Personal Branding is more than just a hot topic. It is certainly not a new phenomenon, nor is it a luxury. It is about how others perceive us – our reputations. We brand each other constantly by way of introduction, in describing one another and by articulating opinions about each other in person or in the media. We all have a brand whether it is positive, neutral or negative – and all of this is happening whether we are managing the process or not.

Great Personal Brands serve us well - they position us as the person to go to in our area of expertise, raise our visibility and income, and set us apart from our competition. Ultimately, they attract what we want, and repel the rest. We like to think of a Personal Brand as the cornerstone of attraction – we don't need to appeal to everyone, to all things. We need to appeal to our target market or audience while eliminating time consuming and costly distractions.

We live in a branded world: we talk about picking up a Starbucks, loading our iPods, wearing our Jimmys or Manolos, scoffing a Mac, being on our Blackberrys or iPhones. We even have nicknames for those who are deeply attached to these things… “crackberry” is just one common example.

When it comes to people, the same rules apply: just mention Branson, Angelina, Mandela, Madonna, Paris, Khofi or Thatcher and we immediately have an idea of who these people are, what they do, and what they stand for.

When we are known by just one name, rather than our first and last, we are truly global brands. And we are using the word ‘brand’ in relation to people all the time: just flick through the news channels or read a newspaper and hear discussions about how an individual’s actions or circumstances affect their brand.

So let’s bring all of this back to managing our careers. Personal Branding is the art of developing, owning and managing our public personas. Everything we do, or choose not to do, communicates our values and character. Our public persona may or may not be in the broader public eye; however, in today's branded world, creating a competitive advantage through development and ownership of your own brand is vital.

The current interest in Personal Branding stems from the realisation during the past ten years that not only are we responsible for our brand, we have the ability to develop and manage it. And perhaps even more compellingly, our Personal Brands have a direct effect on our success.

It started with an article written by Tom Peters, the Management Guru, in August 1997, for Fast Company Magazine, titled “The Brand Called You”, where he delivered the case for becoming CEO of ME Inc. Since then, the world has been paying attention and more importantly, ordinary people like you and me are using these principles to our advantage.

Superior skills, training, resources, experience and market knowledge have always formed the foundations of success. However, without being known for who you are, what you do, and how you do it better, they remain only commodities and the chances of rising above the competition are slight.

The benefits of harnessing and managing one’s Personal Brand are numerous, although broadly speaking people tend to have one of two aims – gaining a competitive advantage, or managing change. All things being equal, we need to focus on what is compelling to our target market or audience. It needs to be authentic, it needs to be consistent, and it needs to be well known.

iWorkshop™ is designed to take you through the thought processes and exercises that we have found to be most effective after working with clients from an array of industries, walks of life and cultures. Our advice to you is to initially explore the principles in each module and then go through each exercise proactively, one step at a time.

And don’t stop there: once you have mastered the principles and have found very practical ways of implementing real change, give yourself a quarterly review. Life is all about constant choices and change and your Personal Brand needs to reflect this on a continuing basis.