Executive’s communication

The Gallup Management Journal website has an interesting interview with Blaise James, Gallup’s global brand strategist and principal.  “It’s Time to Brand Yourself” explores why now, in this challenging economic climate, personal brand is more critical than ever to your career.  Countless articles and how-to books have been written about personal brand, peddling simple prescriptions for turning anyone into a personal power brand overnight, or sooner.  Mr. James offers a common sense explanation on what a personal brand is, including the critical fact that no one’s brand starts with a blank page: “You already are a brand, whether you know it or not. Your bio, experience, skills, behaviors, appearance, even your name -they all express your brand.”

A personal brand has many elements and reputation is key to a strong personal brand. I like this anonymous quote regarding reputation: “A person’s reputation is a mixture of what his friends, enemies, and relatives say behind his back.” You can add employees, ex-employees, co-workers and classmates. Thanks to LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, ZoomInfo and whatever else you use to network, there’s a mother lode of information about you to remind your friends and enemies what you were like way back when…  LinkedIn became a new and a far more effective way to check references or to get information about prospective candidates from former colleagues and bosses than the obligatory list of candidate-supplied references of yesterday.

The most critical driver of a personal brand is communication: how well an executive can put into words his or her experience, achievements and personal strengths.  Presentation skills matter, but content matters even more.  And yet, few executives invest the time to develop a personal portfolio that can make the difference between getting a dream job or accepting second best.

“You’re every bit as much a brand as Nike, Coke, Pepsi, or the Body Shop,” wrote Tom Peters in his ground-breaking article on personal brand, published in Fast Company almost two years ago.  Mr. Peters is right when he says that your brand is your responsibility, not your company’s corporate communications. What counts is your communication on every social networking site and everything you do above and beyond your everyday job – from training your daughter’s soccer team to helping at a food bank.

An Essential List for Corporate PR

If anybody has any illusions that this recession is going to be just like the last two, here is something to change your mind. The U.S. gross domestic product decreased at a seasonally adjusted 6.2% annual rate in the fourth quarter of last year, way more than anybody expected, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal online.  The U.S. Department of Labor reports that 598,000 jobs were lost in January alone. It should not come as a surprise that every big PR agency already stated that 2009 would be tough.  Corporate PR won’t be spared from the wrath of the downturn either. Here’s a list of five critical factors to keep in mind in these demanding times.

#1 – Content

Content in PR, like cash to every business in recession, is king. Your company will still need press releases, your executives still give speeches and presentations, your website still needs new content. And, let’s not forget, social media without content is about as useful as a hole in the head. Content is absolutely essential to your business. Make sure you have people on your staff who can write and edit. You can hire outside help if absolutely necessary, just keep in mind that consultants are less than welcome when your business is suffering. The Financial Times reported last month that Siemens issued a ban on external consultants, hoping to save $386 million.

#2 – Deliver & Report

Deliver results and make sure that your senior executives know what you delivered. We all know that statistics play well, just keep in mind that not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted. Your CXOs’ speeches are remembered longer than most statistics and speeches are amazingly cost-effective for reaching your customers and other key stakeholders. Produce monthly reports, but keep them short. Anything longer than a page gets far less attention than a well-written summary.

 #3 – Extend Your Reach

We are, above all, communicators and our functional expertise and skills are essential for media relations as much as they are for internal and customer communications. Help your sales and marketing people with RFPs and RFIs. Make them stand out over your competition with clear writing and appealing visuals. Work with your HR department to improve communications with employees. Help your investor relations with better presentations. Offer your board members help with their presentations as well.

#4 – Maximize Your Channels

Maximize social media. As my colleague Mark Evans says, there are a growing number of social media that companies can use to extend their messages in new and different ways. This ranges from blogs and Twitter to video and Facebook. The key is determining the social media tools that meet your strategic needs, and then committing the resources and time to leverage them effectively.

#5 – Downsize Right

Create the worst-case scenario model to find out what is absolutely essential to deliver basic PR to your business if you have to lay people off. Keep in mind that, under Sorbanes-Oxley, companies are required to meet certain communications standards. Consider short and long-term contracts for people you want back when this recession is over. Because like all other downturns this one will end eventually.