It’s not all LinkedIn posts and fancy headshots. Your personal brand is about how you demonstrate influence within your organisation.
For a lot of HR practitioners, “personal brand” is a phrase that brings on a full-body cringe. It conjures images of polished LinkedIn influencers, humble-brags and forced networking small talk. But according to culture and brand expert Mark Puncher, the people who feel that way are often the ones with the greatest untapped potential to build real influence.
“For the people who shy away from personal brand, who don’t feel as polished, who don’t feel as ready to put themselves out there, their brand opportunity is far stronger than the people who are gushing and beautifully articulate, but actually not very authentic,” says Puncher.
Puncher, who is speaking at AHRI’s National Convention and Exhibition in August, says that personal brand isn’t reserved for consultants, salespeople or aspiring LinkedIn stars. It’s essential for anyone who needs people to listen to them, trust them and act on what they say – which, he points out, describes almost every HR practitioner in existence.
“If you want people to engage with you, to listen to you, to buy into you, to follow you, to do the things you’re asking them to do… then personal brand drives all of that,” he says.
That applies whether you’re managing a team, trying to get buy-in from the executive or attempting to shift how HR is viewed in your workforce.
“How do you get the workforce to see HR as something more than a compliance machine, or a negative threat and a risk?” he asks. “I’d argue that personal brand is essential for anyone in HR, probably more so than any discipline in an organisation.”
The misconception that trips people up
The biggest barrier to building a personal brand, says Puncher, isn’t a lack of confidence. It’s a misunderstanding of what personal brand actually is.
“Personal brand is not about perfecting the way you speak or what you say. It’s not about portraying something elevated and different from who you are,” he says. “Personal brand is about understanding and genuinely being comfortable with who you are, and then being able to share that externally.”
The goal isn’t to become a different person.
“I want to understand exactly who you are, and I want to show you how powerful that is.”
Puncher points to a simple example: someone who stumbles over their words during a presentation or admits they’re nervous is often more believable, and more memorable, than someone who has clearly memorised their script.
“I don’t believe them, because it was too rehearsed, it was too planned. It was orchestrated and curated,” he says. “Whereas when somebody speaks openly and says, ‘Actually, no, let me try that again.’ I believe them.”
He’s similarly blunt about the old career advice to “fake it till you make it.”
“Why on earth would you fake it?”
His advice for nervous speakers is the opposite of conventional wisdom: say it out loud.
“If somebody hates public speaking and they’re really nervous when they stand up, the first thing they should say to that audience of a thousand people or thirty people is, ‘The truth is, I’m really nervous, public speaking is not my dream come true!’ I will love you more for it,” he says.
“It also gets it out of your head, and if you do appear nervous, it helps the audience make sense of it. They’re much more likely to engage and listen to you, versus someone who stands up and is so rehearsed it feels like a TV ad.”
“Personal brand is about understanding and genuinely being comfortable with who you are, and then being able to share that externally.” – Mark Puncher
Building your personal brand
For HR practitioners wanting somewhere concrete to start, Puncher shares a five-step framework he uses with clients:
- Frame your mindset
- Reflect and understand
- Articulate
- Live and show
- Check in, listen and learn.
Framing your mindset means letting go of the idea that brand is built in a single high-stakes moment.
“Brand is built over time, it’s never too late,” he says. “The more your brand is true, the more effective you’ll be. And here’s the big thing, it’s rarely as bad as you fear, but it’s rarely as perfect as you’d like.”
The reflection stage starts with deceptively simple questions: Who am I? What do I care about, and why? What are my superpowers? And what do I need from others, to belong and to thrive?
When working with teams, Puncher helps to surface these ideas by asking questions like: “Who here is the person who brings the energy and the optimism and the positivity? Who brings the creativity and the curiosity?”
“Then I’ll say, who brings… who’s the cynic? And nobody wants to put their hand up. But we need cynics. We need people who say, ‘Hang on, let’s not get carried away, let’s look at the data, let’s identify the risks.’ HR needs this.”
He also urges practitioners to sit with their “shadow side” – the flip side of their strengths – with compassion rather than shame. In his own case, his gift for storytelling and connection comes with a cost.
“I talk too much, and sometimes I’m exhausting, and I’m a lot for people. Really getting comfortable with that is part of the work,” he says. “Usually the flaws and the challenges…are literally a mirror reflection of the positive attributes.”
Once you’ve reflected, Puncher suggests writing it all down on a single page: who you are, what matters to you, your superpowers, your shadow side and the value you add.
“I always say one pager, not twelve,” he says. “Write it out, especially if you’re more introvered or you’re less confident, and give yourself permission and encouragement to celebrate who you are.”
From there, the ‘live and show’ stage is about consistency in the everyday, not grand gestures.
“Influence, leadership, progress, relationships, brand – it’s all built on all the day-to-day little things,” he says.
“Consider what you hope people would say about you when you leave the room. Then, what do you fear they might say about you when you leave the room?”
Closing that gap, he says, is the real work of personal brand.
Showing your brand to the world
When it comes to platforms like LinkedIn, Puncher’s advice is refreshingly practical.
“On LinkedIn – like any social media platform – you’ll find plenty of inauthenticity; it’s full of hype and gloss and lies. We all roll our eyes when we read the ‘blessed’ and ‘humbled’ posts,” he says. “There is huge power in telling the truth and being you, for real. And I think the more AI takes hold, the greater the opportunity, and the need, for the human. The beauty of human over AI is the imperfection, the subjective interpretation, the fragility and the endeavour.”
Before posting anything, he says, ask one question: will they care?
“And it’s not about asking, ‘will I get like’. Anyone can get their friends to like their stuff. The key question all of this comes down to is, will they actually care about what I’m sharing? What matters to these people, and why should they listen to what I have to say?”
And rather than only sharing wins, Puncher recommends leaning into the harder stories.
“If you want to have a good influence on LinkedIn… talk about the hard stuff, talk about the fails, talk about the two steps forward, twenty-five steps back – that’s the engaging stuff. No great story happens without a low point.”
Finally, be very considerate of the tone you choose to use online. Does it actually sound like you?
“People write as though they’re Winston Churchill… or a word-perfect ad. Write like you would speak. That’s the most effective way to capture people’s attention and win hearts and minds.”
“Too many people… are using impressive jargon and big words and complex sentence structures,” he says. “What I need is relatability. I need to believe that what you’re saying is authentic, that it hasn’t been overly rehearsed and curated. That’s the secret of personal brand. Be exactly who you are, nothing more, nothing less. That’s how you grow influence.”
🧰 HR’s career toolkit
- National Convention and Exhibition: Mark Puncher will explore these ideas further, including how to build influence and lead engagement from the top, at AHRI’s National Convention and Exhibition in August. Get your ticket today.
- Article: How to use more influential language to enhance your impact at work
- Course: Effective Partnering: Overcoming Stakeholder Resistance Course
