Was the concept of personal branding started way back in 1997, when Tom Peters’ wrote “The Brand Called You” in Fast Company magazine? Or was it before that? I think years before. Think of actress Mae West, her brand was definately sex. Not just sex, but SEX.  She ran with it and was a success. So, it does not matter when or how it started, it is a smart and legitimate career practice not just practiced by actors, but used by entrepreneurs, CEOs, and regular workers who want to distinguish themselves from the crowd.

How to do this? First take charge of your career and your life by constructing your very own personal brand and hit bullseye everytime. Or at least most times.

First and foremost know who you are. Your brand should be as near to who you really are. Then run with it.

Identify your passion. Your brand won’t stand the test of time unless it’s based on something you feel strongly about and want to do for the rest of your life.

Specialize. Plant your banner in a niche that’s narrow enough for you to stand out in. Look at what you already do better than anyone else, and concentrate on keeping your skills sharp in that area.

Market yourself. Position yourself as a service provider. Let your manager and co-workers know what you’re capable of and what you want to do. Think of yourself as a CEO, even though you have an employer. Your career is ultimately your responsibility, after all.

Keep a record or scorecard. You know that setting goals is important to your career progress, right? Decide what you want your brand to accomplish, and establish some milestones—your next promotion, a new client, a completed project, etc. Track your brand’s success over time.

Source: Fast Company: Tom Peters “The Brand Called You

You don’t have to be rich to be a philanthropist, you don’t even have to give money. Without hands-on-volunteers, many organizations would soon fold. However, if you do give money or it is your plan to do so, there are some things to think about.

I usually give money to organizations based on how I have been personally affected by certain illness or situations, some I support because of heart tugs. As with all things you should be discerning when you give your hard-earned ‘‘m-o-n-e-y’ or your valuable personal ‘t-i-m-e’ to charitable organizations. How you give and for whatever reason you give, make sure charities;

1. match your principles. Know what they stand for and most important, does what they do match up to what they say they stand for and what you want to support?;
2. truly back what you believe in. While it is nice to be generous and giving, give to support only what you believe in. If you get a telephone call or email and are asked to give as little as a dollar, don’t do it if the cause does not meet with your beliefs or goes against the grain of who you are. And don’t feel guilty about saying no, because what you do no support, somebody else does.

One of my solid commitments is to give to and support charities in my country before I give to an outside country for a similar need. It is like paying myself first.

If you want to check charities, Charity Choices is a good place to start.

I offer quotes for the heart, mind, and soul to end one year and start another. I am hopeful that some will make you go ‘mmmmm.’

• You don’t choose your family. They are God’s gift to you, as you are to them. —Desmond Tutu
• There are people who have money and people who are rich. —Coco Chanel

• Mankind’s greatest achievements have come about by talking, and its greatest failures by not talking. —Stephen Hawking
• Control is not leadership; management is not leadership; leadership is leadership. —Dee Hock
• Statistics are no substitute for judgment. —Henry Clay
• Science is simply common sense at its best. —Thomas Huxley
• There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns. —Edward de Bono
• Succeeding is not really a life experience that does that much good. Failing is a much more sobering and enlightening experience. —Michael Eisner
• Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them. —Paul Hawken

• Sometimes you’ve got to let everything go—purge yourself. If you are unhappy with anything, whatever is bringing you down, get rid of it. Because you’ll find that when you’re free, your true creativity, your true self comes out. —Tina Turner
• And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. —Anais Nin
• The arithmetic of life does not always have a logical answer. —Inshirah Abdur-Rauf

Happy New Year to all.

Vannie Ryanes

Sometime earlier in the year in one of the many forums I belong to, a question like , “Do you share business tips or do feel they take from your own business.” I do not remember the actual wording, but I kept my response because I thought it was a good one. Hey no shyness here

 ”…I too am a sharer, I always have been. I think that is my slight edge in business and in personal life. That may not make sense but it works for me. I am always ready to share an idea, etc., I often say “Have you thought of this or that?” I have known people who say, I never tell everything I know. The truth is no one is asking for that, but a sharing a tip is often so appreciated it comes back two-fold.

This question seems to be two-part. How do you feel about sharing and do you share when it may have a negative impact on your business? I say sharing is no big deal, it is always good to share. It is my firm belief that your circle grows wider when you do. Also, I do not think sharing success ideas have a negative impact on any particular business.”

I believe that you empower yourself by sharing. That being said, I had to learn early on to memorialize my contributions in meetings

Referrals and networking top tactics for job hunters

     What’s the best way to land a new job? High rates of unemployment make that an urgent question for many people. A study of more than 700 job seekers who found employment between July 2009 and January 2010, conducted by the IMPACT Group*, identified these winning tactics:

Referrals from inside the hiring organization were the most successful strategy, cited by 18 percent of job seekers. Social networks like LinkedIn+, Facebook, and Twitter+ helped candidates identify opportunities for referral. Referrals from outside the organization were successful for 9 percent of job hunters.

Posting résumés online was successful for 8 percent of job seekers, the same as in 2003.

Networking was most effective for older workers (50 and up), with 46 percent reporting that it led to employment. For candidates earning more than $100,000, networking was successful for 50 percent.

Never under estimate the power of being kind and friendly, I got my dream job because a former coworker gave my name to a director at her job. Although I was not looking, I have never turned down a job interview. I went, they liked me, I like them. They held the job for a month while I waited for my bosses  return from vacation,  and to give proper notice.

Read Harvey Mackay’s book (from Amazon) about networking basics, Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty: The Only Networking Book You’ll Ever Need Mackay says it is “the only networking book you’ll ever need. His advice? Do not disregard people because of their job title. A store clerk may have a mucky-muck relative.  

Read this interesting Wall Street Journal article How to search for a job online. And finally, connect with me :) my profile at: LinkedIn my Twitter page: @Vannie_Ryanes

Success depends on a certain amount of luck, but smart people know not to leave success entirely up to chance. In the book Work Your Strengths, the authors identify discuss the 12 strengths that are essential to success. Do you have these skills?

Response inhibition–do you act first, think second? Do you have the ability to think *before* you act?

Working memory–are you good at emembering information? can you remember information while you are performing complex or detailed tasks?

Emotional control–do you or can you control counterproductive feelings such as anger, impatience?

Sustained attention–do you have the ability to focus on the immediate job? Oh look, a shiny thing (LOL)

Task initiation–do you sit and plan rather than just get started. When I was in my 20’s, I worked with a young woman who always said to our boss when asked if she had done a task, “Nooo, but, I’m just fixin to now.” In the words of Nike, Just Do It!

Planning and prioritizing–do you know what is important and what to do first?

Organization–do you have tools and resources available when you need them?

Time management–do you use time as efficiently as possible?

Goal-directed persistence—do you set goals and move steadily toward them?

Flexibility– do you have the ability to adapt to changing circumstances? Always have a back up plan.

Perspective—can you see the big picture and your role in that picture?

Stress tolerance—what is your stress tolerance? do you have the ability to deal with stress?

If you don’t have the about traits, I believe that some things can be learned. I had to learn emotion (Impatience) control. I was fortunate, I had a best friend to complain and b**ch to. However, instead of saying you poor thing, she told me, “Everyone is not like you.”

Check out the book Work Your Strengths: A Scientific Process to Identify Your Skills and Match Them to the Best Career for You.

How can you be sure you are hiring the right person for the job?

     I once had to select someone to work with me for a complicated and sensitive project. She was so good that my boss offered here a permanent job, stayed with us for 15 years. Nothing was ever said to me after the hire, but I was often asked to sit in on prospective employee interviews.

I share this list as an executive assistant. I found that my boss and I often had different ideas as to who would make a good employee. It’s not easy to determine whether a job candidate will fit into your company culture; however, there are some universal signs that indicate an applicant may not be right for your business. Here is the order of interview importance as I see it:

1. Improper dress.This may appear to be insignificant in the larger sense, but this tells me that the job applicant did not do his or her homework about the company or the job; or worse, did and chose to ignore the information.

2. Criticizes former bosses, co-workers, or competitors. Not only is this behavior in poor taste, it also shows that the candidate doesn’t take responsibility for creating positive relationships.

3. Focuses on the next job.Interest in career development is fine, but watch out for candidates who ignore the realities of the job you’re actually trying to fill right now. Employees who are constantly looking to move up may put their energy into pursuing a promotion instead of handling their current job.

4. Displays excessive interest in job perks.Vacation time, sick time, and other perks are important issues, but they shouldn’t be the first and only issues a candidate asks about.

5. Takes credit for team efforts.Candidates who do not share the credit for business accomplishments are less likely to be team players.

The holidays will be here before you know it, here are a few simple ways to earn cash for little pleasures and goodies for yourself and your family. 

You won’t get rich with these money-generating ideas, but you can take the results to the bank (even if it’s only your piggy bank):
    • Sell photos to stock photo websites. Stock photography sites offer generic photos of landscapes, animals, and other nonspecific subjects to designers and publishers. Go through your travel photos or your pictures of Fluffy, Fido and great scenery, then check out sites like istockphoto.com and shutterstock.com.

• Sell your books. Go through your bookshelves. Are you hanging on to your old college textbooks? Be realistic when setting prices, are you really going to read A Tale of Two Cities ever again? You can sell books online or try a local second-hand bookshop. If you have enough books you can have a garage sale–get your bookaholic friends involved and set up your own book space in the yard.  

• Sign up for consumer focus groups. Corporations and nonprofits doing market research need opinions from regular people. Make yourself available for focus groups, and you could earn $50 to $100 or so for an hour or two of sharing your thoughts and reactions to ideas. And don’t forget those online survey’s,  MyPoints.com is one of the best, your points add up quickly and you are never added to odd lists.

Why fight over shadows?

There is a fable about a wealthy man who hired a peasant and his camel for a long trip across the desert. The rich man rode the camel while the peasant led it across the dry sands.

In the hot noonday sun, they stopped for a rest. Since there was no shade but the camel, they began arguing about who had more of a right to sit in the camel’s shadow: the peasant who owned the camel, or the rich man who had rented the camel to ride.

Their voices grew louder and louder as the argument and shouting went on. The camel began to get jittery and anxious because of the loud voices of the men. Finally, the camel became so frightened, he ran away –leaving both men stranded in the middle of the burning desert without any shade at all.

Moral of story: Don’t let yourself get so determined to be right that you lose what you’re fighting for.

We all think we know what success is and how to achieve it. But sometimes we don’t know what success is until it bites us in the face and nips at our nose. Usually (because nothing is 100%) success is based on our personal goals and achievements that are uniquely our own and are shaped by our individual personalities.

   Where is your success? Examine your own ideas about success, then;

Learn to recognize your success. What will your success look like or feel like? Will you be able to recognize it when you reach it? (Trying to keep up with this one or that one is not the way to success.) When you do the best to your ability isn’t that success too? The truth is you can’t do more than you can do.

Define success in your own terms. Forget about other people and their vision of success. Think about what you value, not what others value or say you must or should do.

What do you need to do?  Identify specific things that must be achieved before you reach your own goal. Select one thing that you have already done, and two or three things you can do right now, that will bring you closer to your ultimate success. Then start working on them–today.

Are you close to success now? Take a look at what you’ve already accomplished, and compare your current situation with your position when you started working toward your goals. If you are not closer, maybe you are allowing excuses to get in the way of accomplishment.

After looking at your accomplishments are you closer to your success than you thought?

Kudos.