Identity Capital and "Having" vs. "Being"

More likely than not, you’ve heard from a parent, friend, mentor, boss, etc. about the importance of your personal brand.
 
If you’ve read, “You, Inc.” by Harry and Christine Beckwith or “People Buy You” by Jeb Blount, then you’ve gone a step further to understanding the impact your personal brand can make on your relationships, education, career, goals, etc.
 
But, how do you know what you’d like your brand to be? What stories do you hope to tell? Won’t it and they evolve over time?  

The reality is that personal brands are hard to build, lack direction, and are too often influenced by what you or others think your personal brand should be.  

As a result, when we aren’t sure of how we’d like to brand ourselves, it becomes hard not to cave into what is socially encouraged or accepted.  

After all, conformity feels safe and perhaps for some it seemingly allows for a better chance of university admittance, landing a job, or gaining validation from peers or family. 

But aren’t we also taught that you must be unique and stand out from the crowd, that your uniqueness drives complementarity and compatibility with others, not similarity? 

Well, it truthfully depends on who you ask and the context. 

But the challenge we’re presented with is swerving the double-edged sword of aligning your personal brand with a desired outcome but not conforming so much that you lose your individuality.  

Ultimately, though, as Dr. Meg Jay argues in her book “The Defining Decade”, having a personal brand is less about defining your “brand” in stone, but building your identity over time, making it flexible, and unique to your values. 

As such, and inspired by Mary Antin’s famous words from “The Promised Land”, “we are born not all at once, but by bits”, Dr. Meg Jay describes the process of building your identity as more so a collection of Identity Capital. 

Identity Capital is our “stock of personal assets, it is how we add value to who we are, and it is what we have to show for how we spend our time.” 

In other words, they are “investments we make in ourselves, or the things we do well enough or long enough that they become a part of who we are.” 

To be clear, Identity Capital can and should go on a resume, but it is not a material achievement like a GPA, degree, distinction, award, or certification.  

Rather, Identity Capital is more personal and transferrable: how we present ourselves and solve problems, what our hobbies are or experiences we’ve had, and, more importantly, what values and qualities can be gleaned from these pieces of capital.  

For example, training for and running a Marathon, teaching English in a non-English speaking country, serving in the Military, playing competitive sports or an instrument, volunteering, starting a business and failing, etc. are all Identity Capital that trump more commonly known paper or material achievements.

Interestingly, Dr. Meg Jay’s work reminded me of Rich Roll’s podcast episode with Brad Stulberg, a researcher, writer, and coach on mental health, well-being, and sustainable excellence.

Rich and Brad discuss whether it is more important to “to be” than “to have” as it relates to forming and evolving your identity.

Specifically, having is to display a talent or skill but being is how you apply what you have and how it affects you, those in your life, and the broader community. 

For instance, Stulberg draws the comparison between having an athletic, musical, or similar natural talent vs. truly being an athlete, musician, or professional.  

Kobe Bryant’s “Mamba Mentality” is a perfect example.

Yes, Kobe was naturally talented, but his determination and mindset of being the best athlete he could is inevitably the Identity Capital that set him apart and defined his brand.

Lebron James, for comparisons sake, has been able to play at such a prominent level for 20 years in part to his talent, but more so to how well he embodies being an athlete and treating his body as well as he can.

In fact, Lebron reportedly spends over $1.5M a year on his health and wellness, and is a major piece of Identity Capital and his brand.

But, how does having vs. being relate to leadership?

In my experience, just because I have a people leadership role doesn’t mean I am a leader; I inevitably need to make an impact on my team by being a leader.

This means I must continue to focus on building Identity Capital that allows me not to just have leadership skills but for me to be someone that inspires, enables, and leads my team through adversity and success. Being is doing what I say am going to do, leading by example, standing up for my team, or even failing.

For example, my team and org went through a major systems change earlier in the summer. Exciting stuff, right?

The small act of working through this change side by side with my team and getting vulnerable around what I knew how to do or not was a small piece of Identity Capital that helped me gain additional trust with my team.

So, no matter what being looks like, even if it is getting vulnerable, being will always serve as the backbone to the Identity Capital I build up over time.

Now, as you navigate your personal brand or identity, it is OK to not know what you’d like your identity, brand, or story to be.

Rather, focus on building Identity Capital that proves not what you have but who you are and hope to be for yourself, friends, family, colleagues, teammates, and partners.  

After all, as Myrna Loy, the famous WW2-era actress said, “life is not about a having and a getting, but a being and a becoming” and that your personal brand or identity inevitably are defined as such.