Mia Pearson has a clear message for women in the business world: be bold.
Pearson, a well-known entrepreneur, creative strategist and the co-founder of North Strategic, spoke at today’s Women in Business conference and told attendees that increasing visibility and strengthening their personal brands were crucial steps toward career advancement.
“As women, we’re not good at taking credit,” said Pearson, who co-founded High Road Communication in 1996 and held senior executive roles at Fleishman-Hillard before launching North. “We’ve grown up thinking that it’s not okay, that it’s this dirty thing that women should not be comfortable with. But it’s not about bragging. It’s about taking credit for what we do.”
Pearson observed that women are often less enthusiastic about generating media attention for themselves than their male colleagues, and that women are more hesitant to actively promote their personal brands, which puts them at a disadvantage.
“Women need to be okay with self-promotion,” she said. “Men make self-promotion a full-time job.”
And after one becomes comfortable with having a strong social media presence and recognizable personal brand, they need to manage these things properly. “We are in charge of our personal personas and we need to be the ones driving our personal brands forward,” she said. “We need to take it seriously.”
Pearson advised delegates to plan and execute their personal brands using the same organization and seriousness with which one would run a company. This means keeping social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn up to date, as these are often the first places people look when they want to learn about a possible colleague.
Pearson also suggested integrating social media platforms in order to keep personal brands aligned. “You are one person,” she said. “Whatever you’re putting out there should be consistent.” Curating social media content is one way to do this, using platforms such as About.Me or Rebel Mouse, which compile all of a user’s social networks into one page for quick reference.
Other ways to confidently build a personal brand include accepting media requests for interviews (Pearson recalled a magazine editor telling her it was difficult to find women willing to be profiled), and taking advantage of public speaking opportunities. “Visibility is vital to the progress of women in business,” she said. “People won’t notice you without putting that work in.”
She noted that until that visibility increases, men continue to dominate business media coverage. “Women can become leaders,” she said. “We can become CEOs. The stories can change. But it will not happen on its own.”
Pearson said it’s no longer enough to just be good at what you do—you now need to let others know that you’re good at what you do.
“Don’t underestimate the power of a strong personal brand,” she said. “Invest in it and own it.”
