Opening
You can be excellent at your work and still feel invisible in the places where opportunity moves. Your profile sits polished and quiet while someone with half your experience seems to be everywhere.
Personal branding sounds like self promotion, yet the deeper question is who gets to know the real you while you are busy being useful.
The idea
Aarti Parmar is a brand strategist and certified coach, and an old friend from my networking days in St Albans. Her starting point removes most of the pressure people feel about this topic. You are not deciding whether to build a personal brand.
You already have one, because you have always been representing something. The real work is becoming intentional about what you want to be known for, and about who you want to be the obvious choice for.
Aarti builds on the famous idea that your brand is what people say about you when you are not in the room, and she turns it into something you can practise. Every impression you leave is a created perception. Those perceptions form associations, and associations form emotional connection.
So the question becomes what beliefs are forming in other people’s minds, and whether they are saying what you hope they say when you are not there. What struck me most is how clients actually arrive at her door. Nobody ever says they need brand strategy.
They say they do not know how to show up on social media, or they cannot articulate their business, or they have no idea what content to put out. Aarti hears all of that as one thing.
The brand narrative is missing, and it is missing because the business brand and the personal brand are not two separate projects. For anyone delivering a service, the person and the brand arrive together. She also spends her first sessions dismantling the wrong worries.
People arrive stressed about logos and colour palettes, and she tells them that is the last thing to stress about. What matters is the brand fundamentals. What do you stand for, and what is your essence? She is equally clear about boundaries.
A personal brand is called personal because elements of your life come through, not because your private life becomes public content. Some of the creators she admires share nothing of their families yet feel warmly known.
As she put it:
“a personal brand is the stamp of value that you deliver to others”.
The stamp is the value, and the delivery is the connection.
What I took from it
When I first met Aarti I was working in public relations near St Albans, and her posts today still feel good to receive, without any ickiness of sales. That surprised me, because the phrase described exactly what I want my own presence to do.
I have spent years watching brilliant professionals stay quiet online because they were waiting until they felt ready, and Aarti’s reframe removes the waiting altogether. You are already visible. The only choice is whether you shape what people see.
Moving from the UK to Canada in 2021 taught me that a brand is also a bridge. When people already know what you care about, arriving somewhere new feels less like starting over.
I also recognised her repatriate story, the disorientation of returning to a place that has changed while you were away. Whether you move countries or simply change careers, a clear narrative is what lets people meet the current you rather than an old version they invented.
Three things to try this week
- Write one sentence naming what you want to be known for, in plain words you would still stand behind on a difficult week. Keep it visible wherever you draft your posts and emails.
- Choose one place where you already show up and share one story that explains why you care about your work, not only what you deliver. Notice which responses feel warm rather than transactional.
- Ask one trusted person what they would say about you when you are not in the room. Listen without defending yourself, thank them properly, and write down anything that surprises you.
Watch and go deeper
The full conversation is waiting in the player below. Watch it to hear how Aarti helps founders find a brand they feel proud and excited to show the world.
You can explore Aarti’s work at Aarti Parmar.
New conversations land on the Rediscovering Connection channel most weeks
Close
A personal brand is really a promise about how you will show up for others, and our research with more than 1,200 leaders keeps finding that visibility and connection deepen together. Explore the research, then ask what you want to be known for by the people who matter to you.