S.M.A.R.T.-Performance Podcast with Victoria Pelletier focused on Mastering your LInkedIn Profile

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Hi, I'm Walter, I'm the Dutch Mentor and welcome back to the Smart Performance Podcast

with Estense for Self Care and for Mindful Growth, A for Adaptive Problem Solving, R for

Vithmic Operation T for Thriving Community, and of course, P for Performance.

I'm really happy to have Victoria with me today.

We're going to have an interesting conversation over the next 15 minutes about building your

personal brand and why it is so very important, not only once on LinkedIn, but actually

living it as well.

Victoria, thank you very much for joining me.

Today in conversation, and why don't you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Well, thanks for having me, really happy to be here.

So I'll try to keep it short.

It's hard.

I feel like there's a lot.

I describe myself as a multi-potentialite, means I have very diverse interests.

I have been in the world of professional services, a majority of my career.

I got recruited out of banking operations.

Although the plan was to be a lawyer, and I've also built and bought companies over the

years, so I do have an entrepreneurial spirit.

I sit on boards.

I'm an author, a professional public speaker, on the personal front, married to adult children,

which now makes me feel really old.

I started young, and I'm a dog mom, a fitness fanatic, a foodie, and a wine lover.

There.

That covers all the bases.

That sounds like a wonderful way to get to life.

So it is me to get five kids, and my oldest one is 33, and I was like, how is that even

possible?

I got married at 19.

I got my first child at 22, so it is, you could do the math there about this.

Listen to this interesting, so congratulations on your journey.

I think it's something that we are all in charge about our own journeys, and often we

are the limitation of our own journey, we don't do it big enough.

So one thing that people need to think about is, who am I?

And how am I going to position myself in this world, where competition is fierce, and

you need to learn to differentiate yourself, and often building a personal brand is key

to that.

So take me on a journey on how you discovered that for yourself.

What steps did you take to make that part of your success journey?

So I am, I mentioned that it became an executive at a very young age, at 24 years old, when

I got recruited at a banking, stepped into a very big stretch role as the chief operating

officer and general manager for an outsourcing, a call center outsourcing company, and all

functions of the organization except for finance reported to me.

And so I had to quickly one, make sure I surrounded myself with a team who knew all the functional

pieces I did not.

But I also had to learn particularly around how do we grow this business?

So from a sales perspective, and so I focused very much on how do we build a differentiated

company brand?

But what I always knew, but became much more prevalent for me there, was people do business

with people they like, and they trust.

And so it was also how do we create differentiation?

One for me, as now the senior leader in this organization, but getting my team to do the

same for those that sat in client management and in sales.

And so this was 25 years ago, they're, I don't think the vernacular calling it personal

brand existed then.

But the strategies around creating this sort of unique value proposition for one self.

You said it, you're like, you're the CEO of your own career, but also very much from

a brand perspective, if you are not curating the narrative, your personal brand, someone's

going to do it for you.

And so I actually attribute a pretty significant part of my career success to the development

of my strong brand.

Yes, I'm a strong performer, but it's much more around who am I known as an individual

as a leader.

And so then I very, very much focused on that to the point that when I worked for IBM

a number of years ago, LinkedIn ranked me as their number one social seller, and that's

their brand, their name for it worldwide.

So now I spent a lot of time teaching others how to build their brand.

Yeah, very interesting.

So I'm going to go a little left hand term, because there'll be a remiss, so I've interviewed

a bunch of young, over CEOs now in the 40s or 50s, but they started off very, very young.

So what was your big lesson that you learned as a 24 year old executive that if you would

have to do it all over again, that you say this, and I would not make the same mistakes.

And what did you learn from that?

I think the biggest lesson I had to learn, and it didn't actually come immediately while

it came a little bit later for me.

So I stepped into that executive role as the youngest executive by probably two decades.

I was also the only female.

So that sort of informed how I thought I needed to show up.

I entered the workforce into very much a command and control environment, and I thought

I needed to show up that way as well.

So I walked in there, all business, all the time, I'm not going to show emotions, I'm

not going to demonstrate vulnerability.

I don't, I thought that meant showing weakness.

And I'm an actually incredibly emotional person, like I cry at the Humane Society commercials.

And yet I didn't let that be seen.

And I learned a couple years into my executive leadership that I had a nickname as the

Iron Maiden.

And at first I was kind of like, oh, well, I'm like, well, that's unfortunate.

But I thought it's, I've never had a problem making very difficult business decisions,

doing restructure, et cetera.

So initially I thought it was that.

But then I realized that it's actually how I was being perceived how I was showing up

for others.

So that was a lesson I had to, or I learned, I had to unlearn some behaviors.

I had to do things that made me uncomfortable, like be vulnerable, show some emotion, not

be all business all the time, like so even just consciously walking into a meeting or having

a phone call with someone and starting with a little bit of small talk.

Let's get, how was your weekend?

Talk to me about your kids.

What did you do?

Like that sort of thing?

Like where I was ready to dive into the agenda.

So those are things I needed to shift in my leadership style.

I needed to be strategic and intentional.

Now it's completely innate.

That is who I am as a leader and I show up very differently.

But I thought I needed to be one thing.

And it wasn't the thing that made me a good leader at all.

And I had to pivot.

Yeah.

I suspect that that's why I asked you to question because that's been the general experience

of people, including I can identify what that is myself as a leader.

So it's important to learn these lessons because in the end of the day, who you are and

how you show up as a leader is part of your personal brain.

And it can become an absolutely good deal breaker from career stopper.

If you end up going continue to be on that iron maiden, there's a limitation to that.

At some point in time, you run into a wall and you cannot get people to follow you or inspire

you.

So go back to your career.

So once you understood that how you showed up, how you presented yourself, how did you

want to, and how you want to present yourself on a digital format, because obviously, as

we started off at a well, you know, BBB up loading our one picture over every 10 minutes

to what we have today, the first place people go is to your digital profile to check you

out.

So tell us a little bit about how you adopted your knowledge and your abilities to be able

to show up on LinkedIn, for example, and become that number one rated.

What is it that you are now teaching?

Sure.

First of all, we're clearly both old that we know the BBB.

So I'm sure not all of your listeners will understand exactly what that was like and

how painful it was for us.

I still have my original W. Düsseldor at a well say, well, how could you put the P on the

end?

Because back in the day, we were limited number of letters.

And I couldn't, I couldn't have the P on my last name.

So I had to drop it.

I still do that today.

Now, mind you, that's 26, 27 years ago by 1998.

I think it was.

Yeah.

So I am a very early adopter of LinkedIn.

So I've been doing it for a long time.

Now, when it comes to brand, what I quickly saw is, you know, people went, well, one

when I say curate the brand, it's not like you become this false character of yourself,

you said it.

Like you need to show up that way in all formats digitally, but also as my youngest would

say, IRL mom in real life and showing up.

But, you know, I was starting to see people, you know, creating this facade before we

had all the filters of, you know, pictures and things like that.

And it was, they focused on one thing, which was, what, what do I do?

You know, the people will call that your, your eminence.

Well, like that, that's just one part of your brand.

And so I would see people show up and I would like just sort of almost scroll past them.

All they did, it was everything they was also about who they worked for.

So job title and who I work for.

But you're more than that.

So, you know, for me, I believe that there's four, like key elements to a strong personal

brand.

Most definitely it is your expertise, the credibility around what you do, the industries

you've done it, maybe some of the successes and failures you've learned from related to

that, definitely.

But then it's, what makes you you, like what, what, what you are a human?

Like what are the unique life experiences, work experiences?

Did you live in what a country or work in other countries?

Like that experience, you know, as powerful, what, if you're a leader, like what's your

leadership style?

What are the values and things you stand for?

And the next part is related to that one is, but what makes you different?

What is that unique?

I call it the UBP or unique value proposition.

In the world of professional services and consulting, you can find people who have the same

number of years of experience, perhaps in that same, with the same functional expertise

in that industry.

Great.

But why would someone choose you versus another?

What makes you different?

And so for, like, I can very clearly articulate things like, you know, in the world of consulting,

many consultants tell their clients what they want to hear, not what they need to hear.

I'm the truth speaker, you know, I got a nickname a few years ago as the CEO whisperer.

And but that's, that's part of my unique differentiation in terms of how I show up.

And then the fourth is legacy and thinking about like what do you want to be known for?

And so for me, I've now been a part of little over 40 merger and acquisition transactions,

more than a hundred corporate restructure.

I'm called another nickname turnaround queen, love all of those.

But when I die, that's actually not what I want people to talk about.

I want them to talk about who I was as a human, that I raised to really great human beings.

You know, that I left the community, the workplace in the world at large, a better place

when I left it than when I came in.

Those are the things I want to be known for.

And so I think you need to build your brand around all of those things.

And that makes it so compelling that people want to engage with you.

It is what my original says, right?

It's not what we do is put that how you make people feel along the way, right?

It's really so. Yeah, I love that.

So in a time that we have left, I would love to talk about the doing piece of this,

because I think you laid out a really nice architecture.

But obviously the people who are listening to our encouraged them to take meaningful action.

So tell me, what is step number one?

You would recommend them to take and then we can build up on that.

Well, step one is curate that brand.

I'll free.

I've got a free when it, you know, I'll direct people in my website later free workbook.

You can just go and download.

So that's step number one.

The next is to be really clear on the goals you have around your brand and your,

and your digital and beyond strategy.

Are you doing it because you want to win more business?

Are you doing it because you want to secure a new job because you want to be seen

as an influencer to gain, you know, whether it's again, promotions, you know,

visibility, things like that.

Like so be really clear on the goal.

The next is who's your audience?

You should not attempt to be all things to all people.

And so get very clear again, connect it to your goals.

Who's the audience for that?

And then you need to build a content strategy that aligns to your personal brand.

So for me, that becomes a mix of all parts of the things I spoke about.

So yes, you're going to want to share if you're working for a company.

You'll want to share some of their collateral, some of their materials,

maybe some of the research that they do, but you want to share others opinions as well,

with your own voice, right?

So I'll say never just repost and, you know, something.

You know, what is, what does this mean to you?

What did you learn from it?

What do you want people to take away from it?

But then also content, and you don't, not everyone needs to be an expert writer in the,

you know, now with generative AI, you can use chat GPT to help you along the lines,

writing it, but, um, but sharing content that again,

aligns to who you are as a human, what makes you different.

And then also really engaging.

So it's not just like post it and forget it, but continue to stay engaged

because it's also about, you know, building the network of people who want to engage with you.

Yeah.

I mean, I think it's the network where you left it off.

I just worried a future comes from after, right?

It's a referral.

If you're in business, if you want to, if you look for a new role, it is the network

that you can activate, right?

That is so very important that people underestimate.

I do a lot of work with people who are looking for, we're transitioning.

And the first place we go, look is, of course, look at personal.

But what is your true why?

What's your true purpose?

What are your real goals?

You know, my, you know, let's narrow it down to and focus and focus.

And sadly, it's too many people don't really think about the future of it much.

And they don't really prepare for that.

And so many don't at the, you know, if you do a poll today and ask 10 people,

who have you a well-defined plan B?

If you get laid off tomorrow, I would almost say that 9.5 of those people have not.

And only one person has thought about it a little bit and I think that there's something

that people need to think about, right?

So to maintain a digital profile, to maintain a personal brand.

So a lot of the fact that how you laid that out, how often,

so you talk about content, you talk about how often should people do this in order to be relevant.

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I think it depends on again what your goals and objectives are for yourselves.

But for me, personally, I have a commitment to publishing two articles per month,

generally, on LinkedIn.

And I am consistent around engagement with other people's content daily.

I couldn't tell you exactly how much time I spend doing it,

because LinkedIn is a tab that's open on my browser all the time.

And when I'm sitting on a conference call, I'd probably shouldn't say this,

multitasking, I'm engaging with content.

By the way, LinkedIn's made it super easy to do that,

to like, to comment, it tells you when people have promotions,

it tells you when it's their birthday or whatever, right?

So it just becomes a habit.

That's what I'd say.

So make a commitment, block off time.

If you want to do, you should be in there every day.

Ideally, you're even if it's other people's content,

at least once a week, and then commit to creating some of your own content,

maybe once or twice a month.

So I live by the rule of 50 minutes, day, you too can be.

Vitality is that everybody has 50 minutes.

In other words, stop scrolling on TikTok and Instagram,

and go work with your professional profile

and know what to help you pursue your dreams itself.

So, the great work of advice, where can we find you?

The easiest place is at my personal website,

which is victoria-pelty.com.

I'm sure you'll have that in show notes,

so people don't figure out.

And they can link out from there to LinkedIn

and the other places to find me.

And as I said, I've written a number of books

on the one that is Influence Unleashed, is the book I wrote.

If they scroll halfway down the page,

I have the free workbook that I'll take them through

so they can actually start the framework,

build it out for themselves.

Excellent. And again, like I always remind the audience,

listening to us is great.

By Monday morning, I forgot 95% of what we said,

unless you take a quick action step.

So as you're listening to this,

in the show notes, there will be the website,

go there, download it, start working on that,

and make that commitment on your calendar that 15 minutes a day.

Again, it's about continuous growth and development,

is that mindset that is going to help you get across the finish line

to whatever it is that you want to do.

So give me a parting thought,

something that sticks with the audience

and gets them motivated and inspired to speak.

Sure. I will leave you with my favorite quote.

Which is from Georgia Dare.

Everything you've ever wanted lives on the other side of fear.

And so whether it's your personal brand,

whether it's going for that next role,

that next sale, I think growth and opportunity comes

in that zone of discomfort.

So I encourage everyone to step into that.

I love it. I use the Elon Musk sass at the feeling

you have to stare fear in its face in order to overcome it.

And it goes right along with that.

I love that fact.

Victoria, thank you very much for joining the show today.

Really insightful and very helpful.

Congratulations on your journey.

Listen, there's nothing better than having raised

two wonderful kids that are contributing to the world

and that's my greatest pride as well.

To the audience,

remember that you need to take action.

Go to the Apple Store, download the mobile app,

just simple type into Dutch mentor,

come to the seven day free trial.

It will help you get your journey started

and focusing on the things that matter to get you

to deliver the best version of you,

no matter what it is that you want to do.

I thank you. We'll see you again in the next episode.

Victoria, have a wonderful day.

Thank you.

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