Today we are near the conclusion of our five (5) part series on becoming the star employee of your workplace with a penultimate post on Creating Awareness About Your Value.
[Ed Note]: Any non-sequiturs in this post can be directly attributed to the wicked-awesome seasonal flu we contracted directly from our boss, jacking up our sinus pressure to around 1,600psi. A hot bowl of pho with extra shirracha tonight should clear that right up. But we digress.
If you haven’t already been reading this five-part series, you can catch up with the following links:
Part 1 – Understanding the Requirements of Your Organization
Part 2 – Understanding the Requirements of Your Clients
Part 3 – Figuring out What Yet Needs to Be Done and Doing It
Creating Awareness About Your Value
The key to creating awareness about your value is tact and humility. Were going to use the following working definition for tact: “Tact implies propriety and the ability to speak or act inoffensively.” Likewise, for humility we are going to use: “the quality of being humble and modest,” as our definition.
Individuals who have consistently demonstrated these two skills: Yoda, Gandhi, The Dali Lama
Individuals who have yet to learn these two skills: Darth Vader, Han Solo, Venger, or The Donald.
In most organizations there is an unwritten rule that shameless self-promotion will win you far more enemies than friends. We’re quite sure that you have run into this sort of rapscallion who will always share with you the intimate details of their self-declared superiority.
For example, when you say, “Hey, I just parachuted for the first time today with my significant other, it was great!” They will instantaneously follow up with, “Oh yeah, well my dad was a Golden Knight for the US Army for 32 years, and I was a certified parachute instructor by the age of 14.”
You know who you are, Brett M. from Winnemucca. There is one like him in every organization with more than 5 employees. No one likes this guy. Don’t be him.
However, there are numerous ways to tactfully and humbly toot your own awareness horn. Our personal favorite is to have a third-party toot away on your behalf (via public recognition). But in order to achieve this, you need to really develop your own professional brand.
A few professional brands you should try to cultivate include: “client savvy,” “creative,” and “detail oriented.”
A few professional brands you should steer clear of include: “difficult to work with,” “not a team player,” “conceited,” “Sith Lord” or “works well under constant supervision and when cornered like a rat.”
As with all these posts, we like to include some surefire ways to help you achieve your goal of creating awareness about your brand and value; so here goes:
Develop Internal Relationships: Although they never teach you this in college, careers are often based on WHO you know rather than WHAT you know. Are you actively building good relationships with your colleagues, senior leadership, clients and industry leaders? Remember this axiom: For every client you work with, you might well be interviewing for your very next job. Countless corporate officers are hired away from their agencies by kicking butt on client accounts. Also, when great people leave, they often take other great people with them. Be a great coworker.
Volunteer: There are plenty of volunteer opportunities in every workplace. Ask around. What else could you do that might help someone else? Could you do a little extra research for another manager who has a huge new account to pitch? Does the Christmas Party Committee need a few extra hands? The trick here is to find the team, which already has members who have cultivated their own positive personal brand. Join a team with people whom you aspire to be like.
Steer clear of any team that includes: Spencer Pratt, Kanye West, Skeletor or Michael Vick.
Contribute to the Industry: Being published is one of the most important and easiest ways to build a brand as an expert. Obviously you won’t be able to do this right out of the gate, but if you have a specific trick or technique that you think would be a “value-add” for the industry, ask your supervisor if there are some trade publications or blogs you might be able to contribute to. Take a look at the most recent national PRSA newsletter, it’s full of industry contributions. Your recognized expertise is only 500-words away.
Join Industry Organizations: If you are in public relations you absolutely need to be a member of PRSA. Most companies will pay for your membership if they see it as a good value. If not, it’s a tax deduction for you. Marketing folks should be involved with AMA. Advertising folks should be seeking membership in AAAA or AAF. If you are in Portland, Ore., consider the PAF. Graphic designers should consider AIGA. This will also help you contribute to the industry.
Be Kind: It costs you nothing to be kind. Smile at people. Offer to help. Ask what is going on in other people’s lives. Open the door for older 
adults. Hold the elevator for people. Be nice to the administrative staff. Kindness builds karma. You might think it’s hokey, but we guarantee good karma will get you better parking spots, superior office cubes, more friends and fewer health problems. Again, it costs you nothing.
Here’s the final word on this topic. Only try to take on a couple of these suggestion at one time. You still need to get your real (read: billable) work done. You still have clients to satisfy.
You most certainly DO NOT want the brand: “Guy who joins everything, networks too much and never gets his own work done.”
L8r Sk8rs,
PDXSX
Tags: brand, career, skeletor, tips & tricks, value
