Published By:


What's Your Leadership Brand

By Michael Stern 12th March 2008


We hear a lot today about the need for every company or product to have its own branding strategy. If you don't make a strong, consistent statement about your quality, integrity and mission, you might as well not be selling corn flakes at all.

I'm not entirely kidding. What is it but branding that makes Kellogg's Corn Flakes sell for much more than nearly-identical generic products? Kellogg's stands for generations of quality, tradition and consumer trust - and every single day that branding proves itself to be worth at least a buck a box more than the store brand.

Leaders need to define their brands because in today's winner-take-all market for leadership talent, it's not just products that benefit from brand power. Individuals who want to be known for high standards and their focus on stakeholders' needs can also get a jump on the competition.

The concept of personal leadership brands comes from U.S. consultants Dave Ulrich and Norm Smallwood, authors of the 2007 book Leadership Brand: Developing Customer-Focused Leaders to Drive Performance and Build Lasting Value. In a recent article for their publisher, Harvard Business School Publishing, the authors say that leadership brands create value just as conventional brands do: "A strong personal leadership brand allows all that's powerful and effective about your leadership to become known to your colleagues up, down, and across the organization, enabling you to generate maximum value."

You might wonder, well, wouldn't everyone just adopt the same branding? Aren't all leaders Ram-Tough, Like a Rock, "Tried, Tested and True," and The Real Thing?

Uh-uh. There's nothing worse than a brand that contradicts the actual brand experience. Tim ("Always Fresh") Hortons lost credibility when it started using pre-cooked and frozen doughnuts instead of fresh-baked. And there are many executives who call themselves leaders without displaying the vision, strategic sense or genuine concern for others that are the essence of true leadership.

The key is to adopt the right brand for you, based on your own strengths and on the objectives of your organization and your job. This ensures that you don't sell yourself as anything you're not.

In truth, most people have a brand already. For the most part, it's an unplanned image based on their past behaviour, not a conscious attempt to build a brand. The point of developing a leadership brand is to identify your strengths and weaknesses within the context of what you're expected to accomplish. That clarifies your personal mission, and has a teambuilding benefit as well: by defining what you're good at, it helps you create a team around you that compensates for your weaknesses.

To build your brand, Ulrich and Smallwood suggest you start by defining what you're supposed to be doing in your job. What's the best way for you to create value for your customers and your organization? What are your goals for developing your employees?

Then, decide what traits you wish to be known for. The authors offer a long list of positive characteristics to choose from, ranging from "accountable" to "unyielding" and "values-driven." They suggest you choose six traits, again taking into account not just what you're good at, but what outcomes your organization requires from you. Then you turn those six concepts into action steps by using them to build three two-word phrases that reflect your desired brand.

For example, if you chose the same traits as one of the authors' clients (collaborative, deliberate, independent, innovative, results-oriented and strategic), you might turn them into these three personal approaches: independently innovative, deliberately collaborative, and strategically results-oriented. Take your time: the authors suggest that it's experimenting with those different combinations that can transform a handful of keywords into your own personal brand.

Once you're done, they also suggest that you double-check the validity of your intended brand by sharing the list with your colleagues. Confirm that they represent your perceived strengths and align with the organization's goals.

It takes some effort, but I find this a useful exercise. Developing a leadership brand gives you an action plan and a guide for future behaviour. It's a reminder of what you're supposed to be doing, and a warning nudge if you're tempted to do things differently. Whenever you encounter doubts you can ask yourself if what you're about to do fits with your overall goals.

And when you step outside your brand from time to time, you'll do so in full awareness that you're going off-course - so you can explain your actions or mitigate the damage to let others know that the mission is still intact.

I don't buy every business fad that comes along. But if adopting a personal leadership brands help executives become more consistent, self-aware and results-focused, I'm lovin' it.