Module 2: Personal Branding and Empowerment (html version)

Our project

Sustainable development for the inclusion of migrating and refugee populations can only be attained if women are involved, as mothers, as teachers, as entrepreneurs and/or when a gender sensitive policy environment is created for them to influence community and social policies at the higher level. Women are the primary victims of the intertwined causes of conflicts, underdevelopment and migration. To address these issues, in a sustainable and humanitarian way, migrants should be offered assistance in building a new life in the respective host countries by developing, testing and implement new concepts of train the trainer programs for online training offering migrant women the opportunity to develop their entrepreneurial skills. That is the aim of the 241 project.

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01 Introduction

Why are we empowered by our personal brand?

What is empowerment?

Empowerment is:

• a multi-dimensional social process that helps people gain control over their own lives. 
• a process that fosters power in people for use in their own lives, their communities, and in their society, 
• acting on issues that people define as important.

What is a personal brand?

Personal branding is the intentional effort to create and influence society around you by believing in your power being trusted and being unique and different in your own way. 

1. to ultimately advance your career, 
2. increase your influence, 
3. and have a larger impact

Why is empowerment reinforced by our personal brand?

Building a brand secures your trust and belief in yourself, through the 3 Laws of Personal Branding 

• Authenticity: We don’t want to be, or pretend to be, what we are not. | Show your true self and what you can do. | Create your own original content.
• Transparency: Do not hide your professional world. Be proud of you! | Acknowledge your mistakes and learn from them
• Visibility: Take advantage of your network, the internet, everything that makes you visible and powerful!

Valuing your potential

Watch this video on empowerment with the poet Britta B…

Video summary

“Dear Young Woman”: a poem of empowerment

Enforce your character and learn how to present yourself

The most important part of being empowered is the power to Debate and Claim!

Get your voice heard

It is crucial for your empowerment to be able to speak for your rights and wills.

Don’t be afraid to raise the questions about what your rights are and the places you can find an outlet.

How to get into Debates?

In order to feel strong in your own skin it is essential to learn how to present yourself and fight for your rights and opinions. 

Your presentation plays a vital role in how you are perceived as an individual by others and how you are perceived as competition. Speak slowly and with clear enunciation, and consider what it is you are going to say.

This will make for a clearer understanding of what you are talking about and make for better reasoning. 

A really important part of your presentation is how to introduce yourself. See this video on how Kevin Bahler promotes self empowerment and the right for debate through a proper introduction! 

Video Summary

How to introduce yourself -Kevin Bahler:

Kevin Bahler talks about how to introduce ourselves. 

When we are young, we choose things that we care about and we are open about it. When we get older, we choose the things people expect to hear because we want to be part of a group -to have things in common.

So, people don’t share their passions because they fear the others will criticize them and end up with no friends. In the end, they have people around them that are not true friends because everyone doesn’t share who they are as a whole.

Find a way to introduce ourselves is difficult. It is also something that we must think about ourselves. Let’s not allow a job or studies or whatever define who we are. Let’s share our passions and we will attract people that share the same.

Test yourself!

Let’s get you ready to debate for a matter you feel strongly about! 

Follow our critical Thinking Module here and make your research!

Now go on and host a debate with a friend. 

Get them to take an opposing stance than you and see how you can present your opinion and your arguments!!

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03 Explore your abilities and prospects

Check your strengths and realise your wishes

Let’s do a SWOT Analysis

A Personal SWOT analysis is an exercise in self-introspection to help you understand yourself and prepare for growth.

What Does SWOT Stand For?

• Strengths: What are my most developed abilities?
• Weaknesses: What do I not like to do? Or could do better?
• Opportunities: What is an opportunity for me? Where could it come from?
• Threats: What could stand in my way?

Why is a SWOT Analysis Important for your Empowerment and Later on Business Plan?

Your starting point!

When it comes to significant changes in your life, it involves a lot of information gathering, thinking and analyzing. Conducting a personal SWOT analysis can help you avoid unforeseen mistakes because it requires you to address your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

Strengths

Writing down your strengths will help you see your advantages over your competitors/peers. Knowing your strengths will help you position yourself in whatever goal you want to achieve.

Weaknesses

It is essential to list down your weaknesses. It may be difficult to admit your flaws, but you can develop a plan and strategy to bridge your gaps once you successfully recognize them.

Opportunities

The list of opportunities helps you determine availabilities or chances that guide you toward your goals

Threats

Recognizing threats to your personal or professional path enables you to build a defensive plan on what might become your obstacles and prevent you from unexpected challenges.

Take a step back and think about the best ways to recognize what you need to improve. You may be surprised how self-assessment could help you with decision-making and open many new doors of opportunities for you.

Steps to Conduct a Personal SWOT Analysis

Step 1 – Ask yourself questions.

People who know how to ask the right questions always become successful in their careers. Let us show you how to ask the right questions for your personal SWOT analysis below.

Ask yourself these questions on the following slides to determine your prospects 🡪 

Strengths:

• What am I enjoying doing?
• What are my unique skills?
• What are skills that I have but others don’t?
• What do others see as my strengths?

Weaknesses:

• What stopped me from achieving my goal?
• What do I need to improve to achieve my goal?
• What are my bad habits?

Opportunities:

• How can my network help me with my future career?
• How can my skills fill the need in the industry that I want to work in?
• Is there any significant change in the industry that I can take advantage of?

Threats:

• Is my personality hurting my career path?
• Are my peers doing a better job than I do in the same position?
• Are there any skills that my competitors have that I don’t?
• Is my financial situation impact my goal?

Step 2 – List all your answers.

This is the part where you have to be honest with yourself. Keep in mind that this step is a self-analysis; the more you list down your points, the better chance to determine your future improvements.

Step 3 – Ask others for their opinions and be open-minded.

Although this framework is all about self-assessment, asking others how they perceive you can lead to a deeper issue that you’ve never noticed.

Use a SWOT Analysis Tool

It is your time to put theory into practice!! 

Experiment with some of the many free online templates for a swot analysis through:

https://www.swotanalysis.com

It requires a free sign up and lets you create (freely) unlimited projects with up to 25 items per project

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04 Build your own personal brand

What do you want to give to your society and achieve through your brand?

Building a representative Brand

Now that you know your strengths … Let’s Build Your Brand

The most important question you need to ask when creating a brand is ..

How can my strengths create a career? 

Answering the question

Check your Strengths from the SWOT Analysis – Review your Strong Points from the SWOT Analysis we carried out before! 

See this video on how to make the most from your SWOT Analysis:

Video summary

Personal Swot Analysis Example:

This video contains lots of questions and examples to help you do a SWOT analysis and prepare you for a job interview, a promotion or a change in your career.

Strengths: What are those things that are unique to you because they are based on your life experiences?

Weaknesses: What are you missing, what can you improve?

Opportunities: Don’t be afraid to try new things. You have to search for it and think about what are the things you can take advantage of.

Threats: What is preventing you from developing yourself and your career?

You can control strength and weaknesses, you cannot control opportunities and threats -but you can overcome/take advantage of them.

Couple your Strengths with available opportunities for your SWOT analysis

Research, Research, Research!!!

Question everyone you know, Be online to find new ways and opportunities, create opportunities by organizing initiatives with your peers!

Creating a brand

Now that you have made a decision on what may interest you, it is time to create a concrete brand. 

1. Check on what other people with similar interests have done. Google is your best friend. 
2. Take a white board and build your vision!  See the video on your left to see how Lilly Singh does it !!

Video Summary

How to properly make a vision board:

In this video, Lilly is going to show us how to make a vision board.

The main procedure is to: set a goal, visualize it, work for it, and make it a reality.

Materials:

• Foam board
• Scissors
• Double-sided tape
• Google
• Printer (/printing services)
• A good mindset

Start making the vision board when you feel good (have a good mindset) and believe that anything is possible. Then, you are going to cut images and put them on the board. Every picture on the board is going to become a reality in your life.

Make a list of goals: anything (big or small) and in any form (words, sentences, drawings). Everything will go into one vision board only.

Google some images: Images that inspire you (have a good reason), Give many details (be specific), Be clear and show it (manifest).

Print and cut the images: Any size, it doesn’t matter.

Organize the board: You can have small categories (like work, personal life, travel etc.), but at the center put an image that is the most important for you. Play with the position of the other pictures.

When you are ready, tape everything. Your vision board is finished.

Now, how to use it? Put it somewhere that you can see it everyday. Then you can take some time during your day and think of your goal and act like it is already true (visualization). 

Finally, and most importantly, you have to work hard for it! The vision board is just a tool, something to guide you, but you have to work to make your dreams a reality.

Creating a brand (continued)

• Now, think about the specific actions you need to make, visualize the steps, order them in a chronological order. 
• You can make an additional list next to your vision board and put it on the wall so that you can see it every day. Break it into small and easily achievable goals so that it keeps you motivated, and you can see the progress. 

Assignment

Getting to actually create your brand is a challenge! 

You have to find new ways for all the information of your will information and then organize it, save it and use it. 

As an assignment, you can use the Canva platform: https://www.canva.com/ and create (in whatever manner you like -presentation, mind map, poster, collage, chart etc.) content with information for your brand (like a cv, a business card, a sketch of a business you would like to have, etc). 

Get your Brand out in the world

Share what you created with friends and family. Ask them if they see you in the material you created! 

This is not going to be a lonely road, ask for help and don’t be afraid to make changes! 

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Thank you very much for taking on the Course!!
Join Us for the rest of our Modules on our website

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