EWIB-Capital Region Virtual Workshop Series: Personal Branding for Board Candidates, March 7, 2024

WIB-Capital Region hosted a series of five virtual workshops from January to March led by Ms. Kelly Huang, an executive leadership coach with over 20 years of experience in teaching, B2B marketing, and management consulting, and former Co-Chair for Women In Bio’s Boardroom Ready program. Each session consisted of a group session followed by interactive breakout sessions. 

The event’s goal was to give executives and aspiring executives an overview of how to develop our personal branding in preparation for serving on corporate Boards. We followed the five-step “Personal Branding Wheel,” a values-driven approach to developing personal brands that covered the following topics:

• During Session 1 (Define Your Why), we learned that “personal branding” is a strategic set of actions that we could take to distinguish ourselves and help us be found in a crowded community. Our “personal brand” was at the intersection of how we saw ourselves and how others saw us. We discussed identifying and clarifying our values, aspirations, and visions.
• During Session 2 (Define Your What), we were joined by Clarissa Castillo-Ramsey, an organizational psychologist and transformational coach for creatives, authors, and abstract artists. We learned how to use our imagination, focus, and attention to refine our vision and purpose and the need to take “inspired action” to bring them to life.
• During Session 3 (Land Your Approach), we learned to formulate our elevator pitch to convey how our past experiences, present strengths, and future visions could solve our audience’s problems. We also discussed tips on using LinkedIn to develop and share content, grow a community, and become a thought leader.
• During Session 4 (Activate Your Brand and Amplify), we learned about different styles of storytelling to amplify our story for influence and leadership. We discussed the importance of creating an imprint that allowed our brand to be felt, not just seen and heard. We learned to be strategic with our network to maximize our outreach and assessed our current and future networks.
• In Session 5 (Align with Community), we discussed building and activating our strategic network. We learned how to find and navigate our community to find Board decision markers and connectors and to use LinkedIn to test and refine our “Minimal Viable Product” version of our brand.

Each session had approximately 30 participants. The breakout rooms during each session to apply what we had learned appeared to particularly resonate with attendees. They were very lively, with participants sharing their thoughts and progress on their personal branding and giving feedback and advice to each other. 

The progress of diversifying boards is slowing, highlighting the importance of continued efforts, such as Women In Bio’s Boardroom Ready program. Preparing to serve on corporate boards is a long process, which we can start even three to five years in advance. Finally, our network’s structure, not just size, is important to grow our outreach exponentially, and collaboration is key.

Submitted by Nao Gamo