Personal branding – more than social media appearance!

The first part of the intense online workshop Personal Branding with Xoogler: Lazar Džamić organised by Alumni SEB LU started on Tuesday, 10th of October 2021. Certainly, not a classic workshop found on every corner of the internet.

As a proper storyteller Lazar Džamić, Xoogler, Content & Storytelling Trainer, University Lecturer began the workshop with a story about how he become the person he is today. His story begins in a small town in Serbia with the first important lesson, it does not matter where you come from. Immediately continued with another key point of personal branding, it is all about the story you tell to yourself and show to your surrounding: “Talent is not a solo melody, it’s a chord!”

A discussion on what is a brand continued which he summed up with the fact that the number one recognition of the brand is the face, (could also be a mascot) that  depicts a brand. On top of it are the emotional layers of the brand, consistency and stability. “Anything or anyone could be branded,” continued Džamić, Xoogler, adding that the human brain can’t think without storytelling (branding), wanted or not, it merges all characteristics of a person or a business into a brand.

The workshop continued with a module on understanding people and their nature. The human mind works on cognitive biases and is preprogrammed so to make our lives easier. To recognise them at yourself and others is the key. Next, we dove into an “ocean” – a big five personality traits which help understand and predict human behaviour and concluded the first module with the paradoxical world we live in.

Not only understanding human nature, there is an importance of understanding the self. Here Džamić, Xoogler, revealed his personal story of developing into a better person with a help of the cognitive therapy approaches and shown the participants how to thrive where the sun shines under the tree with a self-imposed question: “How am I useful to people around me?” On that note, he pointed out that personal narratives can be empowering or damaging and revealed how to reverse them when necessary.

Džamić, Xoogler, concluded this informative workshop with a question: ”Are you at the right place? Talent needs context, it’s a chord, not a solo melody!”, with an explanation of communication archetypes that could be recognised in every company and a powerful statement of making yourself nearly irreplaceable by surprising people with helping them when they don’t expect it:“Leave it with me.”

Author: Danica Tajčman, Efnews