Reputation - An individual cornerstone for all in society

Why reputation feeds happiness and enables success

We all have being shocked of late by the extremist sound bytes coming from Donald Trump in the US Presidential Election campaign where apparently dirty politics, insanely imbalanced thinking and a neo conservative thrust for power has affected reputations both positively and negatively on all sides.

Donald Trump somehow managed to build a business empire in spite of some colossal errors in judgement and even more spectacular business failures that he has on his resume. He did so for many reasons including the fact that he managed his reputation astutely keeping an eye on how the world viewed him along with reconciling this intelligence to his goals and objectives. All was apparently well enough until his aspirations for higher office seemed to have sent him off the deep end in reputation management by thinking his extremist rhetoric would not have consequences. As the Presidential Office becomes apparently out of reach to Mr Trump, what are the lessons we all should learn from his performance in the management of our own reputations:

• Understand Your Interacting Environment - It’s not good enough to assume your ideas are going to be openly accepted with open arms. If you have a good point (in the eyes of your audience), make it! If you have a bad point, understand how it will affect your reputation because regardless of who you are, you will be judged!
• Embrace who you are - True power in society by definition always lies within the group. By understanding the dynamic of your group interactions, you can understand who you are to ‘your world’. Its their impression of you, not your impression of yourself that matters in reputation management. If you are it, own it and understand the shrewdest of networkers and reputation managers know they can only ascend in the social order so far thanks to inherent ability and/or their situational dynamics.
• Own your ego - Don’t let your ego own you! As you can’t force someone to like you, you should not try. Ego leads to arrogance and thus blinds one to the possibilities of influencing someone to freely chose to like you, trust you and/or even vote for you. An individual’s world should not to be blindsided in the present by lies, misinformation and incessant badgering in some cases. This will be found out and when uncovered, your reputation will be appropriately punished for your ego driven misdeeds.

 As the US presidential race heats up, the outrageous behaviour by Donald Trump should serve as a reminder to us all on the dangers of not embracing your own reputation as a critical aspect of who you are.

Now for my confession. For years, I ignored proper networking, reputation management and personal branding on the grounds that I was honest, trustworthy and technically competent. Apparently, the world saw me a little differently as I had forgone the opportunity to develop my brand and sell myself to the world for who I am, not what some guy with half an opinion and an agenda wants me to be! With my kernel error uncovered in recent years, I have worked hard at personal branding, updating my skills and networking as hard and as fast as I can. The experience has transformed me from a technically competent process manager to a technically competent Technologist who believes in people, process and technology.  Reputation management is now part of who I am thanks to my embracing of it, owning it and using it to be a better version of myself! In refactoring my life into a community based iteration, I face new challenges that starts with where I belong and continues to a happier tomorrow.

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