Turn Your Expertise into Your Brand

Whether you are self-employed, employed by an organization, or a freelance contractor, developing a reputation as an expert can lead to new assignments and it can open up professional opportunities. Your reputation will help to build your brand. Your brand is what separates you from everyone else.

To Become an Expert

First realize that you don’t need to be the world’s foremost expert on something. Being an expert means knowing enough or being good enough to accomplish your projects and assignments well. Becoming an expert does not happen overnight. In addition, it's not just about your in-born talents. What makes people exceptionally skillful top performers in their field are:

• Focus enables you pay attention to the task at hand. In addition, it helps you to ignore all the possible distractions that can pull you off your path.
• Experience allows you to leverage what you have learned so that you can apply it to the next opportunity.
• Keep working on assignments. You are going to have to put a lot of time and dedication into becoming an expert at anything. Doing so will improve your competency and skills. Remember that "practice makes perfect".
• Humility will ensure that you understand your current level of expertise. In turn, you will look to learn what you need to move forward. Additionally, it allows you to see the importance to reaching out to others for assistance when needed.

Turn your Expertise into your Brand

• Teach others what you know. When you can teach something, you are perceived as someone that must know a lot about that subject. Mentoring is a terrific way for people to develop a positive impression of you and your abilities. In turn, they may tell others.
• Promote yourself via social media and other marketing tools. When doing so, focus on facts, not opinions. Tell the stories of your successes and where you implemented your expertise. It's difficult to convince others you are an expert simply by telling them you are an expert. When you demonstrate examples of your expertise, they believe that for themselves.
• Advocate the subject of your expertise. Write articles or posts in blogs, comment on blogs and articles written by others, seek out and accept speaking engagements, and get interviewed by local newspapers and radio programs. With these opportunities, explain the topic of your expertise and why that is important to the reader/listener.
• Expand your range of talents. Emphasize other skills that compliment your primary skill set. That demonstrates that you have a broad knowledge base in addition to your expertise. Also, you will not pigeon hole yourself into just one skill set.

Once you are seen as an expert in your particular field or with a specific skill, you will begin to establish your brand. That will open up the door for higher paying jobs and new business opportunities. In turn, that will help you to fuel your success even more.

I encourage you to leave a comment by clicking on "...comments" below...

David Schuchman

What Cloud "...aaS" Could Mean to You

Are you confused about what technology is in "The Cloud"? If so, you might also be confused by "aaS". Simply, "aaS" is the acronym for "as a Service". Delivering information technology "as a service" is a licensing model where the software and hardware asset, and related maintenance and support, are offered as a subscription instead of being owned or leased. This is the essence of Cloud Computing.

In a traditional information technology asset acquisition model, you would purchase or lease hardware for placement in your own facility, or a leased facility under your control. For software, you would purchase licenses, either for perpetual use or for a fixed term. In addition, you would pay for maintenance and support on the hardware and software on a recurring basis for the useful life of the product at a cost annually of about 20-25% of the original purchase. In this model, you typically have a large capital cost for a product that continually diminishes both in terms of a financial and technological value.

In Cloud Computing, software and hardware are offered as a service by the technology provider, and the technology is typically (not always) installed and running at the technology provider's data center, not in your local data center. Instead of purchasing or leasing the technology, you subscribe to use it. The subscription cost is typically on a monthly basis, and covers all use, hosting, maintenance and support, as well as technology upgrades. Therefore, you do not have a large upfront (or recurring) capital expense. Instead, you have a recurring operating expense which can often be more cost effective.

What has allowed Cloud Computing to become more prevalent over the past few years is a result of an improved and more readily available high speed, high bandwidth internet. Internet Service Providers now offer high bandwidth internet connections at very reasonable costs. Many organizations need the high bandwidth internet connections to support the large amount of data transferred between the technology provider and their organization.

Cloud Service Models

Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) - The service provider hosts servers, storage and other hardware, mostly virtually, with all hardware supporting services. The provided servers will host and run user applications and the service provider will handle all tasks related to system management, monitoring, maintenance, backup and resiliency planning for the subscribed infrastructure.

Platform as a Service (PaaS) - The service provider delivers hardware and software tools needed for application development. A PaaS provider hosts the hardware and software on its own infrastructure. As a result, PaaS frees users from having to install in-house hardware and software to develop or run a new application.

Software as a Service (SaaS) - The service provider distributes software (programs/apps) via their own hosted environment and makes the software available to clients over a network, typically the Internet. In addition, they include all support and upgrades for the subscribed software.

How Cloud Computing is Offered

Public Cloud - The service provider makes the technology, such as software applications and hardware, available to their clients over the Internet. The clients connect to the service provider's system to access the subscribed technology.

Private Cloud - Typically found in larger companies and organizations, the organization itself becomes the service provider. The organization's facility hosts and manages the technology and offers the services to their business groups. User costs are typically incurred and managed via internal budgeting practices.

Cloud Computing provides a simple way to access servers, storage, databases and a broad set of application services over the Internet. You would be wise to consider a Cloud Computing model when you need to replace or upgrade your technology. While there are many advantages to using or implementing a Cloud Computing methodology, I will address that in a future post.

I encourage you to leave a comment by clicking on "...comments" below...

David Schuchman