Читать книгу How You Are Like Shampoo for College Graduates - Brenda Bence - Страница 3

Each one of us has a fire in our heart for something. It’s our goal in life to find it and to keep it lit.

— Mary Lou Retton, Olympic Gold Medal Gymnast

I just might be the kind of person you love to hate. Why? Well, I wake up every single morning happy, with a smile on my face. I can’t wait to get out of bed and head off to work. I thoroughly enjoy what I do for a living. And because I’m so satisfied in my professional life, this rolls over into the rest of my life. I have a terrific marriage, fantastic relationships with family, wonderful friends, and an active social life … and the list goes on and on.

But before you decide that you hate me too much, I should tell you: It wasn’t always this way.

When I graduated from college, I had absolutely no idea what I wanted to do. I had spent four years in school, had worked hard to get good grades, my father had spent all that money on tuition, and there I stood — diploma in hand — with a blank expression on my face. I didn’t have a clue what I should do with it. The only thing I knew for sure is what I didn’t want to do — and that was business! (Funny when I think about that now…)

So, what happened? Well, suffice it to say that the universe kicked me in the pants a few times but, ultimately, led me in the right direction during the five years that followed college. As a result, I eventually learned that I would not only do well in business but that I would absolutely love it. Still, getting there was a rocky road, akin to being in a haunted house … crawling along the walls, feeling my way, not sure where I was heading or what was around the next corner. And just like a haunted house visit, all turned out well in the end, but it was pretty scary going through the process.

Why am I telling you this? For the same reasons I wrote this book: to spare you, as you prepare to graduate, the same kind of floundering that I went through. Defining and communicating a powerful personal brand for your job search can do just that. It can save you time, energy, money, and frustration so that you don’t have to spend your next five years like I did, wondering what you really want to do with your life.

Personal branding helps you cut to the chase, allowing you to carefully define and hone in on your passions. Then, it shows you how to communicate who you are and what you have to offer. And, most importantly, it helps you to get where you want to be — in a job that you love — now, not five years from now.

Branding yourself as a college graduate can prevent you from becoming one of 75% of all people who are unhappy in their jobs. Yes, that’s right — statistics show that as many as 75% of people working today are dissatisfied in their professions. Think about that: If you’re not happy with how you make your living — where you’ll be spending about half of your waking hours — how can you lead a full, productive, and complete life? If you’re not happy in such an important part of your life as your work, how can you be completely fulfilled in the hours that are left over?

There’s just no reason why you shouldn’t feel as passionate about your work as I feel about mine. If it can happen for me, it can happen for you. And wouldn’t the world be a different place if everyone loved their work as much as that? We would be more fulfilled as a whole, our relationships would be better, and our family lives would be happier. What a difference it would make.

And that’s exactly what How YOU^TM are like Shampoo for College Graduates is all about. I created the How YOU^TM are like Shampoo series of personal branding books with this dream in mind.

So, how did I get from floundering five years out of college to becoming the author of a series of personal branding books?

Well, to start with, I’ve spent quite a few years coaching clients to develop their personal brands. Besides coaching individuals, I work as an international branding and marketing trainer and a professional speaker. Not only has this work allowed me to visit almost 70 countries, but I’ve also gotten to live and work in quite a few countries outside the U.S., too. It’s been an incredible experience!

You’ve heard of serial killers? Well, think of me as a “serial brander” — I just can’t stop branding! For many years, I marketed big-name brands like Pantene and Vidal Sassoon when I worked for corporations like Procter & Gamble and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Throughout all of that, I used an established process and framework that name-brand marketers have used for a long time to craft and communicate brands. You may not have known such a process exists, but trust me: Great brands don’t become great brands by accident! It’s only because of a powerful process put into place by good, strategic marketers that these brands make millions. And it’s only because of this process that successful brands continue to survive and thrive through economic ups and downs.

Several years ago, when I began coaching people to reach their goals and develop their individual personal brands, I started to experiment and apply these same principles of corporate branding to personal branding. I took the elements and framework used by name- brand marketers and adjusted them to fit personal brands, so that all of us — as individuals — could thrive in our careers the same way those great name brands we love have thrived in the marketplace. That’s how the personal branding system in this book was born.

Now, you may be thinking, “But Brenda, you weren’t coaching college grads, were you?” Well, yes, eventually I was! At first, as you’d expect, I mostly coached executives, but those executives had sons and daughters just like you who were getting ready to graduate from college. That’s why I took my system one step further and adapted it especially for college grads. So, I’ve witnessed firsthand just how powerful this personal branding process can be when applied to college graduates, and that’s how this book came about.

In the pages that follow, we’ll walk together through the process of building your college graduate personal brand step by step by step, helping you to craft and effectively communicate YOU^TM. That’s right — the trademarked you.

Today, you — or YOU^TM — can apply the same system in your job search that big-company marketers have used for years to build enormously successful corporate brands. Can you see now “how YOU^TM are like shampoo?” Just as a corporate marketer uses this proven process to build the mega-brand of a shampoo like Pantene or Vidal Sassoon or Head & Shoulders, you, too, will build the brand of YOU^TM. It doesn’t matter if you are looking for your first full-time job. It doesn’t matter if you don’t have any work experience or if you’ve “only” ever worked at a fast food chain. You’ll learn how to use your education and all of your experiences (even outside of work and school) to your advantage during your job search.

Since the advent of personal branding over a decade ago, several books have been written on the subject. What makes How YOU^TM are like Shampoo for College Graduates different is that it offers a complete system specifically for job-seeking college grads, covering every possible aspect of how to use personal branding to sail through your job search with a successful result. This book goes beyond the theories about personal branding to bring you practical tools that you can apply immediately to your job search!

My hope is that this book will:

•Open you up to the power that comes from successfully branding yourself.

•Show you how your job search can actually be energizing and fun.

•Expand your vision of the kind of job and career you’re capable of achieving.

•Offer you empowering tips and tools you can use before, during, and after your interviews so that you’ll feel confident and fully ready to wow your interviewers.

•Give you the satisfaction of knowing you’re reaching your full potential and starting the gratifying life that will put a smile on your face every morning.

This is probably both an exciting and scary time in your life. Up until now, your primary role has been to study, learn, and grow. Your parents have probably taken care of putting a roof over your head and food on the table. Now, for the first time, it’s going to be up to you to step up to the plate and fend for yourself. Personal branding can help you do just that, and that’s what this book is all about. Your personal brand can serve as a compass to guide you in a future direction toward a job that doesn’t just look good on paper but that feels absolutely “right” down in your bones. I want you to wake up every day, revved up about going to work.

It’s exciting for me to share with you my personal branding system tailored specifically for college grad job seekers! I hope you’ll have fun with it, too, as we move through this process together.

“Today, you — or YOU^TM — can apply the same system in your job search that big-company marketers have used for years to build enormously successful corporate brands.

Can you see now

‘how YOU^TM are like shampoo?’”