Blog

Number 203

There's you, the essential person you are.

Obviously related, but not quite the same, is you -- the professional who shows up on the job and makes a contribution.

And then there's your professional brand.

Originally a "brand" referred to a word or symbol indicating the owner or producer of a product. Ranchers used hot irons to brand cattle. And back when soap was usually just called "soap," Pears Soap was named after the barber who invented a gentle cleaning bar.

As it's used today, the term "brand" isn't the same as a "brand name." In a branding effort, marketers try to distinguish a product, highlighting how its attributes differ from those of competitors. But a "brand" is an even broader concept than that, because it encompasses not just the qualities of a product but also how customers perceive those qualities.

Your professional brand is a reflection not only of you and what you do, but also of others' assessment of your expertise, your work product and your character. Your brand can greatly impact your career opportunities and satisfaction. And yet it might be quite different from either the real you or the high achiever you strive to be when you are on the job.

In other words, even if you are a good person, and you work really hard, there's no guarantee you'll have a strong brand that differentiates you from the competition and brings you the career success you deserve. So smart professionals manage their brands, using strategies like these:

• Do research. When marketers want to pump up a product brand, they start by getting a handle on how the product is currently perceived. They may conduct surveys or find other ways to collect customers' views. If you want to gauge your brand, gather feedback from other people. On the job, this might take the form of a "360 review" in which your bosses, employees and colleagues are quizzed by a third party about your performance. A simple approach is for you to simply ask people who rely on your work for suggestions about how you might be even more helpful. Or you might find a way to have one of your work products evaluated by the people who use it.
• Promote your work. It is not enough to build expertise and do good work. The next step is sharing the news about what you've been doing and learning. This might mean giving speeches, writing articles or sending out progress reports. Or you can show what you know in more subtle ways, like by offering your services to someone who needs your help. If you become more collaborative, you may have more opportunities to show off gracefully, by shining a light on the achievements of your whole team.
• Look in the mirror. People are more likely to regard you as successful if you present yourself as a person who is doing well. In a professional world, your aura of success is impacted by your personal style. Whether you like it or not, people are influenced by the way you dress, and speak, and carry yourself. If you feel like it's time for a bit of a makeover, look around for people who appear energetic, polished and powerful. And consider small steps that might help you acquire some of their gloss.
• Shape your online presence. The way you show up in an online search has become vital to your professional reputation. If you want to set up a meeting or call, you must assume the person you're trying to reach will Google your name. You can't get around this by doing nothing. Your employer, your university and maybe your competitors have mentioned you somewhere. And your absence from the blogosphere and other professional arenas may be regarded as saying a lot about you. So if you don't have a social media strategy, consider starting with these basics:
  • Set up your LinkedIn profile. You don't have to complete everything. You can project your brand to the world simply by typing in a few sentences in the summary section.
  • Post your work. Do a little writing about your area of expertise. Finding places to show off your work and share your insights has never been easier. Online groups are eager to attract comments and many blog sites welcome guest posts.
  • Curate. You can show what you know without creating original work. If you choose to be a "curator," it's considered legit to collect and republish others' articles, photos and infographics on a site like Scoop.it (of course with full attribution).

Number 204

It's not just that you're getting too much email. A bigger deal might be the way it can ruin your mood and change the structure of your work life. As I listen to clients, I hear growing frustration about how other people's poor email etiquette can drain your energy. Would your days be better without email abuses like these?

• An endless stream from the boss. Some people use email not so much as a way to communicate but as a form of thinking out loud. "Sandra" said that in a few hours her boss might send four or five emails, with changing views about a single topic, to her whole team. Sandra understood that he's an external processor and was using stream-of-conscious emails as a way to examine critical issues. But nobody knew which message would be safe to ignore, so the boss's ruminations created chaos. Fortunately, Sandra convinced him to adopt a new habit of exploring his thoughts in a single evolving document that he doesn't send out until he has lived with it for a day or two. But other bosses aren't so willing to change.
• No time off. Often it's not just the boss who doesn't know how to stop the constant email flow. In too many offices, it never seems to end, and you're left with no time to recharge. "Amanda" complained about "nonstop, 24/7 emailing, and then follow-up texts to ask, 'Did you get my email.' Because everyone does work from home, even in the evening and on weekends, the work/personal lines have blurred. Now everyone is always working."
• Prose that makes no sense. There's a difference between being informal and being incomprehensible. A lot of people are sick of receiving colleagues' unedited messages. Unclear messages can lead to misunderstandings or require time to sort out. And recipients may feel a bit insulted when you don't take the time to proofread and be clear.
• Big boring text blocks. Lengthy paragraphs, full of too much detail, are tough to read and don't work well in email. Effective messages:
  • Start with a descriptive subject line.
  • Are brief.
  • Use dot points or another outline format, and
  • Can be easily skimmed.
• Over-copying. People are tired of sorting through messages they didn't need to see in the first place. It's so easy to hit "reply all," but it creates such waste in the longer run.
• Tone-deaf prose. Let's remind each other that it's difficult to perceive the tone of words you send via email. Humor can fall flat and simple declarative sentences can sound rude or mean. The problem is exacerbated when insensitive senders engage with over-sensitive message recipients. So you senders: reread your messages, particularly when delicate issues may be involved. And you readers: lighten up -- it's probably not about you.
• Negativity. In addition to folks who sound more harsh than intended, there are others whose negative commentary is even more wearing. One category is the whiners, who find little ways to tuck complaints into message after message. Even more troubling are folks who write in anger. Email is not a good medium for expressing emotion, and angry messages can brew up storms in an instant.
• Forgetting how to call or visit. When anger or other emotions are involved, and when issues are complicated or delicate, email may not be the most effective means of communication. Some things are difficult to write in a few quick graphs. A better approach may be to pick up the phone or walk down the hall.
• And those annoying little things: Aside from the bigger issues, some people don't want you to send:
  • Too-long signatures, particularly those with inappropriate inspirational quotes, dense and unnecessary legalese, and logos or other images that arrive as attachments.
  • Automatic out-of-the-office responses when you're briefly away, and
  • Chain mail, even if it's funny.

There's no easy way to reduce the burden of email, but three strategies may make it more manageable:

• Develop protocols. You're not the only one who feels this way. You and your colleagues can save time and aggravation if you work out an agreement on techniques and etiquette for shaping your email exchanges. Consider topics like message formats and length, subject lines, mass cc-ing and weekend policies.
• Review in batches. There’s evidence that you’ll make better use of your time if you don’t look at email every few minutes. Some experts say the most effective way to process email is to work through your inbox at various designated times throughout the day. When you check for mail constantly, you interrupt more important tasks and waste time switching gears.
• Don't let it get to you. You can't control other people, but you are in charge of how you respond to them. If you feel like email is driving you crazy, maybe it's time to get serious about managing your stress level. Deep breathing and other mindfulness exercises are just one of the paths that might help you bring things down a notch.

Number 202

Perhaps best known for his book, "Emotional Intelligence," psychologist and prolific writer Daniel Goleman has had an enormous impact on how organizations understand leadership. In "Focus - The Hidden Driver of Excellence," Goleman says leaders, and all the rest of us, must learn to better direct our attention if we want to get things done and live full lives.

Focusing our attention in the midst of constant distractions is a big challenge in today's workplace. But neuroscience and other research demonstrates we can learn how to focus more clearly. It turns out that attention can be trained, like a muscle. Work it well and it can grow. "Focus" is not a how-to book. But in a series of essays, Goleman offers research and examples spotlighting the "elusive and under-appreciated mental faculty" of attention.

Goleman says leadership and a well-lived life require you to be nimble at focusing your attention in three ways: on yourself, on others and on the wider world:

Focusing on yourself.

It is now recognized that effective leaders typically have a high degree of what Goleman labeled "emotional intelligence." And an essential component of emotional intelligence is self-awareness. You are self-aware if you can recognize your moods and emotions and understand their impact on other people. More elements of emotional intelligence are self-management, empathy and social skills like relationship building and networking.

Goleman is intrigued by the synergy between emotional intelligence and increasingly popular approaches to training attention, like promoting "mindfulness." One way to understand mindfulness is to consider the alternative -- mindlessness -- that occurs when our minds wander and we lose track of where we are. Mindfulness training helps us build the capacity to stay in the moment and choose where we want to send our focus.

Goleman describes a mindfulness program where second graders learned to become more relaxed and able to focus on their work as a result of regular deep breathing exercises. The children lie on their backs and listen quietly as they are led through deep belly breathing. They silently count "one, two, three" with each long inhalation and exhalation. Not only can children learn in this way to be more self-controlled and aware of how they are feeling, but so can adults of any age.

Focusing on others

Excellent leaders tend to be the ones who keep some focus on other people. They try to understand things from others' perspectives. And they have the ability to sense what others are feeling and to recognize what they need.

People who lack social sensitivity are easy to spot. They may be bullies or simply unaware of those around them. Goleman says that as we move into leadership we must be aware of a trap. Research suggests that as we climb up a hierarchy we tend to lose our focus on lower ranking colleagues. But where a leader is able to maintain a balanced focus, including empathy, the result can be greater employee engagement and better team results.

Focusing on the wider world

Goleman urges today's leaders to take a wider view, to consider the environmental and worldwide economic implications of whatever they may be doing. He says leaders with a strong focus on the big picture are not only good listeners but also good questioners. They step back from immediate challenges and take a longer view. They inspire innovation by making new connections within patterns that at first may seem to be unrelated.

Balanced leadership requires systems thinking, but it is seldom easy. Goleman says that a blind spot in the human brain may contribute to the problem. Our ability to focus in and fine tune is part of the apparatus that has paid off in human survival. But our brains haven't evolved to think about huge systems, and learning to do so can be exhausting.

Sometimes it's not easy to know where to focus, whether on immediate problems or the broader future. But Goleman says we can build the ability to focus our attention, and get better at making choices about where to look.