February 1st: the great day has arrived… in fact it has already passed, but the excitement is still very much alive! As anticipated, I had been invited by Tim Clark I went to give a talk on the Personal Branding Canvas at the Masterclass in Business Model You® in Amsterdam.
The presentation generated a lot of interest, though it was not easy to transfer the key concepts of a Canvas in less than an hour to participants for whom the concept was completely new for them. Furthermore the course participants, some of whom were very experienced business designers, had been working for almost two days on their personal business model ones. I must say that I felt very relieved when I saw them working straight away on their Canvases and were aware of their current Personal Branding Results.
Managing the transition
And what a pleasure when in the Q&A at the end I was literally bombarded with questions!
A few concerned an aspect that I had not foreseen while preparing the course: how to manage one’s online identity when in transition from one career to another? Especially when initially you are doing both professions together!
Some participants, in fact, were in the process of passing from a corporate career to freelancing, often chasing their passion, an interest in a completely different field. As Tim teaches us, however, personal interest is one of the drivers of job satisfaction.
It is not easy to answer questions like this without making generalizations. It is often very difficult to Brand yourself online when presenting two parallel public identities: sometimes this will generate an inconsistent, contradictory image, which creates doubts and confusion. You need to create some form of logical connection in the mind of the Audience (those googling you, for example), the idea that one of the professions is somehow relevant for the other.
The easier the better
Another aspect is purely strategic: if you change your profession you need leverage on some elements in order to increase your credibility and make you life easier.
For example, a much respected successful professional in the IT field was taking time her first steps as a coach, driven by the idea of helping others. After creating her Personal Branding Canvas, she discovered that it would be useful to position herself as a coach specialising in the field in which she has the most credibility: her own! Moreover, she has a personal experience of this field, she knows the problems and the desires of her “future” ex-colleagues and she can help them to improve their lives. Now she is going to test this assumption with some trials in her field. There will always be time to expand the market later, if needed…
My glamorous life
A truly fantastic day. Tim ran a perfect Masterclass, even better than the one in which I took part in Monaco in 2013! There were many practical suggestions both for teaching the Business Model You® better and using the method. And I got my second Masterclass certificate…
And in a location with a spectacular view! Amsterdam really seems to me an exciting city, filled with beautiful and dynamic people!
That’s why that evening I just could not help but… go to bed at 9:30! Could the reason be that I had got up at 4 in the morning? The glamorous life of the international trainer… eh Tim?
Amsterdam: 24h, 200mt walked from station to conference center, 1 wful sun set, bed at 9:30. The… http://t.co/neASRGknIy
Update February 6th, 2014:
Today on Business Model You® homepage! Thanks Tim!
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