Intelligence Isn't Enough

Chapter 5

Building your personal brand

When I first heard the term ‘personal branding’ during my time at Deloitte, I thought it was complete rubbish, gar-bahj. To me, it sounded like: ‘You have to fit into a certain box to be accepted into a specific environment, so contort and mould yourself until you fit nice and tight into that box.’ I am a very authentic person – what you see is what you get – so I physically and emotionally could not bring myself to be something that I am not. I decided to bow out of the whole conversation. I thought I needed to find an environment where I could just be me and let my work do the talking. To me, the idea of branding myself sounded arrogant, phony and contrived: not only would I have to do great work but ...