IT executive summary
It is still important to prepare a strong IT resume for executive positions. No matter what they tell you, at least for now, at 4 p.m. resume to determine if you are a good fit for a potential job opening. However, how your resume landed in your inbox or on your desktop can largely depend on your personal branding strategy. Additionally, how an employer or recruiter views your capabilities and their perception of you as they go through the post-resume review process also depends on your personal branding strategy.
Personal brand strategy: what does that mean?
All that personal branding means is how you present or “package” yourself in your professional life. For example, if you’re an CIO looking to advance to VP of IT, you’ll try to brand yourself as an IT executive, not an CIO. Another example would be if you were a technical consultant who has worked with clients in all industries, but wanted to work for a company in the healthcare industry. It would be packaged highlighting its commitments to health and medical services clientele.
The difficulty with branding is considering how you position yourself all the time, not just during a job search. Understandably, the job search, and this job search in particular, may be what motivates you to think about how you are identified. You may be wondering if it has any markings. Well, yes, you are. You may not have defined it, it may be very diluted and it may not be very effective, but each of us is marked in one way or another. Just look at your resume and any other communication you send to a prospective employer. If you had to pretend it was someone else, what would you say is that person’s core message? If there is no central message or the message doesn’t match the types of jobs you want to do, then it won’t be very effective.
How else can I “brand” myself?
As I mentioned, personal branding goes far beyond your job search and your resume. Let’s mention some of the most obvious traditional forums for you to broadcast your brand:
- presentation letter
- visiting card
- executive biography
- elevator plot
And these are some of the social media forums through which you can convey your brand based on your content, likes, retweets, repaints, etc.
- Google+
- Stumble upon
- interest
Don’t forget about these other forums through which prospective employers can learn more about your:
- own blog site
- specialized sites in which you comment that they go with your brand
- in-person networking events
- community affiliations
- industry conferences
How do I put it all together?
You want to make sure your branding is consistent across all of these forums. I’m not saying copy and paste your resume information into all these other sites and converse with people face-to-face in resume language. Each one should have its own unique flavor depending on the audience and their expectations… but the same brand and theme should shine through in all of them.
