Personal Branding: Why Can’t My Work Speak for Me Alone?

Today is a Friday and I have a deadline to submit an article today before the end of the day. At the beginning of the week, I thought I had more than enough time, so it would be possible for me to start writing day by day and still have Friday to just look over my work again. Well, I was wrong and it is 4:27 pm as I start writing this piece. Now I know better to not procrastinate when it comes to things like this, but would I do better? I don’t think so. I am used to moving this way and that’s how it works for me. When I loaded up my writing material, I didn’t even know what I would write about, to be honest. One of my writing weaknesses is that finding what to write can be a hassle. I can spend a lot of time just thinking of the perfect article heading or theme. It is a weakness I have come to accept, and despite having it, I am told by people that they actually enjoy reading my work.

I think a major reason why people tend to enjoy my writings is because I make it relatable. I share my everyday struggles and people get to have a glimpse of what life as me entails. Now remember me saying earlier about knowing the right thing to do but not doing it? Hold that thought and stay with me. I have lived twenty-four years on this planet, and in that semi-long period, I have learned a good number of tips, tricks, and threats. Still with that thought? Thanks. Well, something I have realized when it comes to life and my career is that, closed mouths don’t get fed. People who are usually loud about what they do, tend to get more visibility for their work and in the end, more earnings.

Now I believe that something can be simple but yet not easy to do. An example of that is me talking about work or doing personal branding online. It may sound like I am boasting but I do know if I was loud about what I do workwise, I would not be broke, lol. It’s funny how people online and even in person can’t point out what I do but they think I am rich. I wish I was rich though, or had half of the money people on the internet think I do. The issue of people not even knowing what I do means that when an opportunity that could be beneficial to me pops up, people wouldn’t even know I am the man for the job. The funny thing is that I can’t say what I do easily. Today I visited someone and she asked me, what I do and it took over 6 minutes to explain what I do, starting from what a Decentralized Autonomous Organisation is to what Decentralized Science is, down to how the DAO operates and what Working Groups are.

Over the 6 years now of being in tech, I have gotten to wear a good number of hats. At a point I was learning HTML and CSS with Sololearn, then I did Mobile Development with Java, Kotlin, and Flutter, then I did Project Management, building online and offline communities through Community Management, and then things around Governance and Operations in DAO and now, I am learning javascript which I never got a chance to do then. To me, I am just an individual who is able to use a wide range of available tools to achieve his goal. I call myself an ambitious generalist. I feel that life is too dynamic to have yourself boxed down into one niche, when you can have depth across various things and still have them intersect. I have had several times when I applied learnings from another area in tech to a new area.

Now back to the topic, I often ponder why my work can’t speak for me. I know I have to talk about what I do, for people to even know what I do, and thus gain visibility. However, this is also one of my weaknesses. Despite having good enough writing skills, I find it cringe to make those long-form LinkedIn aspire to maguire posts. The last long-form post I made was one which I had written over 5 weeks prior to publishing it. I currently have two stuff I am supposed to write and post about on LinkedIn and I am yet to do that. I had told myself and someone when we were about to enter 2024 that we would gain relevant social clout, which refers to us being known more career-wise but we have failed to do that. Why? Because despite how many times we try to, we weren’t just built that way. This is a weakness, unlike the article one, that I am really working on fixing. Whether I like it or not, I am losing opportunities not talking about what I do, whether on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Speaking of Twitter, that place to me, is where I go to shitpost. People follow me sometimes and expect to get to hear me dropping some words and being a key opinion leader. But if there’s anything I don’t look forward to, it is being seen as someone to look up to. I don’t even like to give my opinion on things unless I am asked. Funny how a lot of my friends ask for my thoughts on serious work related things. I don't think my life on the internet should be too serious. I grew up being on online forums and social media platforms at a very young age and it made me not take things online too formally. I have lived my life with having my work being in the background and just doing it while separating my work from myself. While this has been my comfort zone, I think it’s time to do more. Anyone who follows me on LinkedIn would realize that in the last month, I have made more posts there, than the entire year. Well the reason behind this, is that I am currently job hunting. I am looking for something exciting that involves my technical background and experience with building technical focused communities. Does this mean I would now be all that serious online? No, I don’t think it would be easy for me to change when it comes to that. However, I would apply more effort in spotlighting my work too. After all why limit things when you can be dynamic?

So if you have good opportunities for me (Community Lead/Manager, Technical Project Manager, Dev Rel/Advocate), you can always send me an email at [email protected] or send me a DM on Twitter at @lifeofdanel. You can even do more by sending my resume to anyone you know hiring. Thanks for reading this piece. I would appreciate it if you give me a headstart for next week by suggesting what I should write about. Thanks once again and see you next time.

Cover photo by Carl Heyerdahl on Unsplash