Brands like Nike and Starbucks prove that the product they sell is less important than the brand they market, and the same idea can be applied to image marketing. In The Persona Principle: How to Succeed in Business with Image Marketing (Simon & Schuster, 1996), Derek Lee Armstrong and Kim Wai Yu were among the first to use personal-brand or persona case studies as analogies to corporate branding. (Armstrong says he later declined an invitation from his publisher to write a sequel specifically dedicated to personal brands because he did not feel he had the expertise to write it.)

To help the unbranded answer questions of personal value, strengths, and weaknesses, some consultants lead their students through exercises aimed at making them aware of the impressions they make on others. Fledgling brands are asked to take stock of their personal assets -- especially those that set them apart from the crowd. By just raising your self-awareness, branding gurus tell their charges, you can almost certainly kick your lot in life up a notch or two.

Much of developing a personal brand centers on identifying personal values. In Be Your Own Brand, Speak includes a brand-values profile intended to help his students identify their values. But he concedes that the checklist may not be enough for everyone. "You can go through the checklist and select things you think reflect your values. But one test is how people perceive you and your values. If I ask five of my friends or associates, and they don’t associate those values with me, that should bring into question how much I believe in those values."

It's not clear that everyone can or even should be branded, however. Speak, for example, finds it easiest to teach personal branding techniques to corporate employees; other consultants prefer to work with self-employed entrepreneurs. Montoya, for his part, doubts that everyone has the ability to do the soul searching required to become a brand. Although he feels that the ability to look at oneself honestly and openly is the most powerful and important skill in becoming a good personal brand, he says, "Some people have it and some people don’t. I’m not sure if it's something that can be learned or not."

But identifying one's core values is reportedly no big deal if you have the knack, according to Montoya. "The simplest way is to say, 'What’s most important to me in life?' The answer that pops in your head is the most important thing. Then ask what’s the second most important thing. That will very quickly tell you what some of your values are," he says.

Several years ago columnist Lucy Kellaway, writing in The Financial Times, labeled personal branding "a hybrid of homespun psychology, self-help and dressing for success." She went on to say, "It is born from the idea that each of us 'owns' our career and that we are never going to get anywhere unless we set out consciously and strategically to market ourselves for all we are worth." But, she added, "I am not a brand and neither are you. We are people, which is not the same thing at all.” Her conclusion: "Personal branding is distasteful for being blatantly ambitious, sneaky and superficial. Worse, it is surely bad for business... The more you focus on Me Inc., the less you are likely to be focusing on the job in hand” (The Financial Times, 4 December 2000).

Denise Kingsmill, deputy chairman of Britain's Monopolies and Mergers Commission and a strong advocate of personal branding, also saw a downside to the personal marketing strategy. Kingsmill told The Financial Times in 1998, "Conscious personal branding can turn into an ego trip unless you are very clear about your objectives."

Certainly the results of personal branding can leave the person feeling more empowered. According to branding consultant Chuck Pettis, one recently branded middle manager, referring to a conversation with her boss, reports, "Previously I... simply said 'I’d like to do more training.' Now I have real ammunition that lets me say: 'There is a recognized need in the library for more training, and these specific managers want me to do it. Furthermore, I’d like to put my analysis skills to use by assuming a leadership role in the implementation of a new library management system.' "

Judging by the proliferation of books and seminars devoted to the subject, personal branding's popularity has yet to peak. According to Speak much of the current appeal of this latest form of self-marketing can be traced to the current economic slowdown. "As more people are out of work, they search who they are in order to make themselves more attractive -- with a new veneer -- to a prospective employer." But, he adds, many workers who have been laid off are also asking themselves who they are in an honest attempt to find employment consistent with their values.    

[4-Aug-2003]