With all the buzz about personal branding, I’m often asked, why would a company care about an employee’s personal brand?
Every industry along with the companies within that industry have acronyms that they use exclusively. J.L.P. is one acronym used by well known international retail giant. It stands for “just like picture”. And, now copycat retailers try to customize that acronym with one of their own, LLP (“looks like picture”). “Just like picture” means that they want a merchandising display to look “just like the picture” that was sent from their corporate or regional headquarters. No variances, nothing adjusted to the locale, nothing different will be accepted – they want it “just like picture”.
Yet, what do you do when the “picture” was built for a store in a large metropolitan area where people utilize public transportation readily and there’s a store virtually on every corner and your store resides in a rural population, where there is no public transit and it’s 200 miles between cities? Does “just like picture” work or does this cookie cutter system make the company feel aloof, corporate and not local?
Every conference I go to I see slides and handouts stating – think global but act local.
I read blogs and Twitter tweets saying when a company gets big they need to remember to act small. It’s about engagement and interaction; conversation not interruption.
I hear people in communities share stories about “their store”, “their city”, “their company” because their desire is really to have ownership in organizations (and stores they shop) and feel a valued part of them.
More organizations are putting social media into their 2010 plan and I see this as a good thing. It is forcing companies to delve into a thought that personal brand strategists have known all along – people do business with people. While the company sets the tone and the culture, the person who is working directly with your customer “is the company” to them.
This week’s #brandchat conversation on Twitter discussed whether people “tweeting for a company under a company’s Twitter account are seen as corporate drones”. Unanimously, BRANDidos (a term of endearment for those who chat on brandchat) shared that a company IS its people.
Here are some stellar nuggets from the conversation:
Can you imagine if Ford listened to “horse and buggy experts”? Would they have unveiled a Twittering car at the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) this week? Would they be so well known for their corporate social media connections?
Why do employees need to manage their personal brand?
Because they already have one and if a company provides the tools for them they can effectively deliver on the corporate brand promise through strengths that are uniquely theirs with an authentic sincerity and genuineness that is just… priceless. If a company doesn’t provide the tools for employees to understand, harness the power of and manage their personal brand, they are truly throwing their customer experience out to the wind or they are making it so “JLP” that it thwarts relationships and the personal connections that customers seek.
Does helping create a personal brand encourage an employee to leave?
This is an age old question tied to “what if I train my employees and they leave?” And, here the answer comes in the form of a question – “Which is worse? The trained employee who MIGHT leave or the untrained employee who stays and represents your company, controls your assets and affects your bottom-line?”
Employees come with their reputation and their circle of influence and that is currency in our hyper-connected society. Relationships have even more value in today’s world of business as there are more opportunities and more choices competing for your customers money. When a relationship become cold and ceases to no longer be mutually beneficial, somebody leaves – we see this in friendships, in marriages and in businesses.
Business is built on relationships and relationships require people.
Author:
Maria Elena Duron | chief buzz officer, speaker and coach. Share your greatest personal branding challenge in the Brand NOT Brag Contest to win a strategic 5-point personalized plan to create positive word of mouth for you!
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You should cut out this (dull) wordy intro:
“Facilitating CEO masterminds, round tables and brainstorming sessions, face to face and online, has given me the chance to witness the company leadership thought process. And,with all the buzz about personal branding,”
and get straight to the point:
“Why would a company care about an employee’s personal brand?”
Does anybody agree?
Okay, I’ll go with you on that. That is the direct question and topic. Done and edited!
Great Article!
Especially with twitter and blogs and such. This is dead on!
-Rudi
Thank you, Rudi! I appreciate you stopping by and sharing your thoughts!
Maria: Love your points and point of view!
You ask the real world question that most companies ask: why should we train our employees (because they’ll leave). Mother Teresa said: Love even though you will be betrayed. Yes, some employees leave – but they are more likely to stay and represent you well if you treat them as human assets. Retailers make a huge investment in marketing and then the revenue is lost when the transaction and the transactional environment is painful for the consumer.
Oh, Nance, thank YOU! That means so much coming from you. I love your Mother Teresa quote and agree 100%. It truly is better to have loved and lost than to never of loved at all. Yet, it’s an question that employers struggle with. In Richard’s comments following, he makes some great points about that. The culture of a company is more important than anything else. It is a core part of the PRODUCT which is the first part of marketing and without it I don’t care how great your place or timing is or how creative and fantastic your promotion is – if your product sucks….it sucks! Companies need to realize that “human resources” are a key part of the product and people will “look over” perfectly good services or people and pay much more to find someone that has the right relational attitude that meets their definition of “good to great”.
Thanks, Nance!!
Think the age old question of why train employees who might leave is prompting employers to be more selective and chose pre-trained or easily trainable employees. (I read that somewhere but can’t recall where, might even have been here). Think it’s important what you said, that employees bring a circle of influence to the company, but also that the company can help the employee to broaden that circle and influence even more (even if they leave if they have positive feelings for the company they won’t go to a competitor).
Thank you, Richard! I agree with you and think that now, in our current economic client, this becomes even more apparent. Companies can broaden someone’s circle and engage a loyalty in that person that they become an ambassador for the company. Organically, they will engage their circle of friends, family members, and connections with a third party validation that cannot be bought through any simple campaign or delivered by anyone else. It has to come from the person that, that circle knows, likes and trusts.
Nance hit it right on the button, if a company invests in the branding of their “stars”, those stars will feel valued and are more likely to feel like partners in growing the organization. I recently had a client express this same concern when I explained the importance of branding their “star team”. Her response was that if they brand them and they become well known, everyone will try to woo them away. While that may be true, the employee’s response to that wooing also depends on how valued those “stars” feel within their own organization. If they really are “stars” they’re reputation is probably well known outside the organization anyway. Why not make them feel that they are valued by investing in them even more. They will be less likely to leave when they see they are valued by their own organization.
Well said, Doris! I do hope that companies see how much their investment in “human” resources can benefit and provide value that’s viral!