2008 Personal Branding Predictions for the Future

Here are some trends I have personally seen in the workplace and throughout my personal branding studies. These are just a few of the one’s currently on my mind and there’s plenty more where this came from.

Have a prediction of your own? Leave a comment!

  • The rise of consultants. Personal brands within larger corporations will break off to form their own personal consulting operations. We started to see that a lot this year with “social media consultants.”
  • Employee’s are king. The average amount of job shifts in the past few years is approximately 12 times. I see this climbing in the years to come, as there are so many opportunities and people to meet and networking tools at our disposal.
  • Networking becomes the deciding factor for recruitment. As competition increases on both the corporate and applicant levels, you will see that if you don’t know someone in a competitive field, your chances of acceptance will greatly diminish.
  • Applicant pools will become smaller and smaller, as people will narrow down their search to align to their personal brand. This benefits both the company and person because companies won’t waste time with resumes that aren’t a best-fit and visa versa.
  • Educational institutions are going to start to teaching these new technologies and tools that people can leverage post graduation. I see classes teaching blogs, wiki’s, discussions and the rise of more virtual classrooms.
  • Companies will be coerced to understand and promote intra-praneurship. This means that employee’s that have great ideas, will want to execute on them or leave. Whether it be an engineer with a new invention or a marketer with a new distribution channel (social media), companies will need to supply them with the necessary assets in order to help their careers, as well as the company’s need push forward.
  • Traditional resumes will play less of a role in job applications and interviews. They will soon evolve in form, taking into account an individuals personality, including podcasts, pictures and “social” elements.
Picture of Dan Schawbel

Dan Schawbel

Dan Schawbel is the Managing Partner of Millennial Branding, a Gen Y research and consulting firm. He is the New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Promote Yourself: The New Rules For Career Success (St. Martin’s Press) and the #1 international bestselling book, Me 2.0: 4 Steps to Building Your Future (Kaplan Publishing), which combined have been translated into 15 languages.

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