One of my professors, +Lynn Keane , recently posted an article concerning the importance of doing your research and personal branding. For me personally, I have read many blogs and articles concerning how important personal branding is, and how enhancing one's network is included in the many ways one can build their brand and gain exposure. Valuable advice I'm sure, yet so many students, at least in my circle, do not heed this advice! There are students that I have encountered that do not know which direction they want their IT careers to go in, they have no professional friends on Facebook, or they simply connect with someone on LinkedIn and beef up there profile and then cross their fingers and hope for the best. I must say that I LOVE this trend because if this is my competition then I know that I have a leg up on some of these students. You would think that in today's competitive and scarce market most students would jump at the opportunity to promote themselves and increase their earning potential simply by putting themselves out there but this is NOT what occurs. Although I have achieved high marks in my curriculum the past two years, I do not have a stellar overall academic career at USC. Being a completely independent student and working multiple jobs hindered academic success early on in my career at USC but I did gain perspective by taking time to travel and expose myself to different parts of the world while also working multiple jobs provided a foundation for working with all manners of people. As a result, I am not afraid to engage with anyone, and their are few topics that I will not throw my hat in being that my life experience has cast a wide blanket of relevance that allows me to easily engage with all sorts of individuals in all walks of life. I will drive several hours to meet or have the chance to interact with someone that I can learn from. I will design what I call a "network map" to structure a way to engage someone that has the power to help get me to where I want to be in my career. Although I don't succeed nearly enough, I constantly look up conferences and attempt to find a way to see if I can be sponsored to attend since my financial situation is tight. I successfully managed to get sponsored to attend an Enterprise Computing Conference in New York and gained many valuable contacts and much needed information during my time there. I am not afraid to step out of my comfort zone and engage with ANYONE. If someone I admire makes a statement on Twitter or LinkedIn I look for ways to engage. Much of the success and publicity
I have received over the past year, whether it is being mentioned in an article or winning a scholarship, is not necessarily due to me being more intelligent than other students, but it is due to the growing strength of my network and ability to be seen and remembered. I have a long way to go but I am pushing forward while others remain stagnant. I will take any edge that I can get so I'm glad that other students still have the ridiculous notion that Twitter is a waste of time. I am glad other students only get on LinkedIn to complete an assignment and do just enough to get by. I'm glad that many students will wait until graduation to reach out to potential employers. I'm glad that personal branding is seen as a chore to some, as opposed to a privilege that our generation gets to enjoy that is virtually free of charge and can put your personality thousands of miles across a distance into the views of those who are otherwise inaccessible. More for me I say!!!
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