earns a significant income and generates lots of business is having the confidence of self branding.

- Self branding defined: Self branding is a strong personal identity based on a clear perception about what you stand for, what sets you apart from others, and the added value you bring to a job or situation.

- Your self brand is the sum total of other people’s feelings about your attributes and capabilities, how you perform, even their perceptions about what you are worth.

- To brand or not to brand? Many people think that if they do a good job, their career will go fine. But no matter how secure your position seems to be, you are in competition with more people than you think. Even if you do a great job, you could still side-railed by circumstances out of control. I had this fantastic position that I was receiving fantastic accolades and wonderful salary. This country’s economic meltdown forced the company to lay off 1,000 employees including me

- To some people, branding may seem manipulative or phony. “I’d just rather be myself,” they say, “to with the flow and see where my career takes me.” Or, the familiar line, “I’m not good at marketing myself.”

- If you don’t brand yourself, others will. The fact of the matter is you’re giving the power to other people to brand you if you don’t do it yourself.

- Self brands are created not born. Branding is mainly a process of analyzing a product in relationship to a market and figuring out how to maximize the brand’s potential. Branding is creating an asset out of something. It is a matter of satisfying a market need in a different way. And figuring out a plan of action – the marketing plan – to build awareness and trial of the brand.

- Launching a person on a drive to become a successful personal brand is essentially the same process. It is a conscious strategic process, a branding process, a process that Hollywood celebrities and high profile athletes have been using for some time. As I mentioned earlier, I had to sometimes be brutally honest with myself in my branding process!

- The Self Brand mindset: Self branding means looking at yourself as a marketer would look at a product that he or she wants to make a winning brand. You don’t think of yourself as an employee even if you work for a boss. You think of yourself as working for yourself marketing the brand, You.

- The first thing a marketer does is analyze the market and the product to understand what the opportunities are, what the threats are. What are the current conditions? What are the assumptions about the future? What problems need to be solved? What needs aren’t being met?

- Act like the marketer of the product: You. In personal branding, after analyzing the market, you do a self audit. What are my strengths and weaknesses? How does my brand compare with the people I am competing with?

- You focus on key attributes and resources that differentiate you. Skills, abilities, even personality traits you have that are a solution to a market need. Then you adopt what Theodore Levitt called “the marketing imagination.” You build a personal brand identity that is different, relevant and adds value.

- Plan to dazzle: Write out a marketing plan. I often work with folks to develop a formal marketing plan that lays out a personal brand strategy and action plan. It is often in the writing that new creative options come to light.

- It is important to set personal brand goals with a specific timeframe and plan of action for achieving your goals. So just like a marketer would, write down your personal marketing activities to achieve your goals. And, of course, you then need to execute the marketing plan. You can’t get to where you want to go unless you plan it and then do it.

- The final step is measurement…assessing your effectiveness. How is my “portfolio” different now than it was last year? What new projects did I take on? How did I expand my network? What new learning did I acquire? If something isn’t working, you change trains. Branding is a dynamic process that offers the greatest rewards to the receptive individual.

- Thinking and acting like a brand can create and maintain demand for your most important product – you.

Coca-Cola or McDonald’s has nothing over you or me – except those millions of dollars. We need to “live” our brand and folks will see the true passion and commitment no matter what your profession.

Please begin to think about establishing or reassessing your personal brand. I will have the next installment in my personal brand series next week. If you want to see the complete series, please just e-mail me at beseke1@earthlink.net.

I look forward to helping make your personal brand experience a resilient and worthwhile adventure.

Until next week, thanks again for joining me. Thousands of others worldwide are also joining you each week to read my career and life resiliency advice and banter. I am very humbled to say the least.

By Steve Beseke, beseke1@earthlink.net

I don’t know about you, but one of my life challenges is to stay “in the present” in my life and career. Not dwelling on how things could have gone or how they might be in the future has been a constant battle for me. I’ve been fortunate to be very successful personally and professionally, but I have had times where the “whata,coulda, shoulda” yips create a barrier that takes extra and unneeded energy to solve.

What if I would have handle a conversation with my teenage daughter more sensitively? Could I have provided an even better answer to an interview question that would have propelled me to a job offer instead of coming in second? As I get older, should I ask for more of a helping hand from friends/colleagues as I get creakier with my physical disability- Cerebral Palsy?

Please think for a moment about your “whata, coulda, shouldas” and how have you reacted to them… Have you sometimes spent more time thinking about them, then focusing on your reactions to present-day circumstances? If you are like me, you probably have.

A few resilient strategies I now use to help prevent me from going down these well-worn paths are to reaffirm the positives in my life today, know what I truly want to do today, and stop worrying about things out of my control. Sounds easier said than done…absolutely. It has taken me much of the last 1 1/2 years to “reprogram” my brain to subdue the yips and stay focused on the present. To be honest, I am still not 100 percent successful, but I have definitely increased my resilience to not always look back or dream too far in the future.

What about you? How are you:

Reaffirming the positives in your life today… For me, I thank God everyday that I am happily married, have good friends not only just acquaintances, and my works (such as this blog) help folks like you sort through their life and career resilience. I post one positive about my life everyday in my office, so I can stay grounded and in the present moment. Sounds simple and it is. Looking at this throughout the day helps me get through bumps all of us can go through.

Knowing what you truly want… I would love to be sitting on a Hawaiian beach, sipping a cool one and being ultimately confident of who I am today. Well, the Hawaiian beach and the cool one may have to wait at least until next week, but I do truly know who I am as a person right now. This profile includes all the positives and blemishes in my life. But I always try to be a Simon on “American Idol” and be honest with myself. Some days I am more brutally honest than others, but that’s what staying in the present is all about. Warts and everything.

How about you? Are you dwelling on your successes/failures in the past and not focuses on what you need to do in the present? Take five minutes and reflect on what you truly want from yourself today. For me, it is always a truly healthy exercise.

 Stop worrying about things out of your control… Throughout my previous blog posts, I’ve highlighted this “things within your control” message. To stay in the present, you must understand what is truly in your control. For me, the one thing absolutely in my control is my attitude. How I am thinking about myself, my work, my life, my family and my friends? In the final analysis, there is not much in our control except your attitude. If you let your attitude slip, life can really spiral downwards. How is your attitude today? With our world’s current economic mess, you may have lost your job, your savings and your confidence. I’d suggest thinking for a couple minutes about how you can take charge of your attitude even with the real challenges many of us have day-to-day. For me, it has truly made a difference.

Staying in the present gives you the ability to still navigate the current of your life – whether smooth or a bit bumpy. This, in the final analysis, will help you stay happy about yourself and continue to ride the wave of your inner resilience…and stay in the present.

Thanks, again, and until next week…

By Steve Beseke, beseke1@earthlink.net

Firstly, I was extremely humbled last week in being nominated for “Blog of the Year” by a national blogging organization. I’ve received thousands of hits and dozens of fantastic comments since beginning my blog a few months ago.  I feel absolutely honored by your continued readership and support, and am so glad my common-sense messages are resonating with you. Thank You!!!

Last week, I highlighted the first two legs of your “Big Comfy Chair to Career Success.” I chatted about the important steps of defining your personal brand and the art/science of networking - please see the previous post below if you have not had a chance to read Part 1.

As I’ve mentioned, all of us have career strengths, life passions, unique personality traits and a myriad of talents that help make us successful in our careers and lives.

Sometimes, however, these talents are not always seen by others and believed in by ourselves. Knowing and being comfortable with yourself will empower you to stay career – and life – resilient as you search for your next great opportunity. It also allows you to sit comfortably in your comfy chair with four sturdy and dependable legs.

The last two legs in your chair are:  Applying all your job search strategies and  continuing your resilience and having fun. In combination with the other two legs I’ve discussed, this comfy chair approach will give you the adaptable and resilient framework to find your individual path to success in your career and, most importantly, life.

The final two legs:

Ø    Applying all your rock-solid job search strategies. Posting your resume on Monster, Career Builder and other job search sites, of course, is a necessary first step. But please don’t think this will yield nirvana. You also need to create a marketing plan for yourself that includes the best ways to network, your personal branding and marketing statement and additional ways you can achieve success if that right job does not come forward right away – including consulting.

 This is where your inner resiliency comes into play. What can you do to keep your name out there for the world to see? Too many of us rely on companies to give us a call after applying. Instead of sitting by the phone hoping, there are several proactive ways to promote yourself and brand.

A few of my favorite examples: Linkedin is a great professional way to promote your skills and keep folks updated through adding connections. The most important way to use this site is to actually network with your connections. Set up coffees or lunches and continue getting better known by so many folks. If you meet with 20 connections, the key is to ask for introductions to at least two of their contacts. That alone means you will get to know 40 or more new people.

You can also use the social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, but I feel Linkedin is all about establishing professional connections, instead periodic chit-chat. The important takeaway is to strategically use the sites you feel most comfortable.

Another example that has kept my name in front of folks is by volunteering. You may think looking for the next great job doesn’t allow you enough time to sit on a city commission, volunteer for your neighborhood association or help a local group you belong to. Actually, I have found this is the time you cannot afford to stay on the sidelines. My last two full-time nearly $100k positions were found by folks I have volunteered  on a variety of levels. While volunteering with an organization or professional association, you are establishing positive relationships, promoting your brand and letting everyone know your terrific skills/qualities.

A third, and extremely important way, is to be prepared for interviews with rock-solid examples. Next week, I will be adding the top 50 or so interview questions you should provide a 30-second story for each one. You should always be prepared beforehand with these vignettes, so you are not caught off-guard by a surprise question or two. One other note on actual interviews: Keep highlighting your personal and always stay in the present. I’ve been tripped up in the past when I drift to the future and how great you  think this particular job will be. Also, just stick to the present when interviewing and don’t worry about the past or what might be in the future.

One additional was to write a blog and/or create a web site highlighting your career sand life talents. These “out of the box” approaches help demonstrate your abilities. I also have found them a very healthy way to approach life and all its stresses.

- Continuing your resilience and having fun. Yes, life is serious business and we are judged partly on the success we have in our careers. But healthy life resilience means more than just hitting the pavement and staying focused every minute of your day. It’s also about stepping back and being thankful for all the good in your lives. Your family, your friends, your colleagues…but most importantly yourself.

By any stretch of the imagination, I’ve not always been thankful of myself. In the past, I sometimes think of my negative aspects far more than my positive ones. To curb this, I now try to do one “enjoyable” thing everyday. That might mean reading a good book, stopping by a lake and watch the gentle waves rolling past or just sitting down, closing my eyes and thinking of our family’s next wonderful vacation – maybe to Hawaii.

Taking a break from promoting your personal brand and finding the next great job is very rewarding. Getting too wrapped up in the moment – even a personal moment – does not allow you to see possibilities for the future. I have a physical disability called Cerebral Palsy, which does not allow me to walk normally. Well, recently, I stubbed my toe and fell. I hit my head on a granite floor and went to the emergency room for tests and observation. Instead of feeling lucky I did not hurt myself severely, I was just embarrassed I fell in front of many of my work colleagues.

Then, in the emergency room, I thought of something my father once said, “Don’t worry about the things you can’t control, just enjoy every moment you have on this great Earth.” While I had a bump on my head, his words allowed me to enjoy that I was still alive – and able to walk another day.

This realization helped me sit comfortably in my big comfy chair again. You, too, can sit easily in your comfy chair by paying attention to its legs and making sure they stay strong. Your personal and constant resolve to keep these legs sturdy will help you feel much more confident and ultimately ready to tackle the next great/healthy adventure: Your successful life and career .

Take care my friends, and I look forward to talking with you again next week!

By Steve Beseke, beseke1@earthlink.net

All of us have career strengths, life passions, unique personality traits and a myriad of talents that help make us successful in our careers and lives.

Sometimes, however, these talents are not always seen by others and believed in by ourselves. One of the best ways to show our best is to better define and our personal brand.

Over the next two weeks, I will be offering you a two-part resiliency discussion on branding yourself. Please let me know what you think…

Part 1

Knowing and being comfortable with your personal brand will empower you to stay career – and life – resilient as you search for your next great opportunity. It also allows you to be comfortable in what I call “Your Big Comfy Chair of Career Success.” The four legs of your comfy chair are defining your unique personal brand, learning the art/science of great networking, implementing rock solid job search/consulting techniques, and last but certainly not least is staying focused while continuing to have fun in your life.

 Once you feel comfortable in your comfy chair the sky is truly the limit for your professional – and personal – success. To help build your strength, let’s look at each “leg” of your chair:

- Your personal brand. While you think of branding for Coca-Cola or the golden arches of McDonald’s, defining your personal brand may mean the difference in finding your next great career and life success.

For myself, I’ve just taken a simple sheet of paper and wrote down the skills I believe  differentiate myself to others – whether it is my work colleagues or my employer. This has included identifying my key strengths, my passions, my personality traits, and the talents I’ve used successfully in the past.

Some of us are not rock stars, but all of us have core competencies that are recognized and respected by our peers, employers and friends. Once you are clear on your strengths, be sure to incorporate your accomplishments and the results you have achieved into your resume.

 Make sure your resume screams, “I’m a get-the-job-done kind of person.” Use the actions = results formula, hitting only your major accomplishments and noting the experience you have that is necessary to do the job. Action verbs like directed, created, and implemented are powerful so start each sentence with one.

This also translates to our interviews. No one will know your strengths and personal brand unless you tell them. Your confidence and passion will come through to everyone.

- Networking, Networking, Networking!  National surveys that more than 80 percent of jobs today are found through networking.

Whether you are an introvert like me or an extrovert, the key is you need to see the value (eight out of 10 jobs connected) of meeting people and not be afraid to do it.

It was quite daunting at first for me. In addition to being an introvert, I also had a physical disability (Cerebral Palsy) that made me more shy in meeting people – especially strangers.

While I love all my extroverted friends, I am here to tell you that networking can work great even for those of us who are less “magically” inclined. Plain and simple: Networking is just meeting people to discuss potential common interests.

When I came back to my home state of Minnesota a number of years ago from Chicago, I did not have a job and had few connections. Within a reasonable period of time, I found a great non-advertised job through networking. Because of my effort, I was working for one of the respected companies in the world.

This was back before Linkedin, Facebook or Twitter to help the networking process.

Here is how I successfully networked then and how it can be applied today for your next great work adventure.

- I happened to belong to an industry association when returning from Chicago. I looked up on their web site the e-mail addresses of more than 400 members and separately e-mailed all of them saying, “I’m in the process of looking for a new position and would appreciate your advice and counsel as I look for my next fantastic place to work.” Everyone loves to give advice and I received more than 150 e-mails from members saying they would help me. More than 100 said they would enjoy personally meeting me at a coffee shop or restaurant to discuss my needs.

1. Never ask them for a job upfront, but provide them with a statement of the work you are looking for and a resume they can look through. If they have something, you’ll hear about the position. Networking, initially, is to get to know the person so they remember you when a position crosses their desk or they see something over the Internet.

2, While not asking for a job, you must ask them if they could connect you with at least two other folks from their network you can talk with. Asking for other people’s names/contact info is less threatening to them and shows your true desire to ask for their advice and counsel.

3. Always ask the person if they would provide short e-mail introductions to their contacts. This will give you instant credibility with those you will be contacting. They know the person you networked with, and that person has said what a nice guy you are, et

4. Meet your network contacts at places and times convenient for them. Have them suggest a spot, and they will feel more comfortable.

5. Always e-mail them after your networking meeting thanking them for their advice and potential contacts. Also, ask them if you could stay in contact with them periodically and maybe meet again at some later point.

6. When you first connect with your networker’s contacts, make sure to reference the person’s name and what a nice person he/she is. This will connect you with that person as the new contact decides whether he/she has time to network or will be able to provide you with an informational interview.

7. Repeat the same processes with every person that becomes a part of your network. Be patient and don’t be concerned the person does not get back to you right away. He/she may be extremely busy, and they may value your true patience with them.

8. Additionally, always let the people you meet with know you are more than willing to help them network or get connected with your contacts if they, at some point, look for a new position. Because remember: A fantastic networker understands that connecting is not a one-way street. Providing two-way support will show your willingness to go the extra mile and will probably be memorable to your “network.”

9. One last to do: I encourage you become active in a relevant industry association as part of your current position at work. This will give you visibility in the association, and you could personally meet a lot of folks who might be able to help you in the future.

As you craft your career strategies, I would starting with these strategies. Next week, I will chat about the other two legs in your comfy chair - implementing rock solid job search/consulting techniques, and staying focused while continuing to have fun in your life.

I look forward to our continued discussion. Thanks so much for the thousands of hits and dozens of comments worldwide since I created this blog earlier this year! I am very humbled by your attention and stories of personal resiliency.