Turn a seemingly negative time into a positive one by taking three key steps.
Honing your professional brand has never been timelier or more important than during this era of the “Great Resignation.”
Early in the pandemic, people were forced to re-examine their priorities. And many people—4.3 million of them in May 2022—either left their existing job for a new one or left the workforce altogether. You’d think by now that this situation might have sorted itself out, but Fortune magazine published a recent report stating that the number of resignations is virtually unchanged from last year.
It seems like it could be tough to be an executive trying to lead during such a “turnover tsunami.” Yet some executives have mitigated the potential negative by recasting “The Great Resignation” as “The Great Exploration.” In other words, they worked on their executive brand, taking the time to excavate their purpose, affirm it so they could feel their purpose in their bones and then tell their brand stories to key people in their networks. They have used their clarity of purpose to lead their teams and organizations forward and to advance their own careers.
“Leaders who reorient themselves around exploration, rather than fear of resignation, will be able to capitalize on the moment’s deep potential,” write Keith Ferrazzi and
Mike Clementi in their June 2022 Harvard Business Review article, “The Great Resignation Stems From a Great Exploration.”
If you’re wondering how to go about clarifying your executive branding, I have good news. Many leaders in healthcare and other industries have used the time-proven ETA™ process from Revealing Genius (and its three key steps—excavate, tell and affirm) to create their professional brands and help them lead—in all kinds of situations. Let’s talk about some techniques from the ETA process that you can use to find your way—and lead others—through the Great Resignation.
Excavate Your Professional Brand
Most leaders spend a fair bit of time in the excavate step, shining a light on who they are, what they stand for and their unique reason to serve.
A key technique we use during the ETA process is to answer a series of 10 reflection questions, such as “Who is your favorite superhero?” and “What quote most resonates with you?” Your answers to these questions—and the follow-up question of “why”—speak volumes about your professional brand. Usually, a different one of the 10 questions resonates with each leader.
Tell Your Professional Brand
In the “tell” step, executives learn ways to tell their brand stories, whether that’s through their LinkedIn profile or a transformation statement, aka elevator pitch.
The difference between the traditional elevator pitch and our transformation statement is that the statement more directly gets at the “why” of what you do. And adding the why is powerful. Look at the formula we use for developing a transformation statement and ask yourself how you’d fill in the blanks.
I <action word> <my beloved avatar/ideal customer or client>
how to <do what they want to accomplish>
so that they can <have the result/transformation>.
Affirm Your Professional Brand
Finally, the “affirm” step of the Revealing Genius ETA process helps leaders develop conviction about their professional brands. This can include saying their new transformation statement out loud regularly until they can feel it resonate in their bones. Check out this blog post about the value of these affirmations.
Revealing Genius offers many ways to tap into your professional brand in ways that will help you during this era of the Great Resignation—and at any time. Check out our Excavate Your Brand webinar, 7-Day Summit and daily email series. We look forward to working with you.
