TIGblogs TIG | TIGblogs GROUP TIGBLOGS LOGIN SIGNUP
Temmylade's Blog
Temmylade's Blog
« previous 5


Brand yourself!
Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

What is it that all successful companies have mastered -- and what job-seekers looking to advance in their careers need to master? What is it about Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Starbucks, Disney, and McDonald's? What makes a consumer buy one product over another -- and makes one job-seeker much more sought after than others? The answer is marketing, but more specifically it is the power of branding. And branding isn't just for products anymore.
Branding can be described as many things, but it's best defined as a promise… a promise of the value of the product… a promise that the product is better than all the competing products… a promise that must be delivered to be successful. Branding is the combination of tangible and intangible characteristics that make a brand unique. Branding is developing an image -- with results to match.
Branding (some call it self-branding when talking about individuals) is essential to career advancement because branding helps define who you are, how you are great, and why you should be sought out. Branding is your reputation. Branding is about building a name for yourself, showcasing what sets you apart from others, and describing the added value you bring to a situation.
Most job-seekers are not proactive in establishing and building their career brand, letting their actions speak for them when seeking promotions or new jobs. But why not take the time to master some very basic tactics that can help build your career brand and make you a much more attractive employee or job-seeker? Remember, if you don't brand yourself, others will for you. And while you may be happy and secure in your job now, you really never know when that will change.
Management guru Tom Peters, writing in his book The Brand You50 (Reinventing Work): Fifty Ways to Transform Yourself from an "Employee" into a Brand That Shouts Distinction, Commitment, and Passion! states: “Regardless of age, regardless of position, regardless of the business we happen to be in, all of us need to understand the importance of branding. We are the CEOs of our own companies: Me, Inc.” He adds, “You're not defined by your job title and you're not confined by your job description.”
This article takes you through five easy tactics for building and strengthening your career brand.
Gain Experience/Track Accomplishments
Building your brand begins with tracking your past accomplishments and gaining strategically important new experiences. Your accomplishments are the foundation of your career brand.
But before you seek out new work, take the time to plan and focus on what you want your brand to stand for -- and develop a strategy for gaining experience in areas of your brand in which you are weak.
So, besides doing your job, ask for new and challenging assignments that will build your brand. Consider freelancing or consulting. Use volunteering to gain experience. If you're a student, seek out multiple internships.
Complete Education/Training
For many careers, a minimum amount of education is necessary, but to excel in your career you may need to complete additional education, training, or certifications. Getting additional education can greatly enhance your career brand.
It may be hard in terms of time and finances, but find a way to do it. Some employers even offer an educational reimbursement benefit.
If you are unsure if you need more education -- and you probably do -- seek out a mentor, someone highly respected in your field (who has branded himself or herself well), and ask for advice.
Promote Yourself
You can have an amazing brand, but if no one knows about it, you are not going to have much success with your career development. And no one more than you has more reasons to promote your brand.
Throw modesty out the window? There is a fine line between bragging and promoting -- and you need to learn it -- but it's always better to err on the side of promoting your brand than not.
One of the oldest tools of promotion for job-seekers is the resume, and you certainly need to start there by listing all your key accomplishments, skills, and education on your resume. You may even have your positioning statement (qualifications summary) on your resume… but don't stop there.
Begin developing two career portfolios -- a print one and an online one. If you don't have a personal Website, now is the time to buy a domain (such as myname.com) and let the world read all about the benefits of your brand. Your portfolio should include all important brand artifacts: resume(s), mission statement, detailed accomplishments list, samples of work, articles and working papers, speech transcripts, awards and honors, testimonials, and more.
One interesting trend we've seen is of employers “Googling” the names of prospective job-seekers -- typing each name into one or more Internet search engines -- and basing initial candidate screening decisions partly on the number (and quality) of hits for each job-seeker. The lesson? Your brand needs to have a strong online presence.
And finally, don't forget to promote your brand on the job. Workers often assume the boss knows your accomplishments, but often times s/he does not. Certainly at review time, have a list of all you have achieved since your last review, but also consider finding ways to let the boss know your successes throughout the year.
Become an Expert
Nothing builds credibility in a career brand more than establishing yourself as an expert in your field.
Start by writing articles that showcase your knowledge -- and getting them published (ideally) in noteworthy media outlets. Consider self-publishing.
Seek out conferences and meetings where you can give speeches and presentations.
Play up awards and other recognition that can help label you an expert.
Get quoted by offering your thoughts, ideas, and opinions to journalists and reporters.
Consider constructing a professional Website where you can publish all your articles and speeches.
Build Relationships
Nothing in marketing is more powerful than a promotion tool called word-of-mouth, which can be defined as what people say about you.
Thus, nothing is more powerful in building your career brand than what your network of contacts -- your friends, colleagues, customers, clients, and former bosses -- say about you and your set of skills, education, and accomplishments.
And keeping your network strong involves nothing more than relationship building. Keep in good contact with your network and be sure they know of your most recent successes.
But the best brand-builders don't stop with their current network; these folks are in constant network-building mode. Search out new professional associations as well as the growing number of online networking communities.
Final Thoughts
Once you identify and build your brand, remember to continue strengthening and protecting it. There will always be competing brands (job-seekers) ready to fill any gap you leave behind. You are indeed founder and CEO of Me, Inc., and the more you do to cultivate your career brand, the more successful you'll be with your current employer and in the job-search.



October 7, 2008 | 10:36 AM Comments  1 comments

Tags:


Memorial Conference on Genocide in Rwanda 2004.
Related to country: Rwanda

Translations available in: English (original) | French | Spanish | Italian | German | Portuguese | Swedish | Russian | Dutch | Arabic

The silence that had greeted genocides in the past must be replaced by a global clamour, and a willingness to call what was happening by its true name, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said this morning at the opening of a one-day conference in memory of the genocide in Rwanda 10 years ago.
The Memorial Conference on the Rwanda Genocide, which had started with a minute of silence for the victims, was co-chaired by the Foreign Ministers of Rwanda and Canada and moderated by Ruth Iyob, Director of the Africa Programme, International Peace Academy, and David M. Malone, President of the International Peace Academy.
During two panels that followed the opening of the Conference, participants in the event remembered the 1994 tragedy and considered means to ensure a more effective international response to genocide in the future. The Conference attracted representatives of governments, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, academics and members of the Rwandan Diaspora.
The international community had failed Rwanda, the Secretary-General stated. If it had acted promptly, it could have stopped most of the killing. But neither the political will nor the troops had been there. If the United Nations, government officials and the international media had paid more attention to the gathering signs of disaster, it might have been averted.
The Rwandan genocide raised questions that affected all humankind, including fundamental questions about the authority of the Security Council and the effectiveness of United Nations peacekeeping, Mr. Annan continued. If confronted by a new Rwanda today, would the international community respond effectively? He had suggested a number of measures that would better equip the United Nations and its Member States to meet genocide with resolve, including a special rapporteur on the subject. More must be done, and he was currently analyzing what further steps could be taken.
The Foreign Minister of Rwanda, Charles Murigande, stressed the need to learn from the tragic failures in Rwanda, saying that no other nation or people should be allowed to suffer what the people of Rwanda had suffered. . . .
The international community, while it had learned what needed to be done, still lacked political agreement to prevent a Rwanda from happening again, said the Foreign Minister of Canada, Bill Graham. . . .
Harsh words were said about the role of the international community in Rwanda during the first panel - entitled "In Memoriam: Bearing Witness", which was chaired by the Foreign Minister of Rwanda.
While the head of the Association of the Widows of the Genocide, Speciose Kanyabogoyi, and genocide survivor, Eric Nzabihimana, recounted the events of April-August 1994, when some 800,000 people were murdered, former Commander of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR), Romeo Dallaire, said that the Mission had been "a last priority" for the international community. It had no budget and no structure at the time the killing began. The Security Council had made it a point not to consider the threats and warnings about Rwanda, and as the months went by and the peace agreement was "falling to pieces", there was political stagnation and no real desire to put any resources into the Mission.
He also recalled that some 2,000 personnel from several countries, including France, United Kingdom, United States and Italy, "remained firm in totally ignoring the catastrophe" as they fulfilled their mission of evacuating their expatriates, "though they were stumbling on corpses". On 22 April, when over 100,000 people had been killed, the bulk of the Force was ordered to withdraw, but 450 African and 13 Canadian troops were told to stay on the ground and observe. As millions were internally displaced, killed and injured, the Mission was able to save some 30,000, and on top of that, he had been ordered to abandon them. The order had come from the Security Council, and nobody objected.
"Never Again: Toward a More Effective International Response of Genocide" was the title of the second panel, which was chaired by Canada's Foreign Minister. Its keynote speakers included Ibrahim Gambari, United Nations Special Adviser for Africa, Ramesh Thakur, Vice-Rector of United Nations University and Danilo Turk, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs. . . .
Mr. Gambari said that the real key to preventing conflict and genocide was political will to act promptly and decisively. Without a doubt, it was the Council, especially its most powerful members that had failed the people of Rwanda in their gravest hour of need.
The controversy over the international community's culpability for its failure to prevent the genocide in Rwanda would not easily go away.

March 19, 2008 | 9:10 AM Comments  0 comments

Tags:


VICTOR MY MENTOR

viCTOR MY MENTOR

October 17, 2007 | 4:30 PM Comments  0 comments

Tags:


An Inspirational Thought, Motivational Thought - What It Means To Be Young - Temmylade Ayo Aladeokin

Youth is not a time of life, it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips, and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.
Youth means the predominance of courage over timidity, of adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of sixty more than in a boy of twenty. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals.
Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, doubt, self-distrust, fear and despair - these bow the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.
Whether sixty or sixteen, there is in every human being’s heart the love of wonder, the sweet amazement at the stars and the star like things, the undaunted challenge of events, the unfailing child-like appetite for what-next, and the joy of the game of living.
You are as young as your faith, as old as your doubt;
as young as your self-confidence, as old as your fear;
as young as your hope, as old as your despair.

October 17, 2007 | 4:22 PM Comments  0 comments

Tags:


What goes around comes around - Inspired by Pau Maria Tapay
About this event: Global Young Greens launch


It is said that: What goes around comes around. May
this short story open your eyes to one of the deep
reasons we are here on earth!!!

He almost didn’t see the old lady, stranded on the
side of the road. But even in the dim light of day,
he could see she needed help. So he pulled up in
front of her Mercedes and got out. His Pontiac was
still sputtering when he approached her.

Even with the smile on his face, she was worried. No
one had stopped to help for the last hour or so …
was he going to hurt her? He didn’t look safe; he
looked poor and hungry. He could see that she was
frightened, standing out there in the cold.

He knew how she felt. It was that chill which only
fear can put in you. He said, “I’m here to help you,
ma’am. Why don’t you wait in the car where ! it’s
warm? By the way, my name is Bryan.” Well, all she
had was a flat tire, but for an old lady, that was
bad enough.

Bryan crawled under the car looking for a place to
put the jack, skinning his knuckles a time or two.
Soon he was able to change the tire. But he had to
get dirty and his hands hurt. As he was tightening
up the lug nuts, she rolled down the window and
began to talk to him. She told him that she was from
St. Louis and was only just passing through. She
couldn’t thank him enough for coming to her aid.

Bryan just smiled as he closed her trunk. She asked
him how much she owed him. Any amount would have
been all right with her. She already imagined all
the awful things that could have happened had he not
stopped.

Bryan never thought twice about being paid. This
was! not a job to him. This was helping someone in
need, and God knows there were plenty who had given
him a hand in the past. He had lived his whole life
that way, and it never occurred to him to act any
other way.

He told her that if she really wanted to pay him
back, ! the next time she saw someone who needed
help, she could give that person the assistance they
needed, and Bryan added, “And think of me.”

He waited until she started her car and drove off.
It had been a cold and depressing day, but he felt
good as he headed for home, disappearing into the
twilight.

A few miles down the road the lady saw a small cafe.
She went in to grab a bite to eat, and take the
chill off before she made the last leg of her trip
home. It was a dingy looking restaurant. Outside
were two old gas pumps. The whole scene was
unfamiliar to her. The cash register was like the
telephone of an out-of-work actor — it didn’t ring
much.

The waitress came over and brought a clean towel to
wipe her wet hair. She had a sweet smile, one that
even being on her feet for the whole day couldn’t
erase. The lady noticed the waitress was nearly
eight months pregnant, but she never let the strain
and aches change her attitude.

The old lady wondered how someone who had so little
could be so giving to a stranger. Then she
remembered Bryan.

After the lady finished her meal and the waitress
went to get change for her hundred dollar bill, the
lady slipped right out the door. She was gone by the
time the waitress came back.

The waitress wondered where the lady could be.

Then she noticed something written on the napkin
under which were four $100 bills.

There were tears in her eyes when she read what the
lady wrote: “You don’t owe me anything. I have been
there too. Somebody once helped me out, the way I’m
helping you. If you really want to pay me back, here
is what you do: Do not let this chain of love end
with you.”

Well, there were tables to clear, sugar bowls to
fill, and people to serve, but the waitress made it
through another day. That night when she got home
from work! and climbed into bed, she was thinking
about the money and what the lady had written. How
could the lady have known how much she and her
husband needed it? With the baby due next month, it
was going to be hard.

She knew how worried her husband about was, and as
he lay sleeping next to her, she gave him a soft
kiss and whispered soft and low, “Everything’s going to
be all right. I love you, Bryan.”
There is an old saying “What goes around comes
around.”

“Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you
do not know what it will bring back: a new life, a
new friend, a new love, a new country.”

October 17, 2007 | 4:16 PM Comments  0 comments

Tags:


« previous 5


Temmylade's Profile

Temmylade's Friends


Latest Posts
Brand yourself!
Memorial Conference on...
VICTOR MY MENTOR
An Inspirational...
What goes around comes...

Monthly Archive
October 2007
March 2008
October 2008

Change Language


Filter By Type
Events
Travel
Topics

Friends
abosede alimi
Angel
Anna Luehrmann
Caroline Ayling
Douglas Arege
Erick Ochieng Otieno
Jacques
LauraK
Mandela Kapere
nguyen thuy duong
Ogy Kovachev
Pau Tapay
Rebecca Lohman
Sarah S.
Silke Gebel
Vikram aditya
Vikram aditya

Links
Gbegasesan


8188 views
Important Disclaimer