How to Build a Career-Changing Personal Brand That Opens Doors With Leigh Welsh

Ever caught yourself wondering if you could build a personal brand - and the impact it would have on your career?..

In this week's episode, you're in for a real treat, as our guest is none other than Personal Branding Specialist and Strategist Leigh Welsh. Leigh has spent over a decade building his own personal brand, with thousands of followers on LinkedIn and a female leadership community he’s grown with his podcast She’s a Leader. Leigh is the founder of Vidible, a personal branding & video marketing business which empowers individuals to think about their personal brand as much as they do their company brand. He’s the mastermind behind the personal brands of some of the UK's most exciting entrepreneurs and is giving you his top tips on how YOU can build an effective personal brand and accelerate your career. We're diving deep into how having a standout personal brand is no longer just nice to have—it's absolutely crucial if you want to make waves in your industry.

Leigh will pull back the curtain on his journey from blending into the background to becoming the talk of the town, telling us the exact steps he takes when building his clients' personal brands. We chat about how personal branding has evolved from being the icing on the cake to a main ingredient in the recipe for professional success.

No matter where you stand in your career or business journey, the insights Leigh offers are gold for anyone looking to create a personal brand that truly hits home and does great things for their business or career.

So, pop in those earbuds and join us as Leigh guides you through building a personal brand with conviction rooted in the real you. It's time to shine, and Leigh's here to show you how.

Show Links:

Connect with Leigh Welsh on LinkedIn

Connect with Elizabeth Willetts on LinkedIn

Visit the Vidible Website

Boost your career with Investing in Women's Career Coaching! Get expert CV, interview, and LinkedIn guidance tailored for all career stages. Navigate transitions, discover strengths, and reach goals with our personalised approach. Book now for your dream job! Use 'workitlikeamum' for a 10% discount.

Transcript

Elizabeth Willetts: 0:00

Why should we prioritize building a personal brand and who should prioritize who should try and find the time to do this?

Leigh Welsh: 0:07

My simple answer to that would be everyone, and the benefits are on hold from a personal level, from a career progression level, from a building a business level. If we link it to the corporate world. It has not only elevated my career, but what I do for my clients now is Everything you've just said about connecting with someone and feeling like you already know them. Isn't that exactly where you want your business to be the best and biggest brands in the world? How create an emotion? You have a connection with that brand. You wear that brand because it provides you with a feeling. You follow that person because they allow that connection. So the simple answer is everyone the benefits that can come off the back of that.

Leigh Welsh: 0:51

If we just think about work specifically right, because I imagine a lot of your audience thinking well, the main reason I would want to develop a personal brand is not for likes on instagram or for my friends to think I'm doing well. It's for my employer to recognize it. Off what other potential employers or potential customers to recognize what I'm doing. That is the biggest benefit you could look at personal brand In that you are creating a network of people. We're in an age now it used to be what you know. That it was who you know, and now it's who knows you.

Elizabeth Willetts: 1:26

Hey, I'm Elizabeth Willis and I'm obsessed with helping as many women as possible achieve their boldest dreams after kids and helping you to navigate this messy and magical season of life. I'm a working mom with over 17 years of recruitment experience and I'm the founder of the investing in women job board and community in this show. I'm honored to be chatting with remarkable women redefining our working world across all areas of business. They'll share their secrets on how they've achieved extraordinary success after children, that boundaries and balance, the challenges they faced and how they've overcome them to define their own versions of success. Shy away from the real talk. No way. Money struggles, growth, loss, boundaries and balance we cover it all. Think of this as coffee with your mates, mixed with an inspiring Ted talk sprinkled with the career advice you wish you'd really had at school. So grab a cup of coffee or a glass of wine, make sure you cozy and get ready to get inspired and chase your boldest dreams, or just survive Mondays. This is the work it.

Elizabeth Willetts: 2:34

Like a mom podcast, this episode is brought to you by investing in women. Investing in women is a job board and recruitment agency helping you find your dream part time or flexible job with the UK's most family friendly and forward thinking employers. Their site can help you find a professional and rewarding job that works for you. They're proud to partner with UK's most family friendly employers across a range of professional industries, ready to find your perfect job? Search their website at investinginwomencouk to find your next part time or flexible job opportunity. Now back to the show. Hi Lee, thank you so much for joining me today on the podcast. We're going to be chatting all about personal branding, who should have a personal brand, why a personal brand is important and how to get started building your personal brand. So before you dive in, lead you mind, just give me an overview as to who you are, what your background is and what brought you into the personal branding space.

Leigh Welsh: 3:40

Absolutely, liz, and thanks for having me. It was quite weird being on the other side of the camera. To be honest with you, I'm used to doing these myself and personal branding is something that I've been passionate about for a long time, but I actually started out my corporate career in recruitment 10 years ago, so, similar to yourself, I know we have both worked at the same company years and years ago not at the same time but for me, personal brand has always been super, super important in recruitment, especially because it's such a competitive industry and really your personal brand is everything. I felt. The more I could develop and build my own personal brand, the more business I was going to win, the more people will see that I'm quite different to other recruiters in an industry that sometimes gets a bad name.

Leigh Welsh: 4:28

And it took me 10 years to realize where my passions truly lie, and that was less in the day to day recruitment and more in the building personal brands, branding, marketing. I was putting out a lot of video content. I launched my first podcast whilst in a recruitment business and quite quickly realized that that was the sort of stuff that I was looking forward to each week, rather than actually finding candidates and delivering on roles. I definitely miss the people element of recruitment because you know you get to chat to loads of interesting people day in, day out. But I think when you end up in quite a senior role in recruitment it's a lot of P&L's, kpis, budget expectations and actually I kind of defaulted to what I actually enjoy doing each and every day and I've built a business around that.

Elizabeth Willetts: 5:19

Obviously. I mean, I've been in recruitment a long time. When I first started recruitment, it wasn't LinkedIn, it was pre-linked in just when personal branding, when you started becoming aware of personal branding, and then how you sold the concept of personal branding to your employer at the time and persuade them maybe to invest in this podcast.

Leigh Welsh: 5:38

Well, I think I was quite aware early on with the nature of what I was recruiting. I started out recruiting digital marketing, so naturally the candidates that I was speaking to, the client briefs that I was taking and the jobs I was filling, were marketing related roles, and so it might be social media Paid social was starting to come out. Crm was getting quite big, email marketing and social media was evolving and developing across that. 10 years into you had the Instagram age coming out of influencers and Rolexes and Lambos and fancy meals out, and then branding from a corporate Side of things was all about about us pages and values and messaging, and so I was kind of somewhere in the middle of that and I just, I think, tagged quite early on to the concept of if I can push out my LinkedIn profile to enough people where All of my clients are now spending a lot of time, if I can get in the face of those on LinkedIn and and, I guess, provide a different angle than can you give me some jobs, can I work with you, actually show them who I am with a, which you can't do on email, right, you can't send someone an email and really show who you are, whereas putting out a video or a post or starting a podcast, you can really get your personality out there.

Leigh Welsh: 6:55

It took me a very long time to actually sell the depth of concept, with personal branding, to the businesses that I was working because I still had a day job, I still had to recruit and place people and make money and it was only my most recent recruitment business that actually went to know what, because of what your podcasting about and because of what you're talking about, is so aligned to us as a business. It was women in tech. It was, you know, all about gender diversity and breaking stereotypes and pushing through barriers that women face. That was quite aligned with the business that I was working in, so they were for it and then it took me a little while to actually show them the value that we're getting from that, because the more and more people that are seeing that, listening to that podcast, seeing those posts, end up being clients or interacting with the company that I was working for.

Leigh Welsh: 7:46

So it just naturally evolved and developed with the work that I was putting in. But because it was kind of recreational to a certain extent, it was outside of my day job I just found it quite difficult to manage the two, and barely mind 20% of my role was the personal branding and the podcasting and the marketing stuff. That was the bit I enjoyed. So then I had to really, really focus on what do I want to be doing day in, day out? And they let me to hear.

Elizabeth Willetts: 9:17

Wow, so we've spoken actually quite a bit now about personal branding. Somebody listened to this night and never heard of the concept before personal branding. What is personal branding?

Leigh Welsh: 9:27

For me, I think personal branding is how people feel when they interact with you online. Now, I think personal brand we naturally develop in our day to day lives. We naturally exude a personal brand. It may be at a networking event, it may be picking your kids up from school. Whatever you're doing on a day to day, you're projecting this image. It's how others perceive you, how they want you, what they think about you, how they feel when they see you. That is what we're trying to get to in an online presence and specifically on LinkedIn. Right, I think personal brand people think personal brand is a reputation.

Leigh Welsh: 10:09

Yeah everyone has a reputation. It might be good, it might be bad, it might be indifferent, but we've all got one just based on the interactions that we have with people, with companies, in different walks of life. Whereas personal brand is how you want people to see you, rather than it just being given as a reputation, and you can promote that as much as you want, personal brand is a conscious effort To portray who you really are and I think sometimes it can be given a bad rap and people associate personal brand with Instagram, lamborghini's yachts, that kind of ego driven personal branding, or they perceive brand as the word is, as Coca-Cola, nike, brands that are, you know, huge in the market, and I think personal branding is somewhere in between. We're not going down the look at me, I've drive a Lambo, but we're also not hidden behind about us pages and core values and you know, cookie cutter, stereotypical corporate content. You've not. Your personal brand is essentially Creating a feeling that someone has when they interact with you or your content.

Elizabeth Willetts: 11:20

You know what? There's so many people I follow online. Obviously, a lot of people are like this. People I follow online you just have a real connection to and you've never spoken to them before in your life. You feel like you know them, you feel like your friends, and I think that is just probably a really good example of someone who's done an amazing job of building a personal brand Absolutely and, if you think, if you met that person in real life.

Elizabeth Willetts: 11:44

I'd be so excited. But I feel like I know that, I feel like I would know them like I would know a neighbor.

Leigh Welsh: 11:49

And so if we quantified that good job that they're doing with personal brand, it probably comes down to a few different points. One is they're authentic as they can be. They're not trying to be someone else, they're not trying to copy someone else. They are projecting their true, authentic self in whatever format that works for them. It might be video, it might be written, it might be images, it might be podcasts, whatever they feel most comfortable in that format, and then they're consistent with it.

Leigh Welsh: 12:17

Right, they're not thinking about oh, I shouldn't post this or I haven't got time to post this. They are documenting and creating on a consistent basis which gives you a glimpse into their life, their journey, their story, the business they're running, the career path they're on. They're giving you that inside. I try every possible opportunity and so, therefore, when you do get three months, six months a year, two years, three years down the line, a following person, you start to build that connection with their Content. Even if they've never responded to your comment, never messaged you back, you still feel that you know them because they're letting you into their life.

Elizabeth Willetts: 12:57

I built my business off the back of a personal brand and that was because I had, no, no money for marketing. But someone listening to this might think it sounds a lot of work, and it is a lot of work. Why should we prioritize building a personal brand and who should prioritize who should try and find the time to do this?

Leigh Welsh: 13:14

My simple answer to that would be everyone, and the benefits are untold from a Personal level, from a career progression level, from a building a business level. If we link it to the corporate world. It has not only elevated my career, but what I do for my clients now is everything you've just said about connecting with someone and and Feeling like you already know them. Isn't that exactly where you want your business to be the best and biggest brands in the world? How create an emotion? You have a connection with that brand. You wear that brand because it provides you with a feeling. You follow that person because they allow that connection. So the simple answer is everyone the benefits that can come off the back of that. If we just think about work Specifically right, because I imagine a lot of your audience are thinking well, the main reason I would want to develop a personal brand is not for likes on Instagram or for my friends to think I'm doing well. It's for my employer to recognize it or for other potential employers or potential customers to recognize what I'm doing. That is the biggest benefit you could look at personal brand in that you are creating a network of people where we're in an age now where it's not. It used to be who you know, it used to be what you know, that it was who you know and now it's who knows you. Everything is connected, right, we can see, and, bearing in mind any potential employer, they're gonna look at your CV. They're gonna want to interview you. Before that interview happens, they are going to look at your social media, right, little wrongly, they'll be looking at your LinkedIn, absolutely, and take it from someone 10 years in recruitment. They're probably gonna look at your Facebook page and your personal accounts, and so it's.

Leigh Welsh: 15:03

How are you Emulating your personal values? Right? You've got a course set of values that you live by. How do those translate into the corporate world? How do you show up every single day? What is your day-to-day routine look like? How do you conduct yourself at work? What difficult situations have you been in that you've navigated? There's so many different avenues you can explore with personal branding that it doesn't just have to be a fancy restaurant and a meal out and that ego driven stuff that we hear a lot about On social media because of the influence of world that we live in.

Elizabeth Willetts: 15:37

I mean, I can see how hugely valuable it is, the certain people I follow online. Obviously, there's people a lot of people I follow that run their own businesses that have done amazing. We were building a personal brand, but also employees, and we all know how fickle the workplace is and there is obviously always redundancies. But I do think, like you, if you can build a personal brand, it makes you so much more valuable as an employee and potential employee. And I see some amazing people employed, you know, produce brilliant content, and I just think their employer would never in their right mind want to get rid of that person and if they did, they'd be like five other competitors straight on the phone trying to hire them. So I do think it's a good thing to brief your career.

Leigh Welsh: 16:20

Well, you've got a couple of elements to it, haven't you? You've got the. I'm currently working in this business and I have a big online presence. The business then has to consider not just what skill gap are we losing in our business if we lose that person. What impact does that have on our business brand?

Leigh Welsh: 16:37

If that person leaves, what is the messaging that goes out associated with that person? Because they've got their own audience who may be potential customers or current customers or people that would buy our product. What are those people going to think if we make this person redundant? I wouldn't say it's completely safeguarding you against that situation, because we know business can be very, very cutthroat at times, but what it does do is add an extra layer of protection because there has to be that consideration from that business. If that person is made redundant or ejected from the business, it's a really difficult situation.

Leigh Welsh: 17:16

But you've also got to think the other side of that is, if that situation does happen, you are so much more desirable, as you say, for a potential employer because you're not just bringing yourself and your skill set and your CV I can get a real glimpse of who you are in the online arena but also you're bringing a network of people of following your scene as a thought leader in your space. If I go back to sales force recruitment that I most recently recruited for, the people that earn the most money and are the most desirable in the candidate market are the ones who are seen as thought leaders and trailblazers in their fields, and the more that you can promote that, the more the better.

Elizabeth Willetts: 18:00

So someone's listened to this and they may have never been on LinkedIn. They may have a dusty profile that they haven't looked at for years. How, would you say, is the best way to get started building your personal brand?

Leigh Welsh: 18:11

So the key to that question is get started. So many people sit and wonder and think and theory craft and find reasons why not to get started, and actually you've just got to get on and do it. I found this myself. In the beginning I was hesitant to post. I was worried about what people might think, I was worried whether the content would be any good and, like with anything, you've got to do it to get better. Right, it doesn't matter what you're doing, what job you're doing.

Leigh Welsh: 18:42

Personal branding is a conscious effort to put yourself out there and the more you do it, the better you'll get. I look at, you know, some of my earlier podcast episodes and I'm like I feel like I've got so much better. My questionings got better, my speaking's got better, I'm less agit. You know, jittery, nervous and that takes time. The only way you're going to do that is by getting started and don't worry about what other people think If those people are going to pull you down or send you a message like I used to think. Oh, if I put something online and one of my friends messaged me on WhatsApp and they're like what is that? Why are you talking about women in technology? And you know what's all this rubbish you're putting out. They're not my friend Like, because the content that I'm putting out is so closely aligned with my personal values and what I believe in that if you are not on board with that and you're just going to pull me down because of what I'm putting out online, then you shouldn't be in my circle anyway. You want those people that go mate. Well done Like. That looks brilliant. I don't know enough about that subject, but I know more now. Or, that was a great post, that was a great video. You want those people around you and so don't worry about what the other people think. If they're going to pull you down, they're not the people that you're trying to engage with anyway.

Leigh Welsh: 19:53

People worry about oh, what if a potential customer sees this and they don't like it? Then they're not a potential customer. We're not trying to appeal to everyone, right? You're not trying to capture the entire world. You're trying to capture an audience of fans, not followers. People get hung up on this. Oh, I need more followers and more likes. People follow you for the sake of following you. Wife sister has got a huge following on Instagram. How many of those people actually believe in what she does, what she stands for? Or are they following her because she's got a big following and they're hoping other people following will see that they're following and it's it becomes this follower society of let's just, you know, drive a number up for our ego.

Leigh Welsh: 20:36

We're looking for a legion of fans who will stand by you when things aren't going great, will support you when you know nobody else is. They're the people that are going to buy your products. They're the people that are going to talk about your products or your services. You want those people that are advocating for you, speaking to other people and going. Have you seen this post? Have you seen what they're doing now? You've just said at the start of this podcast about people that you've connected with and you've engaged with. They're the people that you talk about. I remember when we spoke last time about Stephen Bartley and the Diaries of a CEO. You're advocating for him, having never spoken to him before. But you are a fan, not a follower, and it's really, really important to move away from the follower ego metrics to I want, I don't care, even if it's 10 people. If those 10 people support me and are going to help me get to where I want to get to then they're 10 more people than I had before.

Elizabeth Willetts: 21:31

I've obviously done a bit of link to Enchanted in the people it gets similar. I get similar objections to why they don't want to post or start personal brand and it's obviously similar to what we spoke about but slightly more specific as well. So one is oh, I'm worried that my colleagues gonna think who do they think they are posting that? You know they're really up themselves which is prevalent in women as well.

Leigh Welsh: 21:53

Right, we've got to remember that women are evaluated more harshly in their networks, in their groups and especially at work with who does she think she is. And it's really, really important for women to self advocate and get over that hurdle and start believing in their journey, their process and start documenting it, because I think there's a real concern. What I hear a lot is I don't know where to start. I want to get started, so we've done that bit. I know that I need to do it, but I don't know what to post. I don't.

Leigh Welsh: 22:25

You know, I'm not like these content creators that can come up with this amazing concept and write a story that gets 500 likes. We're not trying to do that, just documents first. And I think it was Gary V said it when I read his book years ago, and he's been bleeding the same message, which is document rather than create. We're not trying to create something, we're just trying to let people into our lives. So document what you're passionate about, the trouble that you've had, the journey that you've been on, your failures. Give people that real, authentic glimpse into who you are, and that is enough for you to start you as a person, at whatever age, have got enough to talk about with just the journey that you've been on and where you want to get to, before you have to start worrying about creating some glossy linked in post that's going to get a load of likes.

Elizabeth Willetts: 23:15

The other objection I get and I'll be really keen to hear your thoughts on this is, for example, I spoke to somebody the other way and she was like I'm really passionate about working parents and work life balance and flexible working. So the companies that I want to apply for are banks and they obviously have a reputation for not being particularly supportive of work life balance and flexible working. So she was like how do I square that my values and the types of things I want to post with actually the companies I want to work for and their thoughts?

Leigh Welsh: 23:46

But they should be aligned. Liz, and my question to that person in particular would be if your personal values of work, life balance and being a mom, and if they're not aligned with banking, then why am I trying to get into banking? And I would strip that back to that first section, which is why do I want to work in that business if they're not aligned with my value? So we're not trying to create this facade that I really like work, life balance and I really want to spend time with my kids, but I know you as a bank really don't support it, so you know I've got to find a way of navigating that. No, if you're not on board with that, then you are not a company that I want to be involved with. So it all should work together in harmony, really, because you'll be in authentic with your true self, like uncovered in tattoos.

Leigh Welsh: 24:30

If there was a business that felt that tattoos were unprofessional and I was going to give the wrong impression with their client, they're not a business I want to work with. It's as simple as that, because my tattoos are who I am. I believe in my tattoos. My sister does them, she's a fantastic artist and I love going and getting tattoos and I can't wait to get booked in with her. If a business doesn't support that, it's not for me. I also love spending time with my kids and working from home, and I've spoken a lot on LinkedIn about flexible working, the impact that that has on parents, especially if you're not allowing me, as a parent, to spend time with my kids or you're expecting me to see my job as everything and you know family, kids looking after my mom, whatever it is you've got else going on, if you're not allowing me to take that into consideration as a priority alongside my working day, you're not the business for me.

Elizabeth Willetts: 25:23

Yeah, I like that and I think that confidence obviously makes you attractive. You know, to employers, to customers not everyone has that confidence that you always been quite confident in who you are.

Leigh Welsh: 25:33

I project a confident self because I have to force myself to be confident, and what personal branding and posting and social media really helped me with is getting over that barrier of what people are going to sit and think and how am I going to come across. That's really enabled me to do that. I mean, I grew up fairly quiet, fairly timid, always wanted to be the Joker at school and make people laugh and wasn't particularly academic, I think, growing up in a pub. My auntie had a pub and I spent a lot of time in there. I had to interact with lots of different characters on a day to day basis. So holding a conversation I'm pretty good at public speaking I've never had an issue with. But the actual confidence piece of how I feel I still post stuff. Now I'm like should this be going out? I don't know. And then I'm like I just always default back to.

Leigh Welsh: 26:22

The advice that I give to my clients is just post it, just get it out there. What's the worst that can happen? Are you going to lose your job over this? If it's something misogynistic, racist, something that's going to get you cancelled, you probably need to look at your personal values and what you believe in before you're even looking to project that and post that externally like let's look at that first. If that's going to be a problem Outside of that sort of stuff, what's the worst that's going to happen?

Leigh Welsh: 26:49

Someone's going to go. That content wasn't great. They're going to scroll, scroll past and, as I said you before you've got to post that average, mediocre some posts are going to land some arm for you to really get to a point where you found the format that works for you. Some people love Writing and they're really, really creative. They're still trying to do videos because they know that video gets more reach, more shares, get, you know, does better from a metric standpoint. Stick to the stuff that you feel comfortable with and that you're really good at. So trying to push a video when you don't feel comfortable on video because it's that's going to come through in the content that you're putting out.

Elizabeth Willetts: 27:27

Yeah, that's a really good point in terms of I guess as well, people are a bit worried if they work for quite corporate organization. If they post something that's a little bit, you know, on the edge, how do they sort of square that as well? You know getting their points across while working for a big corporate.

Leigh Welsh: 27:45

So I would be looking at what is the benefit of putting that post down if it's that I want to project my true, authentic self Now. Naturally, when you're working in a business have to, especially on LinkedIn, because your job role is associated with your profile. Anybody that sees that post or sees you online can see who you work for. That has to be taken into consideration, which is why it took me so long to be able to launch a podcast and I really had to sell the idea on multiple occasions and there was even certain posts. I remember doing a post in my last business writing out and it was me taking a picture of some on the tube and everybody that I could see. I was standing in the carriage and everybody I could see was down there on their phones on the way into work and I was just thinking, like I'm all about digital. I've done tech recruitment and digital recruitment for years, but this is really quite sad. Nobody looking up, no emotion, personality, authenticity, anything from anyone. Everybody's just down at their phone and I my immediate reaction to that when I got into the office was I'm writing out a post saying get off your fucking phone. Basically like, get off of your phones. We're completely absorbed by these smartphones and we're losing that human connection.

Leigh Welsh: 29:01

And it was only writing it out that I knew it was on the edge that my boss walked in and I went what do you think of this? Read it out to him. And he went I probably wouldn't put that one out. And I was like you're probably right, you know the ones that are just teetering on the edge and get that second opinion. You may find that your director, hiring manager, founder, is completely aligned with that message that you're trying to send. And so they go yeah, good on you, I agree, put it out.

Leigh Welsh: 29:28

But there's also got to be that consideration. When you are in that corporate world. I have to have these conversations with the founders of businesses, right? It's like you know. Are you right in putting that out? Could we frame that slightly differently? I get the point that you're trying to say but how's that going to be received online? That consideration has to be there. But again, if you don't go and approach that, I made the point of writing out that post and I was ready to send before I went and asked the question. Don't go and ask the question without getting that far, because then you haven't resided yourself to actually go and do it.

Elizabeth Willetts: 30:04

You're right. It's like my husband. He's sort of trying to build a person and he works for an organisation and he often just posts without asking me. The other night he wrote a post. He went what does this sound like? And it didn't sound well. I was like no, I don't think that's going to land. Well, I think you're right. He the fact that he had to ask me. Obviously he said I'm weird, this is a bit controversial, and it was so I was like, yes, don't post that one. But I think you do know, don't you?

Leigh Welsh: 30:27

And what's the benefit of that post Right? Could we frame it slightly differently? Could we soften it slightly? You're still getting your message across. You're still, you know, offering that glimpse into who you are, but are we positioning it in the right way? Because don't forget when we're, especially when you're writing content, the same way you'll receive. I receive a text from my wife sometimes and I'm about sounds a bit frosty, and then she'll get home and I'll be like, what is that text about? And she'll be like, oh, I didn't mean it like that. I just was saying this, this and this. It can just be received in different ways, because there's no body language, there's no tone of voice, it's just words on a bit of paper. So just be really, really mindful of that. Think how your audience is going to receive it and then the impact that might have on the company brand that you're working for.

Elizabeth Willetts: 31:11

Good advice I've kept hearing. There's the theme, and I've written it down because I didn't want to forget is about does this align with your values? You know, just say the employer, potential employer line with your values. Is your posts align with your value? Some listeners might think I don't know. I do want my values are. Is that the first step to building a personal brand, identifying your values? How do you do that then?

Leigh Welsh: 31:32

It's really looking into who you are, what you stand for, what you believe in, what you're passionate about. Think about how you feel when you watch certain parts of the news or when things are going out and you're reacting to it in a certain way. I support that. I don't agree with that. That's all shaping what you believe in and what your values are. I would then go and ask a second opinion or a third opinion or a fourth opinion. Call your friends and be like how would you describe me? How do you feel when we spend time together? What feelings do I leave you with when I leave time? But some will say I'm bloody exhausted, mate. To be honest with you, you chew my head off. Some will say you know what? I wish I could see you more. Work doesn't allow it. You know we've both got our own lives, but I wish I could see you more. And the reason being is because we're aligned on this, this, this and this. I love when we joke about this. I love when we put the world to rights about this and you create a narrative on what you stand for and what you believe in. So the first step has to be understanding what your values are.

Leigh Welsh: 32:32

Values have become a real buzzword. They have been in business for years and years and years and years. As long as I can remember, it was what are your core values, what is your mission statement? And that's just translated into the personal arena because we're able to project more and more online. Before it was, a business is a business and the messages they put out are that business. Then LinkedIn comes along and it's like well, that's the business and that's the messaging of the business and these are the people that work for that business. What do they believe in? And then personal social media takes steps in and now we can get a glimpse into okay, that's the business, that's the brand messaging. They're the people that work for the brand and that's their messaging. What are they like in their personal lives? And then you build this picture of branding and values and all of these buzzwords creep in. But it starts with that alignment on what you actually believe in.

Elizabeth Willetts: 33:25

If you're a company, should you encourage your employees to build their personal ramps. 100%, 100%.

Leigh Welsh: 33:31

Providing you've got that, I wouldn't be putting too much of rigid framework in place for what they can post, what they can't post, because then you lose that authenticity. If you think about the biggest influencers of the world, they deliver the best brand messages and paid advertising when they're given free reign by the clients that they work with. If a client is coming to a person that believes in their brand and going I want you to post this in this format, with you doing this, this, this and this is the script, I want you to say it's so obvious that it hasn't come from them, because the people that follow them have spent years as you said earlier on in this podcast of getting to know them, knowing their tone of voice, knowing their humor, knowing their wit. If suddenly they're putting a paid advert out that's aligned with a business they aren't a part of, it's super, super obvious. So it's absolutely paramount. There is a framework in place, but it's not too rigid.

Leigh Welsh: 34:27

Once you've got that framework in place and there's an understanding that employee is aligned with what we believe as a business, because that's why we hired them, that's why they're still working here, then why would you not want them advocating for those messages that you collectively share and the more that that person, bearing in mind that brand message is shared by people, so personal profiles are linked in are also linked in Are over 20 times more shared than by a company page.

Leigh Welsh: 34:55

Why would you not want them pushing them? Because anyone that visits their profile is going to see that they work for your company and I can assure you that if they are as passionate about your business as you are and that's why you hired them then they're going to be promoting your business along the way. They're going to be talking about that new event that they're going to, that new product you've just launched, and it's going to come across as an authentic post because, one, they're not being paid for it and they have to do so, and that's the framework they've been given. But, two, they believe in what your company has to offer. So for me, I don't see any downside, as long as all of those values everything we've spoken about are aligned.

Elizabeth Willetts: 35:35

Yeah, you have that framework Because I guess there is obviously the certain footpoints where it may go a bit wrong. If there's a post that goes out that you know how would you advise to a client.

Leigh Welsh: 35:44

Then, if a post goes out they don't approve of, Well, one thing I struggled with in a previous company was working for a big corporate. I was working for a very, very big recruitment company and anything I wanted to do creatively so, whether it be posts, whether it be podcasts, whether it be video I had to always run it past their big marketing team and the message and response was always sorry, that's not on brand guidelines, sorry, and, as you can imagine, I didn't stay in that business very long. My advice to any company that has an employee that is posting something outside of the brand messages that they're trying to portray is let's go back a step and understand where that alignment is. Again, what is it that they're posting that's so far out and what you believe in as a company? Because then you need to question who you've got in your business and how aligned they are with your mission, because if it goes against that, we've got a much bigger problem than a post that might get a bit of hate online.

Leigh Welsh: 36:45

Or you know the founder looks at the post and goes oh, I don't know what that's talking about, I don't like that. Or I don't like the language of that. There's things like swearing and language and you know some businesses don't care, some businesses really care and they have their own reasons for that. So that's where that framework comes in. But if you're a company that's got the ump because one of your employees has posted something, depending on what that is, how serious it is I would be scaling that back to where is that message your post come from, and is that really aligned with us as a business? If it's not, you've got a bigger problem in your hands.

Elizabeth Willetts: 37:19

So really all that starts with values, doesn't it? Company values and individual values, and then making sure you're aligned. That's something obviously people can explore when interviewing with organizations.

Leigh Welsh: 37:30

If you want authenticity, because we can all project something that we're not businesses that typically fall, reject something they're not. If you look at the Willy Wonka experiencing Glasgow prime example, right, we're projecting an experience that it isn't and so naturally it gets a load of stick in the media and a load of crying, screaming kids, because it's that expectation versus reality. Right, we've always talked in sales under promise over deliver. That is the same in your online persona, right, it's like I'm not trying to promise you that I'm the finished article. I'm not trying to promise you that I get everything right all the time and I know it all.

Leigh Welsh: 38:13

I'm real and I have my flaws and I've failed and things go wrong, and I don't care if I'm in a C sweet position in a FTSE 250, things sometimes go wrong and the more that you can push that and show that glimpse into reality, the more authentic the content is going to be. Rather than forget about values, forget about messaging, I'm just going to put some stuff out because I've seen that it worked for that person. Or I saw that company is pushing the gender diversity agenda, so we're going to jump on board with that. But if you're not actually believing in that and you're not authentic with it. It's so easy to see through online, and AI plays a massive part of that. Now, liz.

Elizabeth Willetts: 38:55

What's your views on AI?

Leigh Welsh: 38:57

I think AI is absolutely incredible and saves me a load of time with a load of different stuff. Where I think AI is the same with any tool right, it can be used for good, used for bad. Where I think it's super, super obvious that it doesn't work is when you're trying to create marketing or brand messaging, that a computer I don't care how clever it is is telling you or generating that post for you. That then isn't you. I know you can train it and you can tell it to speak how you speak.

Leigh Welsh: 39:32

For me, the human element of marketing is getting pushed aside with AI, because we're seeing more and more and they're so easy to spot right, and maybe they'll get less easy to spot as AI develops. But for me, I can see that you've literally just put into chat GPT write me a post on LinkedIn about gender diversity and they've just copied and pasted it and I'm like that doesn't. It's not consistent with the other messages you've been putting out. I know that that is something that is half-assed, you couldn't be bothered, so you've just gone. Whereas if you genuinely believe in gender diversity, then let's actually sit down and hear from the people that have had challenges and triumphs in that arena. Let's hear from the people that have gone through those troubles, and then let's translate that into an impactful post that is actually authentic and coming from you, rather than it being an AI chatbot.

Elizabeth Willetts: 40:25

I think it is about that consistency, because we're recording this as International Women's Day, I think on Friday, and you know there'll be certain organisations that post about it, but that'll be the only time they post about it. They'll post about once a year.

Leigh Welsh: 40:36

Which is worse, which is worse than not posting anything at all. It's the same businesses that pride flag on for Pride Month but don't say anything about the LBQT Q plus for the rest of the year. It's those same businesses that go. I know everybody else is doing that and it's the hot topic for the month, so we should probably do that. Let's also put the Ukraine flag on when the war started and let's show our support. How are you actually supporting? And there is nothing that frustrates me more than businesses doing that obligatory post in March for International Women's Day, when their board is 90% men or 100% men and the rest of the year there's absolutely no discussion about gender diversity. It's just something they've seen. They need to post online.

Elizabeth Willetts: 41:22

Absolutely so. Before we wrap up, just some top tips for people you know. Give a bit of some rate. Why should you build a personal brand and how to get started.

Leigh Welsh: 41:30

So we've established the why is absolutely obvious, and building a personal brand is going to elevate your career. It's going to elevate your feeling about yourself. It's going to build confidence, as it did with me. It is going to put you in a position that you are harder to get made redundant in the world that we live in at the moment, because you have a following, you have a presence, you're seen as a thought leader. It's going to take a lot of time. You're going to have to be consistent with it and we need to start with those values and what you believe in.

Leigh Welsh: 42:04

Then forget about creating, start documenting, start thinking about the journey that you've been on, where you're trying to get to, the challenges you've had along the way and the interest that people might have in that story, because everybody has a different story. I have it on my podcast, right the imposter syndrome of guests going. Well, people aren't going to want to know what I've been through or my story, and I'm like it's completely unique. No one has been on the same journey, and so there's an interesting element there that's going to resonate with some people, not everyone, but we don't want the everyone we've already established.

Leigh Welsh: 42:36

We want fans, not followers. Embrace you, be as authentic as you can be. Don't think about how am I going to position this for that audience or how am I going to put this out that is going to resonate with that demographic. I'm just going to post me. I'm going to show the world me. I'm going to gloss it up in whatever way I feel most comfortable with, but without the Lambos and the fancy dinners and the Rolexes and the rubbish that people think personal brand or branding is associated with on Instagram. Don't copy others. Don't try and be someone you're not and get out there and start posting.

Elizabeth Willetts: 43:11

That's great. Do you know what you're going to put? Loads. Thank you so much, lee, for joining me today. Thank you so much to everybody that has listened. I hope you found it helpful, and why don't you tag me and Lee in your first post or your next post on LinkedIn?

Leigh Welsh: 43:24

Yeah, I love that. Thank you, Liz.

Elizabeth Willetts: 43:26

Thank you. Thank you for listening to another episode of the Work it Like a Mum podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please rate, review and subscribe, and don't forget to share the link with a friend. If you're on LinkedIn, please send me a connection request at Elizabeth Willett and let me know your thoughts on this week's episode. You can also follow my recruitment site Investing in Women on LinkedIn, facebook and Instagram. Until next time, keep on chasing your biggest dream.