Читать книгу Ditch. Dare. Do! - William Arruda - Страница 21

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Focus on the Future:

Be Goal Oriented

Executive brand management starts with focused aspiration.

As an experienced executive, you start every project with a goal. But have you established the goals for your career? And we aren’t talking about the commitments your company asks you to write each year!

Just as a business plan guides your company, your career goals give your brand direction. Without goals, you lack the focus necessary to turn an unknown brand into a clear winner, and a solid job history into a stellar career.

We often speak with executives whose default goal is to be VP, become partner, or make it to the C-suite. But when they think long and hard about it, they find that’s often not what they’re really after.

What do you want? What do you really want?

The first step in executive brand management is to start at the beginning by visualizing the end. Once you know where you want to go, you can identify milestones that can get you there. And you can turn those milestones into actionable steps that you can take every day—moving you closer and closer to your ultimate goal.

William started his company, Reach, with the singular goal of putting personal branding on the map. With that goal in mind, he steadfastly focused on the milestone that would make it happen: Connect 10 million people, in 10 years, to the Reach personal branding methodology.

To enable his goal he planned key action items:

• A non-stop global public speaking schedule

• Building the Reach certification program (transforming coaches and HR executives into Reach personal branding experts)

• Raising the program’s visibility (by joining several career and executive coaching networking groups, delivering keynotes at career conferences, writing Personal Branding for Coaches, and more)

William’s focus on a clear milestone and specific actions made it easy to say no to opportunities (however enticing) that would detour him from his goals; for example, when he was offered several corporate branding consulting gigs, he immediately referred them to others in his network so he could continue to attract and train a community of personal branding professionals who would rapidly extend his voice and accelerate his goal. Today, there are hundreds of Reach-certified Personal Branding Strategists in 31 countries, and they have been instrumental in putting Reach Personal Branding on the map.

Like William, when you identify your goals; keep them fresh and visceral; and engage in daily, deliberate brand management, even the most audacious dreams can be achieved.

Do you know where you’re going? Are your daily decisions direct routes to goals, or off-brand detours to distraction?

DO

Document your goals; they are your treasure map—the guide to your richly satisfying future. Post them where you’ll see them, and read them every day. Your goals are gold!