You work hard, but you’re not getting the opportunities that you want or feel you deserve. It may be that you want to step into leadership. Or you may be a seasoned manager who wants to operate beyond his or her area of expertise. Or you just want to be recognized for the work you are already doing. How do you communicate your leadership strengths without having to “toot your own horn?”

Today, people are constantly bombarded with messages about promoting themselves. This can leave them feeling like they have to project something they’re not in order to get the opportunities they want. Some people seem to play the game and brag about their accomplishments, while others refuse to even engage.

Communicate “Us”

The good news is you can communicate your strengths (a.k.a. Personal Leadership Brand) in a way that others appreciate and reward. It begins with a shift in your thinking from “I” to “us.” We all have a tendency to process information from our own scale of “I.” While there is nothing wrong with starting there, we are well-served by shifting to the scale of “us” whether it is the “us” as a team, or “us” as a department, or “us” as an organization.

When you think of your job within the context of the team, department or organization, you can find your footing in communicating how your work is helping support the long-term strategies and goals of the team, department, and/or organization. To do this authentically, you will want to connect the overall strategy and the long-term goals of the team, department and/or organization to what is important to you at your own scale of “I.” In other words, it is where a Venn Diagram of (1) what is important to you and the impact you have and (2) the goals and objectives of your manager and/or the larger group. More importantly, others begin to recognize how your contributions are aimed at supporting them and the group at large because you’ve incorporated it into what you say about the work you are doing.

Align Strengths with Team Objectives

Step 1. Write down your strengths

• Make a list of your key strengths and why they are important to you. 

Step 2. Assess your team’s goals and objectives 

• Capture what the goals and objectives are for the person or groups of people you are working with and try to understand the stated or unstated values. Each organization and team will be different. If you don’t know, talk to your leader. They are accustomed to thinking from the scale of the group.

Step 3. Consider your impact

• First, think of how what you do impacts the team, the manager, and the organization’s goals and objectives. Who does it impact and how? 
• Second, how does what you do contribute to the success of the whole instead of just your own job role? Who does it impact and how?

For example, you find great satisfaction in figuring out streamlined processes. When you look even deeper, you realize that your efforts to streamline processes benefits both your team and clients. Now, let’s say the team you work on develops software to help their customers improve their lives in a particular way. You have discovered that your ability to streamline processes is an expression of your value of helping others and intersects with the values of the organization’s client-focus. 

Step 4. Share your story

Now, you can share what you do by talking about where your group’s values intersect with your own. This strengthens your Personal Leadership Brand in the context of what is important to the team and the organization.

For example:

“I wanted to update you on the progress of the XYZ project. We are making great progress with this particular process which will really help our clients to…” As you can see, you are tying what you do to the larger goal of the organization.

A coach is your best resource for developing your Personal Leadership Brand and using it to communicate strengths to your team. For more information, you can visit our website at peridotcircleconsulting.com, or book your free consult call here.