Personal Branding Without Being a Douche

Thanks for your thoughts.

I wrote about my personal experience with cold showers and how I feel they have improved my life. This is an experiment with an N of 1. Most notably:

"It also helps me temper my emotional responses to things. I no longer have the panicky feeling that a ton cold water on your skin gives you for more than a few seconds when I take my cold showers – I’ve trained myself to calm down and overcome this natural response. And I’ve noticed this ability to temper my response overlap into other areas of my life"

If you haven't tried taking cold showers regularly you might be surprised by the results.

I never posted the 100 pushups article on HN so I'm not sure what you mean about being irresponsibly promoting pushups.

I agree that the 100 pushups requires a relatively short period of commitment. Yet it seems impressive. Which is why in my post I wrote:

"It turns out, with about 4-6 weeks of pushup training 3x a week (~10 mins per session), you can do build your capacity to do something rather difficult: 100 pushups in a row."

The point of that post was not to show off how awesome I am, but to encourage people to go after goals that seem difficult because with consistent effort, large goals can be conquered.

I find it unfortunate that my life comes across to you as molded for SEO and blog hits as that is not my intention. As I state in this post and in my about section, I write to provide resources to help others.

Thanks for the thoughts.

I used the word "personal branding" mostly because it is the established term that covers what I'm talking about. But I agree with your point in that it sort of turns people into products.

I guess a larger point I should have made in the blog post and that I did in the talk is this:

Your name has a meaning to people, even if you choose to not think about it. Recognizing that what people think / feel when considering "you" is something I want to encourage. Shaping your reputation/brand/name into something positive and making it a useful tool for achieving your goals is, IMO, a worthwhile endeavor.

Hi Jason, thanks for responding. I liked your post, and I appreciate that you didn't coin the term -- 'personal branding' has been around a long time.

But the idea of 'Public Rhetoric' has been around far longer, and that's what we're really talking about -- the connection between what I present in public speech or other forum, to a truth about myself -- the 'ethos' of rhetoric.

It's an ancient problem, and the concern I have with propagating the language of 'branding' is that it pulls it too close to the ethics of Mad Men for my taste. There are other ways to, ahem, spin this I think.

The intent of our public rhetoric should be more than just commerce or marketability, as you demonstrate with the charity you started at Stanford.

But I see a problem with the language of 'branding' so close to the idea of 'charity.' It raises a question of ethos -- why are you doing this? For self-promotion or for some other human good?

Of course this has always been a problem, and language can always be used to obscure our true motives. But declaring something as 'branding' outright seems to me to subtly give too much license to our more selfish intents. I'd rather we still talk about Speech or Rhetoric or Reputation than Branding, if for no other reason than it at least creates some distance between commerce and altruism.

And now I've taken this conversation into Aristotelian waters way outside my pay grade...

The throwaway paragraph about fashion holds much truth, I have found. I decided a year ago to learn how that stuff works. I can't even begin to list the benefits that come with it - it isn't only women that like you more, but men are more likely to take you seriously if you aren't walking around in jeans and a t shirt.

Here's a good site to get started:

http://www.magnificentbastard.com/

Lots of good advice, I agree with most of it. A more important step is to head to a high-end clothing store, the type that sticks a salesperson on everyone who walks through the door. Yes, the clothing is expensive, but in conjunction with the professional advice it is very much worth it.

Hey Dave,

It's great to have a discussion about this. I think the concern that people have with businesses is that profit is a rather cold motive. We wonder if at the core of every corporation is an empty vessel, an icy void, a dispassionate pursuit of the bigger bottom line.

As I mentioned in the post, I think the best brands (and businesses) have a mission that is higher than profit. Of course, some might dispute that claim as simply another cold-hearted way to make a buck, but from what we know about Steve Jobs, it seems that he really saw Apple as a vehicle for delivering insanely great products to the world.

And that's why their advertising and marketing resonates so much with us.

I think of it like this: brand -> reputation -> character -> legacy. You've got to work backward from what you want your legacy to be. The usefulness of calling "branding" is that we can use other words/tools/strategies from business and marketing in an analogous way.

Business can be more than "just commerce" in my opinion. But yes, we have to watch our words because they suggest our intent. Would love to hear more about your thoughts on this.

Jason