Over the summer I dug dig and put together my leadership brand statement. This statement is something I come back to weekly, if not daily. Given how powerful this tool and mindset shift has been for me, I wanted to share some of my thoughts on the topic and a guide for how to develop your own leadership brand statement with the LLC community and allies.
I catch myself now and again feeling that I cannot make as big of an impact as leader from home. My rational brain however knows this is not true. If anything, I would suggest times of crisis, change, and uncertainty is when we see true leaders emerge and differentiate themselves. What has helped keep my focus on the opportunities I have to make a difference and be a leader, has been thinking about how I want to be and need to be showing up for my key stakeholders each day. For me, I think of there as being five stakeholder groups I want to be a leader to and generate value and better outcomes for; employees/colleagues, my organization, customers (both brokers & insureds), investors, and our industry. I have found this approach has helped empower me to be more deliberate with my actions and (hopefully) make a bigger impact.
What is a leadership brand?
Good leaders have a strong brand. They do what they say they will do, enabling them to build respect, trust and loyalty, similar to any other brand. Leadership brand is outward focused and is about delivering results. It incorporates the kind of leader you are and the kind of leader you are becoming/working to become.
Brands typically have aspirational mission statements, Ikea, “To create a better everyday life for many people”; Nike, “To bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete* in the world. *If you have a body, you are an athlete.”; Apple, “To bring the best user experience to customers through our innovative hardware, software and services”; Marriott International, “To enhance the lives of our customers by creating and enabling unsurpassed vacation and leisure experience.”. Like any brand, your leadership brand is a promise that you will live up to your mission statement. It should incorporate what comes naturally to you (think self-awareness strengths) and aspirational traits and qualities that will be critical to future roles.
“I want to be known for being ______________ so that I can deliver __________.”
The attached includes an 8-step framework to help you articulate your leadership brand. I promise it is not as daunting as it may seem and I encourage you to all follow the process.
Defining your Personal Leadership Brand – 8 Step Approach
With acknowledgement to Norm Smallwood & Dave Ulrich and Linda Schnabel
Step 1: What results do you want to achieve in the next year? What results do you want to achieve in the next 24-48 months? Make them SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time Bound).
The first thing you should do is ask yourself, “In the next 12, 24, 48 months, what are the major results I want to deliver?” Take into account the interests of these five groups:
• Employees
• Customers
• The organization
• Investors
• The industry
Example:
Dave and I once worked with a very talented and hardworking executive we’ll call Tricia. Her successful performance in several varied roles at her organization — she’d been an auditor, a process engineer and a customer-service manager — earned her a promotion into a general manager position, charging her with running one of the company’s largest businesses. To succeed at her first large-scale leadership position and meet the complex set of expectations she would encounter in it, she knew she needed to become more deliberate about the way she led others. In short, she knew she needed a new leadership brand, and asked us for help in forging it.
We advised Tricia to begin by focusing on the expectations of those she was working to serve, rather than on what she identified as her personal strengths. Leadership brand is outward focused; it is about delivering results. While identifying innate strengths is an important part of defining your leadership brand, the starting point is clarifying what is expected of you.
Step 2: What do you wish to be known for?
When people think about you, want do you want to be known for? Are you currently “showing up” how you would like people to perceive you? As you let down some of your guard/armour, are you conscious of the next layer(s) you are making visible?
Think of six or more descriptors that balance the qualities that come naturally to you (think self-awareness strengths) with those are critical in a future role(s).
Example:
Tricia knew she was seen as technically proficient and hardworking, but somewhat aloof.
These traits, she realized, added up to a leadership brand that would not take her very far in her new role.
With that in mind, Tricia picked six descriptors that balanced the qualities that came naturally to her with those that would be critical in her new position. She then tested her choices by sharing them with her boss, her peers, and some of her most trusted subordinates. She simply asked them, “Are these the traits that someone in this general manager role should exhibit?” Their responses helped her refine her list to ultimately include the following traits:
• Collaborative
• Deliberate
• Independent
• Innovative
• Results-oriented
• Strategic
Step 3: Define your identity
The next step is to combine these six words into three two-word phrases that reflect your desired identity. This exercise allows you to build a deeper, more complex description: not only what you want to be known for, but how you will probably have to act to get there. For example, calmly driven differs from tirelessly driven. Experimenting with the many combinations that you can make from your list of descriptor words will help you crystallize your personal leadership brand.
Example:
Tricia combined the six descriptors into the following three phrases:
• Independently innovative
• Deliberately collaborative
• Strategically results-oriented
She tested this with several colleagues, neatly pulled together what came easily to Tricia (“independently innovative” and “strategically results-oriented”) with what she could accomplish through disciplined effort (“deliberately collaborative”). Tricia was satisfied that it aptly described both the kind of leader she was and the kind of leader she was becoming.
Step 4: Construct your leadership brand statement, then test it.
In this step, you pull everything together in a leadership brand statement that makes a “so that” connection between what you want to be known for (Steps 2 and 3) and your desired results (Step 1).
Fill in the blanks:
“I want to be known for being ______________ so that I can deliver __________.”
With your leadership brand statement drafted, ask the following three questions to see if it needs to be refined:
- Is this the brand identity that best represents who I am and what I can do?
- Is this brand identity something that creates value in the eyes of my organization and key stakeholders?
- What risks am I taking by exhibiting this brand? Can I live this brand?
Example:
Tricia’s leadership brand statement read: “I want to be known for being independently innovative, deliberately collaborative and strategically results-oriented so that I can deliver superior financial outcomes for my business.”
After going through this exercise, Tricia was satisfied that she had crafted a personal leadership brand that was appropriate for her new role and within her power to live and make real.
Step 5: Make your brand identity real
Espoused-but-unlived brands create cynicism because they promise what they do not deliver. To ensure that the leadership brand you advertise is embodied in your day-to-day work, check in with those around you. Do they see you as you wish to be seen? If you say you are flexible and approachable, do others find you so?
To be sure, your leadership brand isn’t static; it should evolve in response to the different expectations you face at different times in your career.
Example:
After Tricia defined her personal leadership brand, she shared it with others. She let people know that she was evolving as a leader and invited their feedback, especially on her efforts at working collaboratively.
The exercise of forging a leadership brand and the day-to-day discipline of making it real,
Tricia said, helped her stay focused on the most important challenges of her new role.
Step 6: Live Your Brand by Linking Actions to Responses in Question 1.
Step 7: Assess Results after 3-6 Months
Are you living up to your brand statement? Are you doing what you say you will do? What could you be doing differently to ensure you are living up to your own leadership brand promise and potential? How are others perceiving you?
Step 8: Modify and/or Keep Going
There will always be room for improvement. As you continue to grow, learn and progress in your career, different roles will warrant a brand re-fresh. It is worth coming back to this exercise every time you transition into a new role, take on additional responsibilities, are looking to take on a stretch assignment, etc.
Written by Alexandra Spence
