Go From Technical Expert In Your Company To Trusted Authority In Your Industry

I love tonight's event because it combines two elements of career progression, the technical side of things, but also the more soft skills and this is exactly what authority means.

And we heard about hexagonal architecture and the authorities in that space. And when you thought well, but I have developed a model. I haven't written a book, I don't have a PhD, I don't have a zillion years of experience, can I still become an authority?

The short answer is yes, you absolutely can.

Because for tonight's context, I want to create some common language, what actually an authority is an authority means the go to, for a certain topic to be the go to in your field. And trust. It means by choice, not by title.

Especially looking into the future of work, it's a very important distinction. And this is what we're going to cover in the next 30 or so minutes, I want to take you with me on a journey as to what the next world of work looks like. And why it is so important to not only be a technical expert, but become the trusted authority. And since I'm all for taking action and making it as practical as I possibly can, I'll share with you also three steps that you can apply to become the trusted authority in your field. Because first things first, it is crowded, it is busy, and it's noisy.

If you thought it was quite competitive already before COVID, it's taken the world of work to another level COVID-19 basically fast track 10 years within 10 days. And I always intentionally say welcome to the next world of work and not to the new world of work because we've seen those trends, meaning global talents, remote working more automation and technology.

We've seen those trends coming for the last decade. There's an incredible research that's been released by the Institute for the Future in 2010. That already shows every single trend that is now reality coming our way. And truth told we're not going backwards anymore. We have had now the experience with working from home working remotely being in control of our own schedule, but also don't have to compete necessarily with people within our own state or even with our own continent.

We can now work globally for companies and brands that we want to work for and with this is very exciting, but at the same time the world has opened up So as much as we've got more opportunities to work globally, it's also going the other way.

Companies are tapping into global talent pools and simply having more degrees and more years of experience isn't enough anymore, because it's becoming a commodity. There are so many countries where we can tap into those skills and levels of experience for a cheaper price. And truth told, we always be somebody who is cheaper, who is faster, who is more experienced, who is with you, who is smarter, you know, you literally name it, which means that we need to identify ways how we can stand out from the crowd, especially as I always call my audience, my left brainers digital intake is my sweet spot. And I love it because I need step by step everything and the process and the method and data and research behind everything that I'm tapping into. And there is a way this is the good news.

The answer is you want to become the trusted authority in your field, simply that people want to work with you and not have to work with you. So what exactly is the difference?

That's a good question.

An expert is all about your own knowledge, how much you know how much experience and expertise you've got an authority, however, is a person who can leverage their knowledge and experience and make an impact in other people's lives.

And although this is now more relevant than ever before, it's actually nothing new Harvey Coleman, identified in 1996, already, that only about 10% contributes to our career success in terms of performance, 30% comes down to the image.

A whopping 60% comes down to the exposure, meaning that we are seen by the right people. And for the right reasons, this impacts whether we get ahead in our career, or not. And unfortunately, I learned about the pie concept way too late, because I started in brand and product marketing.

So I graduated 15 years ago. In fact, it was last week that I had by 15th anniversary. And I thought my one and only Korea is branding product marketing in a fast moving consumer goods industry. And I did that for the next 10 years. And it progressed very quickly.

Because I'm from Austria, and I could add work, every single person I was the first in last out. And I got to a senior level that I considered as success. I had the senior role, I had the title, I had the budgets, the team perspective, you know, responsibility, this came with it.

It was a Friday morning, I was called into a manager's office and I thought, oh, must be time for my next promotion because I've worked really hard. And it was exactly the opposite. They put me on a performance improvement plan. And I didn't see that coming. I didn't have a plan B. And their explanation was yes, we see that you do a lot of work, you are the first in last out.

But you are on a senior level, you need to influence people. And at that stage, I was looking after 18 boards across Australia and New Zealand. So my work was actually not doing the work but communicating the right way having the authority and being able to influence on an international level. And he said you don't have that level. And that impacts the national performance.

I did not see that coming because my biggest asset, which was outworking everyone having more credentials than most of my peers, got me to that level, and it didn't get me any further. And to be honest, that feedback, got me got my ego bruised, just a little bit. Just kidding. It bruised me a lot, that much so that I actually got out of the industry and got into recruitment.

I had a new desk that I had to start. This was the condition where I got the job without the previous experience. And it was digital and tech and was you know, seven, eight years ago, and the agency never had that kind of recruitment.

And he said, we don't have a candidate and we don't have a client either. So you need to build that practice. And by the way, you have to build within three months, otherwise, you're out this is company policy. Now at that stage, because I progressed so quickly in my career. I didn't actually do the doing. I was looking after strategies. So I had no idea what even SEO means.

So I did what every millennial would do. I googled it. But the next stage it was also that I reached out to candidates and I interviewed hundreds of talented professionals who were extremely experienced who were qualified. And so one after the other missing out on opportunities, from not getting the pay rise to missing out on the promotion to not often even get invited to an interview simply because the decision maker, either a head of the department or SEO from a smaller organization didn't see that this person was the right solution to their problem.

They didn't see them as the best answer for what they were looking for. And because in recruitment hide works, it all comes down to how you position and present the candidate is whether you make a placement or not. And because I interviewed them so thouroughly I could tell the story. And instead of sending a resume, I simply called my clients and talk them through the background and why their skill set would be perfect for what they were looking for.

So basically, I translated languages.

And I placed over 300 candidates in less than five years because of that. And in recruitment as it is, you only have so many roles to work on. So this got me into thinking, what is it?

What if I could develop a method or a system or a process, that I can help people clarify what makes them unique, so that they can communicate it confidently, and also consistently, online and offline. And they can commercialize their strength and credit career rounded.

This is why this was time when impact was born, my first company, and I've been running impact since 2017, full time, and I've had incredible pleasure to work with incredible smart individuals, a couple are actually in the audience today. And also with amazing companies like Domino's, in serum, and Microsoft, just to name a few. But what it has come down to is, especially with the last 18 or so months, where industries have taken turns is that simply doing great work and being amazing in what you do doesn't mean you have influenced nor being successful.

The truth is that especially now the 21st century, success comes down to two parts equally, yes, skills and talents are incredible important. But at the same time also the ability to brand and market yourself and communicate effectively is what makes or breaks your career success. And what we want to achieve is we want to not be the tree that falls in the forest when no one is around.

Meaning we don't want to stay the best kept secret because as we just discussed that about 60% of our career success comes down to exposure, which means that we want to proactively transition to become the trusted authority, because that means that opportunities come to us recruiters reach out to us clients want to work with us rather than we having to chase them.

This is why it is so important to elevate ourselves to not only be the technical expert who is known for doing the doing, but for somebody who can impact others with their knowledge. And if you think but how do I do this? How do I become a trusted authority. It is a process, it doesn't happen overnight, we're not going to wake up tomorrow and say":

You know what, I'm going to be the trusted authority on cloud computing.

Because it's not going to happen. It is a process.

But this process helps us to go from unknown to become known. And nowadays, where more decisions are made without us in the room working from home. And also without us on the Zoom, we need to be known by the right people for the right reasons.

And this is where trust comes in.

Trust is built over time.

And for those who have been following me for a little while, I've been talking about personal branding, since they dove and people were already sick of me talking about it. And over the last 18 or so months, my conversations have shifted simply because we have transitioned online.

I've come across an incredible, interesting research by Rachel Botsman. If you've never heard of her, Google her and watch her TED talks, because she's the first fellow at Oxford University, researching trust. And she has identified that the career capital in 2021 and beyond his reputation and capital. It's not just what we say about us and what our immediate circle, and the community says about us, but also what the rest of the world says about us social proof, meaning what do we find, when we look up your name, what comes up, and digital platforms like Airbnb and Uber, they take over the role of traditional institutions like banks, because we've seen so many trust issues of the last few years that we have lost trust in those traditional authorities. Maybe you've seen new features on LinkedIn that has been rolled out, you can now add your services under your name. And not only that, about six weeks ago, I got the next edition, meaning people can rate me based on the services that I offer.

So we see already it goes into more transparent worlds where the collective makes up our mind whether we are the right person and the right solution for a problem and not just us. And you would have experienced that many many times that your reputation doesn't follow you it's already there before you are their first point of contact is usually online these days especially.

We make up our mind in a split second whether we like this person or not. And choose told our reputation is three dimensional, which is also why we need to focus from the personal brand which is kind of two dimensional to now reputation capital three dimensional. It's what people say about us when we are not on in the room or on the suit.

It's what people see when they come on our LinkedIn profile? how trustworthy are we? It's also what comes down to when they see our resume. When we have an opportunity to get promoted, what do people say about us? How do they vouch for us, this is all these are all elements for us to build a reputation. And why it is so important. It's this fact, we make up our mind that quickly in less than a second, we make up our mind, whether we like this person or not, whether we trust them or not, whether we engage with them, or click on somebody else's profile.

We don't have much time to make a really strong first impression. But the good news is there is a method to the madness. In fact, there are three pillars to it. It's the credibility pillar. And this is where most professionals over index, they get another degree, they get another few years of experience to get another award, they get another certification, which is great, but it's only one of three pillars to establish yourself as a trusted authority. And I will share with you in more detail how you can actually turn that around. The second element is consistency.

As I said, we have now shorter periods of time where we can actually engage with each other, we don't have the watercooler conversations necessarily anymore.

We live in those micro moments where we have only a couple of minutes to give our team an update where the projects are it where we only have half an hour to discuss details with our clients. And they will make up their mind based on their interaction with us, but then also our online presence. And the last pillar is the community.

I already said the social proof, what do others say about us, and again, I will share with you very practically tips, how you can work on all of them. So let's start with the first one, credibility become the translator. Now what does that mean? Here's a question.

What do these three gentlemen have in common?

Jamie Oliver, Daniel Goleman and Robert Cialdini.

Any ideas? What they have in common? It's not the industry and it's not the profession?

Just as a little hint, they've written books.

Absolutely.

Yes, they are all men. Unfortunately, I've tried to find a few females. But hey, they are not that many. So if we can books, they're all men. Is there any other commonality, I'll give you a little hint. They have become translators. They've gone from an expert in the field because they were all good and what they were doing to not being an authority in a certain area.

And what they've done, they've connected two worlds.

Look at Jamie Oliver. He connects gourmet cuisine with everyday family cooking. And also how he dresses is very casual. He cooks in his normal shirts, he doesn't wear the fancy aprons. And he doesn't use fancy ingredients that nobody can't even spell the name of or find in the supermarket. So he's established himself into the in that niche, which is why he could break through and is seen as an authority. What about Daniel Goleman, you would have heard about the concept of the importance of the EQ, the emotional quotient, he didn't start there. He was a journalist before he found research on EQ. And what he did was he was translating highly psychology, focused language and research into easy to understand commercial, relevant language.

And finally, Robert Cialdini, he's all about the power of influence, How to Win Friends and Influence People, one of his books, he's known for influence and influencing, or the topic of influence has been around since mankind it's nothing new. But he distilled the only six elements on how we influence people, and he stilted in a book that's relevant for the business world, how can we apply it to consumer behavior and to buying behavior, so none of them have actually done what's called primary or traditional research. They have translated existing material and insights into another world. And this is what builds credibility. They connect to words that are not common as such. And this is one of the easiest and fastest ways how we can establish our own authority.

When you think of your own example, you might be in cloud engineering. Your clients might be CEOs, or commercially minded decision makers.

What is their language, it might also be that you are applying a different approach from your different background to this new industry.

This is what creates a new insight to it. Once we know that, we then build our credibility by finding commonalities, because it's not about us against them. It's about how can we demonstrate our knowledge in a way that makes sense to those decision makers that they see of course I needed and of course to trust you because you explained it to me in a way that I understand it.

And if you've been multitasking, come back, because this is definitely the most important slide, take a screenshot if you want. It can't get any more practical, how we can actually get better with communication cultural comedy, In fact, once I know what I actually want to stand for, who are my decision makers? What kind of two worlds? Do I want to connect? I do my research.

What are their KPIs for today get measured on what are the biggest challenges, for example? And how can I translate what I know in an easy to understand way, which means we're cutting all the technical jargon. A couple of weeks ago, I went with my partner to his function, he's in the army. And guess what, I didn't understand a word. Every now and then I heard an ‘and’ and ‘but’ and ‘hi’.

But in between, there were just six RTR and RSA.

And there was like, I don't understand what you're saying.

Now, I felt silly, because I didn't understand any word even though it was English. But that didn't leave a good taste with me, I left within a couple of hours because I was so bored and also felt so out of my depth. And often unfortunately, this also happens when we are in our own worlds.

And we throw language out there and technical acronyms to people who are not from the feet who don't have the experience with us. So instead of using those technical terms, we want to use language that makes sense to them. So using metaphors, analogies, similes is the way how we can cut through.

A simple example would be so you know how it's a little bit like, you know, you know how annoying it is when the internet constantly cuts out and you get frozen on the screen?

Well, if we would implement XY said this would prevent it. So now all of a sudden, I'm connecting the dots and make my point of view relevant to my decision maker. This is also what connects the message with their KPIs. So now all of a sudden, we've got their attention and their buy in. And finally, speak in threes. Which means when we start a conversation, a meeting, we say, today, we are talking about analysis, strategy implementation.

When I started my presentation, I said, we are going to talk through what the future of work looks like, the difference between expert and authority and three steps how you can actually build it, because our human brains are wired to remember this kind of information, easier brownie points, if we use the same iterations. So I said before, my intake method with the Triple C is clarify, communicate, commercialise, and people repeat that back.

This is what makes a language stick. But this is only the first step. And I know I've got only about five more minutes. So I'll cover this. Second part is the consistency because the more we see the same, and the same behavior, the more familiar we get with them, and the more we trust them. Think of starting at a new job. The first two weeks are awful, because we don't know anyone, everyone is a stranger to us, don't look me in the eye. And three weeks later, we are best buddies, because we've seen each other Same with the gym. But the same happens also with us. So we need to be very mindful of our online offline presence. Because whether we speak or not, we still communicate.

Paul Wazlavik, an Austrian psycho therapist already identified that you cannot not communicate. And this is one of my favorite exercises, which I know we don't have the time for it now. But simply grab somebody's name from the screen and who read them and see what comes up. Maybe you're surprised that they were a sheep farmer in New Zealand in the previous life. But this is how quickly we make up our mind, whether we like this person or not, whether we trust them or not.

And it comes down to three elements, how we can actually stand out and be consistent.

Firstly, it's obvious the value message.

So what is it that I want to stand for? What is the promise that I make based on my expertise, and based on your needs? How can I translate that and be consistent in the same delivery over and over. The second part is the visual component.

And that obviously includes the colors that we use, but also the accessories that we are using and associating ourselves with, and also, the social media updates that we give is the same look and feel. The more familiarity and consistency, the quicker the memorability and finally, it's also the voice and tone. For example, I use a lot of Converse conversational language.

When I write an update on LinkedIn, I'm not all of a sudden putting my very professional hat on and speak very high, sophisticated language. I still say boom, or Bing, or something very conversational and people know exactly that it's coming from me even if they wouldn't see my name. And this is what builds a strong brand. And the last of the three pillars after clarity, consistency is now community. This is the social proof element because that creates certainty and social proof.

This is a term that comes from psychology. We are following people to be safe when everyone runs out of the house because it's burning We are also following it. And this is also translated in the modern way. Social proof is built in many ways.

Having an incredible idea and an insight isn't enough, we need to share it with the world. And we said just before, there will be a LinkedIn article. So writing and creating content is one element to build social proof, especially in the knowledge area that we live in. We can't simply say, we are the best cloud engineer, because what does it even mean?

Sharing our ideas, and how our expertise translates into the future of businesses, for example, the future of architecture, that this all of a sudden, make something invisible, visible. Another great way to show social proof is speaking and contributing.

It doesn't need to be at massive conferences or meetups like that it could be literally, in the town hall, or even in a team meeting, to speak up and share the idea for a new project or a new initiative. It could also be having the right conversation with the right people. So it might be that we want to shift into a different industry.

Who could we connect with? Who is already there? And how would they introduce us?

If I say, I've got a meeting with your boss, and I want to vouch for you for this incredible budgeted that you've been wanting to get into for last three years?

What should I say?

Being able to communicate that consistently and also demonstrating it this is what gets us ahead. Also being part of industry associations, like the guild, for example, is it social proof ticking the box, having a strong mentor or somebody who is well known in the industry is another social proof. Having gone to university social proof, I'm part of the Forbes coaching Council.

And that's, again, social proof. So you see, right there are many ways how we can build social proof it comes down to our personality, what we feel comfortable with, and also what we actually want to achieve. And to sum things up, because we're right on time.

The three pillars and has to go from the trust from the technical expert to a trusted authority is clarity, meaning how can we speak a common language and simplify our message, showing it and demonstrating it consistently, verbally, visually, and also a value based.

Lastly, community. It's not just what I say about myself and my skills, but also what the community says, getting involved in meetups like that being a contributor in even intranets.

You know, in turn forums and sharing an idea. It all starts there that we get the buy in from others.