Focus: The Start-Up of Me

I can tell you, to the day, when I bought the book, what I was doing and where I was going.  I was having an identity crisis specific to my career.  My list of skills and accomplishments took up multiple pages and they spanned different areas of expertise. 

The reason for my identity crisis: lack of focus.  I’ve never sat down to identify the handful of things that I was not only good at but also passionate about.

What is the value that I could bring to the table? 

Sure, I’m hardworking and loyal, a perfectionist to the point of an occasional OCD moment.  But so is everyone else.  There’s drive and then there are unique set of skills and networks that truly make someone valuable.   Like a company selling a product with unique features and benefits with exclusive networks of distribution.

I never finished the book but the first couple of chapters got my wheels turning.  A few months later, I was introduced to social selling and personal branding.  The puzzle pieces started to fall into place and it became clear to me: it was time to treat myself as a business and create a plan.

A personal brand is a constant work-in-progress.  

Rome was not build in a day and continues to evolve to this day. 

I’m constantly learning… by reading, networking, and doing.  It’s the only way.

My roadmap is charted in pencil because spending too much time planning is a waste of precious time I could be experimenting, taking risks, and learning from my mistakes.

The other day, I took a good look at my skills and expertise and organized them into three buckets: marketing, management, and sales.  Then I listed the specific skills and areas of expertise in the buckets where they belong. 

This is what it looks like:

Marketing

Communication
Social Media
Content Management  
Content Curation
Blogging
Inbound Marketing
Copywriting
Branding

Management

Project Management
Event Planning
Event Management
Training

Non-Profits

Sales

Social Selling
New Business Development
Key Account Management

My next goal is to dive deeper into each bullet point, one blog post at a time.