What is the Value of Your Career Brand?
25 November 2020
Whether you have intentionally crafted it, reflected upon it, determined it, or changed it, if you have a career then you have a career brand. Your career brand is the story or imagery others have about you in the context of career.
Researchers have identified three components of career brand:
- Brand Appeal
- Brand Differentiation
- Brand Recognition
Your Brand Appeal reflects others response to your brand. You can think about this in terms of the popularity, admiration, and prestige that is attached to your career brand. Your Brand Differentiation is the degree to which you stand out from the crowd and are recognised for the value of your uniqueness. And Brand Recognition reflects the ease with which others recognize, or think about, you in your field.
Your career brand is something that can have more or less value. The more value your career brand has the more you can use it to have impact. If you want to have impact, make a difference, spread ideas and have influence then it is useful to be aware of the value of your career brand.
A scale developed by researchers called the Personal Brand Equity presents 12 items to help you quantify the value of your career brand. Run through each statement and give yourself a number according to the following scale.
1 = strongly disagree 2 = disagree 3 = neither agree or disagree 4 = agree 5 = strongly agree
- I have a positive professional image among others.
- I have a positive professional reputation.
- I am appealing to work with.
- My professional strengths are clear.
- I am considered a better professional compared to others.
- I am regraded as delivering higher professional value compared to others.
- I am a preferred candidate for projects and tasks.
- I have a reputation for producing high value results.
- My name is well known in my professional field.
- I am known in my professional field.
- I am known outside of my immediate network.
- I am often recommended by others to their professional contacts.
Source: Gorbatow, S., Khapova, S. N., Oostrom, J. K., & Lysova E. I. (2020) Personal brand equity: Scale development and validation. Personnel Psychology.
Take some time to reflect on your answers. Your brand may well be appropriate for the level of impact you want to have, it may also be totally appropriate for the competitiveness of your field. Few people will give themselves a 5 for each statement and many people will find they don’t agree with some statements. This is OK; the scale simply gives you information that you may wish to use to guide ongoing career actions.
As always, wishing you a flourishing career.
Katherine