Tuesday, January 3, 2023
“I don’t think you’re tough enough for this business.”
This feedback was the big aha moment for Carla Harris. Now the senior client advisor at Morgan Stanley, Carla was given this critique by a senior managing director five to six years into her career. And this made her realize that smarts and hard work aren’t enough — she needed to work to change how she was perceived.
“A very big component of your success is the perception that others have of you,” Carla says at a MAKERS women’s leadership conference. Luckily, “you can train people to think about you the way that you want them to think about you.”
And that’s exactly what she did. Now with nearly 30 years of experience as a successful woman in the rough-and-tumble (and male-dominated) world of Wall Street, Carla worked hard to shape her personal brand as intelligent, talented, and tough.
As a recruiter, having a great personal brand is crucial for working with hiring managers, getting C-suite buy in, and attracting great talent. Below is some of Carla’s advice for building your brand at work, along with some other tips on how to build your recruiter brand online.