presentation

Hi guys,

I did my presentation on Thursday and thought I would let you know how it went.  I am also trying to find a way of putting my artifact online so if anyone is interested in identifying what your personal brand I will blog when I find the best way of uploading it.

So my presentation…… having spent every spare moment for the last three weeks working on finalizing my inquiry report and artifact I finally got round to the presentation.  I followed the guidance in the hand book and did 5 slides:

·         Cover page

·         Introduction which was a brief summary of my back ground and how I finally arrived at my topic title (that was not a easy task)

·         My main findings from the inquiry

·         A high level evaluation of the inquiry tools (the highs and lows)

·         Some critical reflection

I am a visual learner so my slides as you can see are mainly pictures that I talked around. 

 

I used skype to present to Paula and Rosemary and despite normally being very comfortable with presentations I had been stressing all week because I needed to get it done before I fly abroad for work and was worried about  the format of the slide pack and what I was going to say.  The night before I think I only had 1 hour of sleep so on the day I was running on adrenalin.  Because it was a subject I had spent the last 8 months researching and I was passionate about, it did not take me long to relax and tell them all about it.  I ran over a little so do keep an eye on the clock when you do yours.  I had my report, artifact and books with me, they were comforting to have but I did not need them. 

I am overseas now so I will miss your presentation but I hope they all go well and congratulations to everyone on completing. 

I will be working on getting my artifact on here so I am hoping this will not be my last blog, but I just wanted to share some wise words of wisdom I was given before my presentation that helped me:

·         Remember you are now the expert on this subject!

·         You have worked long and hard for these 10 minutes so try to enjoy the moment

·         Remember your tutors want you to pass they are not there to trick you and they will only ask questions that will help them understand your topic better

·         After this you can celebrate big time.

Good luck and enjoy

Chat with Paula

Tonight I had a really useful chat with Paula after submitting a draft of my report to her and I feel much clearer on what I now need to do.  There were a few things that now seem really obvious and will make my report much more coherent once I make the changes:

·         When I was writing my report I interchanged the phrases “my research project” and “my inquiry”.  Eventually I updated my report and only used Inquiry.  The difference between the two is:

o   Practitioner research is about a given topic and only looks at literature

o   Inquiry includes looking at literature and talking to real people about it.

·         I must not assume people reading my report will know about me or the background to the Inquiry.  I MUST state the obvious.

·         If it is commonly known I do not have to say where it originated an example of that is “triple threat”

·         I originally had problems with the BAPP Library so have not looked there again for a while, It is significantly improved so I will make time to skim what’s there and if it’s useful I will add to my literature.

·         I must keep it simple, start with an introduction of what I did and then go into the detail.  Yes it is obvious but I am not used to writing reports and this was not as easy as it sounds.  I will get other people who are completely fresh to the report to read it to make sure I have explained everything.

·         When I have finished the report I will go back to the module handbook and look at the table of knowledge and skills being assessed.  It is a good check list!

·         I will use my personal experience when necessary, but make clear it is my personal experience and not factual and use it in the conclusion.

·         Make sure I use my learning journal if I can.

·         Choose my appendices wisely.

I think I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel, I still have a lot to do but I am slightly less panicked!  I hope you are all doing ok too, and it’s all coming together.

Should You Leave When Your Still Winning?

I was talking with my colleagues and the subject of Julie Andrews’s concert in 2010 came up which led to a conversation I found really interesting and I felt it had some relevance to my inquiry subject of Personal Branding.

A Personal Brand has 3 components:

·         Your image

·         Your personal values

·         What you want to deliver

these components will elicit an emotive response from your target audience. So when we were talking about Julie Andrews I thought about her Personal Brand:

·         clean cut, “proper” lady image

·         her personal values include clean living, hard working and goodness and she delivers perfect pitch singing. 

·         The emotive response she gets from her target audience is a feeling of calmness, beauty and admiration for her talent.

I attended her concert in 2010 at the o2 which had very mixed reviews and my conversation at work was about what a shame it was that some people felt it wasn’t made clear that she would not be singing all the songs herself.  She bought in other singers and the few songs she did attempt were spoken rather than sung.  We all felt that there will probably be a lot of her fans where this might be their last memories of Julie rather than when she was at her best.  We all felt she would have been better off doing what Doris Day did and leave the business at her peak when she was still the performer everyone loved her for and delivered her promise.

If Julie could no longer fulfil her promise should she have been brave enough to call it a day, or do you think the risk she took was worth it?  She had acted in a few films without singing since her surgery and the audience had been sympathetic and embraced the development in her personal brand.

What do you think?  Should you stop and leave when you are still at your best?

Starting survey analysis

I have just started my analysis of my surveys and thought I would share a few of my findings with you. 

A personal brand is made up of two views:

·         What you want it to be; and

·         What is seen, felt and heard

In my audience surveys and my interviews I asked what the first word was that came to mind when a performers name was mentioned.   Have a look and let me know if you think these are a fair and give a good general representation of their personal brand:

	See	Hear	Feel
Marilyn Monroe	White dress Blonde Sex symbol Glamour Curvaceous	Ditzy Girly voice Cotton wool Happy birthday	Sad Vulnerable Sympathy
Katie Price	Boobs Fake Vulgar Business woman	Loud Cheeky Whining	Tragic Money seeking Attention seeker Admiration
Kylie Monogue	Smile Petite Bum/Gold hot pants Sexy Fashionable Good energy	Great entertainer Good voice Locomotion Pop princess	Brave Happy
Madonna	Idol/legend/icon Pop star Talented/controversial Smart/Business woman	‘Boderline/like a virgin’ Emotion Good in her day	Impressed Ever Changing Old Harsh
Michael Jackson	White Gloves The king Talented/Legend Great Dancer	Superstar ‘Thriller’ Amazing Vocals Pop	Lost his way Weird/Odd/Bizarre A legend that fell from grace Sad/Agony
Amy Winehouse	Drink and Drugs Brilliant artist Tatoos	Incoherent words Valerie Good Singer	Wasted Sad Vulnerable A Wreak
Gary Glitter	Paedophile Phariah Glitter	Loud Noise A pop star	Nothing Disgust Sad Mad
Cher	Long Hair Plastic Surgery Over the Top/Eccentric Great Songs Talented	‘Shoop Shoop’ Highly Fantastic Good back in the day	Nostalgic Earthy Lonely Entertained
Michael Buble	Sexy/Gorgeous Lovely/Yummy Handsome Cheesy	Fantastic Entertainer Brilliant Voice Jazz Modern day Crooner	Real Charisma Happy Loving Cheerful
Darcy Bussell	Ballet Dancer Talented Graceful Beautiful Dancer	Not a good voice	Impressed Admiration
Adam Garcia	Handsome Tap Dancer Great Footwork/Performance	Not heard much	Cute Warm towards him Strength
Grace Kelly	Legendary Beauty Style Icon Elegant/Graceful Film Star Princess	Unique Voice Class High Pitched	Entertained Moody Awesome
Fred Astaire	King Of Dance Legend Amazing Dancer Icon	Perfection Great Rhythms Old Fashion Smooth ‘Singing in the Rain’	Brings a smile to my face Just lovely Entertained Happy
Victoria Beckham	Skinny Stunning Visually Pout/Moody Devoted an successful Mother Social climber Wife of David Beckham	Spice Girls Not much Girl Power	Uninterested Vulnerable Insecure Not posh!

As you can see some brands have positive descriptive words and others not so good.  For ethical reasons I have not used some of the words even though I felt they were a true representation of how that person felt I did not think they were appropriate for use on here and would not have added anything extra.

A successful personal brand does not always have to portray a nice image.  There are some well known people who are very successful being the bad guy.  Katie Price for example is successful in her own right, has a fan base but as you see from the summary above the negative words out numbered the positive.

In some cases the personal brand can help you when you make a mistake.  Hugh Grant was caught in a compromising situation but he owned the problem, apologised and the fact that people liked him before and believed in his brand helped him get over the situation and it has not been detrimental to his career. Some other performers have not been so lucky. 

I watched ‘A week with Marilyn’.   I know this is someone else’s interpretation of events, however it is a good example of how someone was stuck in a personal brand created by others but not exactly what she wanted.   In my previous blog my research showed that you need to take control over your brand before it is decided for.

http://pearllinnascott.blogspot.com/2012/03/personal-branding-literature_8789.html

I am in the middle of analysing the surveys and it has been good looking back and reflecting.  There are some finding/results I am really pleased with but it also showed up a few things that could have been done differently. 

Hind sight is wonderful thing!