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Feeling Trapped in Corporate? The Exact Steps to take NOW to establish your brand

The other day, my good friend texted me, “Our company just received a billion-dollar valuation, and we think it means they're getting ready to sell.”

Now, being married to a corporate lawyer, I assured her that she could bet her bottom dollar that news of that valuation is EXACTLY what that means. Companies rarely get valuations for funsies.

(Fun fact: If you're married to a corporate lawyer and want to take on a dangerous drinking game, take a sip of your favorite beverage every time you hear the term “EBITDA,” and you'll be three sheets to the wind before the clock strikes 10am.)

Naturally, this set off a slippery ”what if” slope in my friend's mind.

“What if my position gets eliminated?”

“What if that means I'll have to return to the office over 2 hours away from my house?”

“Well, what if I'm busier?”

The fact of the matter, though, is that all that what iffing won't do diddly. Ultimately, if her company is sold, her fate and all her colleagues' fate is in the hands of whatever private equity firm picks them up.

And I don't know about you, but I don't want some slick MBAs racing to the bottom to determine my life and career trajectory. (No offense to all you slick MBAs scaling businesses—that's your job, no disrespect. You're likely way smarter than me.)

So, it was at this moment that the prevailing thought I always have when I see my friends’ lives in a corporate game of “roll the dice” was ringing in my mind. And that thought is this:

Start building your brand. Start building it yesterday. And if you didn't yesterday, start building it now.

But how does one do that when one is still in corporate without alarming one's employer?

Isn't it going to look a bit funny if you go from radio silence to telegraphing your thoughts and passions — some of which may not be related to your day job — on LinkedIn?

Don't worry, reader. I've got you covered. Here is my proven playbook for how to start branding yourself in corporate without pissing off your employer (the 2025 edition).

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1/ Find the intersections with your job

You may be building your personal brand while still in corporate because you want to turn your side gig into a full-time gig. Or perhaps you want to build your brand to parlay your brand leverage into another (better-paying) corporate job. Either way, I want you to take a moment to list out the things you love doing professionally. When I was a corporate marketer, those things included:

• Brand positioning
• Mentoring younger women
• Finding my seat at the table when everyone was pretty much twice my age

Now, only the first one of these was a part of my job, and fractionally so. The others were passion plays. But they were relevant enough that when I shared content about “How to present an idea when you're 26 years old at a strategic planning retreat,” it wasn't alarming to my employer.

2/ Write about your experiences

As you saw from the example in point one, writing about your experiences is another surefire way to begin to flex your personal brand's muscles without setting off the "I'm in the market for another job” alarm.

Why? Because no one can argue with your own lived experience. It's exclusively yours.

So, if you have a particular story about how you used to bomb on job interviews and then learned to ace them, share it! Not only is it exactly the type of content a LinkedIn audience loves, but it can also help you overcome imposter syndrome as you find your voice. This is because you don't need to be an expert to share your experiences. You just need to think about all those pivot points in your life and talk about them.

Expert advice here:

Avoid sharing stories while you're “in the suck.” I love how Amy Porterfield phrases this. She says she doesn't share “her open oozy wounds,” but she does share about her hard-earned scars. Ensure you have enough distance from yourself and the situation to have some learning lessons to share with your audience, or else it could telegraph as trauma-sharing or complaining (think CEO who posted a photo of himself crying the day he fired some employees — zoiks)

3/ Find inspiration from your core values

Core values are what makes you, well, you. It's uniquely human — something AI, despite how fast it's advancing, can't duplicate. My core values are community, freedom, wisdom, and health. So, I will often share stories that reflect these. Here's a great example from Eli Albrecht when he was still in corporate growing his brand before he started his own firm:

You can see what Eli values in this post. He flat-out says it — self-growth, family, reflection.

The reactions to this post show that this type of content resonates with a LinkedIn audience. It uses Eli's values to bridge work and life and share more about himself.

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The Recap

Don't wait until an external event forces you to start building your brand capital. Your personal brand is your biggest asset; you can leverage it to cash in now. If you're worried about how to do this in a corporate job, here's how to get started:

1. Find topical intersections between your passion and your job
2. Don’t start by sharing expertise; focus on sharing experience (Bonus: it’s the ultimate imposter syndrome, short cut)
3. Outline your core values, then list examples and stories that reflect them

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✨ As promised, here is The Personal Brand Escape Plan to help you work through this!

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