5 Benefits of Conducting a Personal Branding Workshop (+Examples)

A personal branding workshop is a forcing function to help to stop procrastinating and do the work you know you need to do. 

You have been thinking about working on your personal branding, maybe you’ve even downloaded some materials or read some books, but you still haven’t done the work. 

I’m here to tell you that knowledge will not translate into insights and transformation unless you take action. 

In this guide, I will share with you:

• How to leverage a personal branding workshop to elevate your professional profile
• The difference between group personal branding workshops vs. individual personal branding workshops
• Examples of personal branding workshops

The value of a personal branding workshop

One of the most important components of a personal branding workshop is that it forces you to think and reflect. 

And we rarely do these activities nowadays. 

We are so distracted by social media, on-demand award-winning movies and TV shows on streaming platforms, news, and podcasts that we rarely take time to slow down and consider being intentional in our professional lives. 

A personal branding workshop is a space to be introspective and creative. 

Being able to focus is a superpower nowadays. 

So, make sure that when you decide to conduct or attend a personal branding workshop, you do the necessary preparation to be all-in and totally focused on it. 

You will leave the workshop with insights that can help you elevate your professional profile and finally get the recognition you deserve. 

Another important aspect, as we’ve already mentioned, is that it will force you to do the work. 

We are not lacking information nowadays. 

There are thousands of videos, courses, books, podcast episodes, and free resources available to help you work on your personal branding.

Why haven’t you done it yet, then?

Because it’s easier to consume than to create. 

We all know we should be going to the gym. But most people quit this resolution by February. 

The same happens with your professional life. At some point, you settle into a particular rhythm, and it’s hard to do something different. 

A great personal branding workshop, then, is one that creates space for insights to appear, and it’s integrated with an accountability system to support you in doing the work. 

What specific results can you get from a personal branding workshop?

Here’s a list of some of the specific results you can expect after going through a personal branding workshop:

• A clear personal branding statement to communicate your value and expertise with confidence.
• A set of personal branding stories about your career that communicate what makes you unique, the types of problems you solve, the results people can expect when working with you, and what the experience of working with you feels like. 
• A professional bio that you can leverage when you get invited to speak so that others can introduce you, and it doesn’t feel weird to tell others about your top accomplishments.
• A speaker one-pager, media kit, and a podcast guest pitch script that you can leverage to expand your network and influence by being a guest speaker on podcasts within your niche and industry.
• A clear list of topics and themes that you should cover in your content to position yourself as the go-to expert in your niche. 

If any of these sounds like something you would like to achieve, going through a personal branding workshop is the right next step for you. 

Group personal branding workshops vs. individual personal branding workshops

Group workshops

Seeing how other people think and work is powerful because it can help you break your frame and adopt a new one. 

Maybe you were doing a ton of manual work on Excel until you learned a formula or shortcuts from a colleague. 

Or you were doing very basic PowerPoint presentations until you learned a few design tricks from your boss. 

This is the power of doing group personal branding workshops. 

You will be able to see how others tackle personal branding exercises, which might help you get unstuck and open up a whole new world of possibilities. 

I remember a couple of instances where this has happened to me. 

The first one was when I auditioned for a theater play. 

I had been doing improv comedy for a while, as a way to work on my presentation skills and stage presence, and wanted to try something new. 

It was mind-blowing to see how words on paper could be transformed into diametrically opposed performances by different actors. 

I pocketed a few of the creative choices I saw from actors as tools that I could use in the future whenever I was on a stage. 

The second one was when I was invited to be part of a group of MBA students doing an independent research study. I learned many PowerPoint and Adobe tricks that have allowed me to stand out throughout my career whenever I give a presentation (even though I’m not a graphic designer). 

So, the main value of the group workshops is that you will get insights from all the different perspectives and a variety of feedback from your peers as you do the personal branding workshop exercises together. 

Individual workshops

Individual personal branding workshops allow you to go deeper and are completely focused on you. 

You will get the full attention of the personal branding consultant running the workshop. 

This is what I do with all of my clients during the discovery and strategy phase. 

There is a lot of comprehensive and personalized research that happens before and individual workshop (for group workshops, the research is not as deep). 

You will be able to ask questions and clarify doubts. And you will be able to get into private topics related to your personal brand that you might not want to discuss in front of others. 

Also, you get more time to work through the exercises, and the consultant can ask clarifying questions to get to core insights.  

So, the main value of the individual workshop is the level of personalization and focus. 

Online personal branding workshops vs. in-person personal branding workshops

The main differences between online and in-person workshops is the convenience and engagement.

It’s much easier to get people to connect with you on a Zoom call. 

People don’t have to get on a plane or drive to do so. 

On the other hand, the level of engagement and connection you get when you are in person is much higher. 

So, it is often a decision between convenience and cost. 

Yet, both can deliver great results. And the same workshop can be adapted to be conducted online and in person. 

Examples of personal branding workshops

I conduct a personal branding workshop that is focused on helping the audience craft their personal branding statements and personal branding stories. 

In it, I share some principles and templates that can help people leverage these tools to elevate their professional profile. 

I’ve been able to do this workshop in different settings:

• In-person at the MBA International Students Orientation at the C.T. Bauer College of Business
• Virtually at the IEEE-USA Webinar Series
• For the Latino ERG at Avanade

This is a workshop that can be conducted in an hour. 

If the audience is less than 40 people, some of the components can be turned into interactive sections where we get to work on personal branding statements and stories and provide real-time feedback. 

You can book this workshop for your company or organization here. 

Another example of a personal branding workshop is the personal branding audits and discovery sessions I run with clients. 

This is an individual workshop where we explore your unique value proposition, define your ideal clients, understand your competition, and set the foundations for your thought leadership content strategy. 

You can learn more about this workshop by reading our personal branding template guide and downloading our personal branding template. 

Also, below is a video of an example of what an individual personal branding workshop could look like (this was a podcast episode experiment I did with Candyce Edelen).