IQ gets you the job. EQ gets you promoted. Lead like you would like to be led and treat people like you would like to be treated. Be the type of leader you would want to work for.
Differentiate yourself in your current job to compete for your next job
These differentiators will help you stand out from other individuals who are interviewing for the same position.
Searching for a new job? What is your value proposition?
How you can differentiate yourself from other job seekers in the job search process? Highlight your power skills, and do your research.
What Steve Jobs and Albert Einstein can teach us about networking and risk-taking
Get out of your comfort zone. Introduce yourself to someone new. By doing so, you never know what opportunities might open for you.
Graduates: embrace change, never violate the trust of others
For the past eight years, in my role as Vice Chairman of Drexel University, I have been honored to address in person the graduates of Drexel’s College of Medicine – M.D.s, Ph.D.s and graduates who earned master’s degrees.
You are now unemployed. What should you do?
If you don’t think you will be called back to your job, you need to move forward and search for another job. The following guidance, developed over years of personal experience and coaching others, will help you in this process.
Why leaders should encourage others to soar like Icarus
Leaders should encourage others to get outside of their comfort zone, to take a risk and to try new things, so that they grow as individuals and fly high.
Be different! The key to business and career success
My book is based on personal experience serving in
the trenches, rising to the position of CEO of PQ Corporation, as well as what I
have learned by serving as a director on public, private, private equity and
nonprofit boards. The following advice is excerpted from my book.
Want to differentiate yourself from your peers? Learn entrepreneurship skills
Regardless of whether you start a business, work at a startup or work at an established company, entrepreneurship skills will differentiate you from your peers and help you land your first and subsequent jobs.
Differentiate yourself to win that next job
As an applicant interviewing for a new position, are you prepared to address the following areas?
How to Build Your Personal Brand and Achieve Professional Success
Article originally published in the Philadelphia Business Journal on September 25, 2018
Business Brands and Personal Brands
All of us are familiar with a business brand. It’s the marketplace recognition of the promise of a company or professional services firm to meet or exceed the high expectations of its customers or clients in the delivery of products or services. Less familiar is a personal brand, which is the recognized promise of an individual to help a client or employer to be successful in their business.
Customers and clients buy from companies with strong brands, such as Nike, Mercedes, Apple, Google and Starbucks, to name a few. These companies have a reputation for consistently offering high-quality products or services and delivering a great customer experience.
Companies with a great brand reputation are often not the lowest price offering in the marketplace but offer perceived value for the price charged. The strength of their brand gives these companies a competitive advantage. They become the preferred provider in their marketplace. They are the companies that customers and clients want to do business with, and they hold a significant market share within their market.
The same holds true for personal brands. Individuals develop a reputation such that clients want to do business with them. Employers want to promote them to their next job within the company or hire them as new employees. They differentiate themselves and develop a competitive advantage over their peers.
Ram V. Iyer of The Business Institute writes, “Personal branding is the intentional identification, packaging and marketing of a person’s mission, strengths, capabilities, talents, background, appearance, etc. as a brand. A big objective of personal branding is to establish a specific image or impression of the person in the mind of others that evokes positive emotions.”
Iyer continues, “If you build a strong personal brand, the benefits could increase your popularity, credibility, prestige, customer loyalty and market differentiation; it could attract new (and the right) clients, partners, employees and build bigger networks; and it could increase your perceived value (ability to charge higher prices) in the marketplace while negating your competition.
“Personal branding involves self-packaging – combining your mission, strengths, capabilities, talents, background, appearance, etc. – to define your uniqueness.”
So, as an individual, how do you build your personal brand?
How to build your Personal Brand:
- Do your job and do it well. Develop a reputation within your company,
client base and industry as someone who achieves results, is a problem
solver and facilitator with high emotional intelligence, is an individual
who improves business processes and is someone who brings people
together to find common ground. - Develop your reputation as a thought leader – a recognized authority in
your field of expertise. Get what you have accomplished and are
accomplishing out in front of an audience. Volunteer to speak in front of
groups. Help others be successful. - Write articles or blogs on LinkedIn. Develop a website that can feature
your articles and share your views on industry trends and on how to be an
effective leader. Exercise caution not to criticize the company at which
you work or its leaders and don’t reveal confidential information. Build
an email list of individuals who would be interested in what you convey
and send them what you write. - Develop your networking skills. Attend industry conferences and
network with other attendees. Your goal should not be to hand out as
many business cards as possible at these events, but to develop
relationships with a small number of attendees. Connect people with
common interests or who can be helpful to each other. Become well
known by others within your industry. - Hone your leadership skills. Become known as an individual who creates
a culture in which employees are empowered and encouraged to develop
a sense of ownership in what they do. Develop a reputation for holding
people accountable for results, as well as a boss people want to work for.
Become known as someone who develops future leaders. - Develop a reputation for honesty and integrity. People will not want to do
business with people they don’t trust. If you make a commitment to
someone, be sure to keep that commitment. She may have made a
commitment to others based on your commitment to her. - Always have and project the right attitude. It is a significant determinant
of your success. Develop a reputation for seeing a world of possibilities
and abundance, vs. seeing nothing but limitations and scarcity.
Individuals with positive attitudes move forward in their career. Those
with a negative attitude do not. - Always be on a journey to be the best in the world at what you do.
Follow the above advice to build your personal brand. It will help you advance your career, especially when in transition to your next job. When employers vet potential new employees, they look for the traits identified above.
Stan Silverman is founder and CEO of Silverman Leadership. He is a speaker, advisor and nationally syndicated writer on leadership, entrepreneurship and corporate governance. Silverman earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemical engineering and an MBA degree from Drexel University. He is also an alumnus of the Advanced Management Program at the Harvard Business School. He can be reached at Stan@SilvermanLeadership.com. Follow Silverman on LinkedIn here and on Twitter, @StanSilverman.
Advance Your Career by Being Different from Your Peers
Article originally published in the Philadelphia Business Journal on August 28, 2018
People advance in their careers by differentiating themselves from their peers, just as businesses differentiate themselves from their competitors. An individual’s track record of accomplishments, skills and the experience gained in previous jobs can be used to achieve that peer differentiation.
Recently I had lunch with a college sophomore at Drexel University who was just finishing up his first six-month co-op work assignment at a company before returning to school. The co-op program is an opportunity for students to work full-time in their field to gain valuable hands-on experience. I asked him what he had learned during his co-op job and what he contributed to the organization.
He responded with the many ideas he offered to improve the organization’s business processes. Because his suggestions fell on deaf ears, he thought his experiences at this company would not help build his resume, which is one of the most important things anyone can do regardless of where one is in their career.
I told him to the contrary, his focus on continuous improvement is exactly what might make his resume stand out from the dozens submitted for a job opening and get him an interview. A commitment to continuous improvement, among other factors, is a differentiator for any job candidate.
In November 2017 I wrote an article headlined, “Eight ways to differentiate yourself to land that next job,” in which I identified traits attractive to potential employers. Employers will want to know if you possess these traits. How you respond to the following questions will differentiate you from your peers.
1. Are you results oriented?
You will be asked about the results that you achieved in your previous positions. How did those results support the goals of your organization, or those of a customer or client? Show how you have been innovative and have exercised initiative. A potential employer will assess what you can do for their company, based on what you accomplished at your previous company.
2. Are you customer/client-focused?
All employees have internal and/or external customers/clients. If you are in a staff position, your job is to help other staff and line organizations within your company be successful in achieving their goals. If you are in a line position, your job is to help your company’s clients or customers achieve their goals to be successful in their businesses. How have you done so?
The Holy Grail of any business is to be the preeminent preferred provider to its market and the company that customers/clients will first choose to go to for products or services. How have you helped your previous employer travel the journey to be the preferred provider to its market?
3. Do you embrace continuous improvement?
In your previous jobs, did you challenge paradigms and the accepted ways of doing things within your area of responsibility if you felt there was more effective or efficient approaches to accomplishing your organization’s goals?
4. How do you de-risk your decisions?
You may have sole authority to make a decision that you deem risky. The way you de-risk that decision is by asking others for their opinions. It is not a weakness to ask others for their views – it’s a strength. The decision is still yours, but you get the benefit of others who may see the issue in a different light. Share examples of how you have de-risked your decisions.
5. What is your leadership style?
You should share your expectations and jointly develop goals with your direct reports without micro-managing how those goals are achieved. You should help create a sense of ownership in your employees for what they do, and hold them accountable for results.
6. Are you effective at selling your ideas?
People who are in sales aren’t the only ones who sell. Everyone is selling their ideas to their boss, their peers, the teams they serve on and to their direct reports. This requires good presentation skills. It also requires good listening skills, not only to address objections, but to be open to other ideas. Discuss how you have sold your ideas to your organization, and demonstrate that you listen and value the opinions of others.
7. Do you keep commitments?
People who keep commitments engender trust. Without trust, no organization can properly function.
Don’t make a commitment unless you can keep it. If you find that for whatever reason, you can’t keep a commitment, let the other person know immediately. She might have made a commitment to another based on your commitment to her.
8. Do you fit the culture?
Prospective employers will want to know if you are a good fit. Conversely, you will want to determine if the culture of a prospective employer is a good fit for you. Stay away from a company that has a reputation for unethical dealings with employees or with customers, or has a toxic culture.
The key to landing your next job is differentiating yourself, demonstrating that you are an effective leader and developing a reputation of achieving results within your field. Do this well, and employers will seek you out.
Stan Silverman is founder and CEO of Silverman Leadership. He is a speaker, advisor and nationally syndicated writer on leadership, entrepreneurship and corporate governance. Silverman earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemical engineering and an MBA degree from Drexel University. He is also an alumnus of the Advanced Management Program at the Harvard Business School. He can be reached at Stan@SilvermanLeadership.com.