Identity Crisis: Asking AI to help with my personal profile
Periodically I go through an identity crisis. I don't wake up thinking I'm Napoleon or something. But rather I worry about the splintered nature of my corporate personality, and how I ought to present that to the world.
I write about this here because I don't think I'm alone in this. And because I think the challenge I'm facing today will become more common.
A nation of shopkeepers
When Napoleon referred to us as a nation of shopkeepers, he was being disparaging about Britain's focus on trade rather than military might. But he wasn't wrong then, and his statement stands. Britain is a nation of small, and increasingly micro, businesses. Many people now have more than one business identity, whether that’s a single ‘side-hustle’, or a rather more fragmented set of interests like me. Which are, to recap:
Applied Futurist: The majority of my work, writing, speaking, broadcasting and consulting about the future.
Founder/Chairman of Pomona Partners: the speaker/talent agency I created to represent and develop people with careers like mine
Founder, The Kartel: A networking group I hope to franchise built around my love of indoor karting
YouTuber, EV DIY: My lockdown project gone mad, building my own EV(s), and sharing information about the DIY EV community - close to being a revenue stream in its own right, as well as contributing to my knowledge/prominence for work on the future of cars.
Who am I? And do you care?
These interests are both aligned and separate. They cross over and they don’t. Which has always left me with a conundrum: which should I speak about when talking to a particular audience? And on those channels where I promote myself - these days LinkedIn, Threads* and Instagram - should I be conscious of the fact that only some of my small audience will care about each one?
Even my ‘core’ identity of futurist contains multitudes. Across social media I might be sharing articles I wrote on the future of one industry, media coverage of a campaign on another, my latest broadcast escapades on a third, and then perhaps plugging a book.
The result of this has been that I have started multiple different outlets - websites, social media accounts etc - to represent each facet of my corporate personality. This would be fine if I had infinite time, money, and interesting things to say. But I don’t. So ultimately all my channels end up suffering from a form of benign neglect.
Occasionally I beat myself up and post a flurry of content. But it doesn’t stick as a habit, as I am then naturally drawn to the other channels. But is this better than boring some people with information about an aspect of my work in which they have no interest?
This is a question to which I have never had a good answer. But when I’ve asked it to myself before, I’ve never had AI to assist me. I know we’re not supposed to use AI for therapy, but I figured corporate therapy was OK. So I thought I’d ask its opinion.
Hub and Spoke Model
Gemini’s response to my query was unequivocal. I shared with it much of the same information I have shared with you above. It’s answer? “A neglected social media channel is worse than no channel at all.“ Ouch.
That actually came later as part of a clarification. Its main point was that I should focus on a hub and spoke model, where most of my effort goes into the ‘hub’, my core identity that encapsulates everything I do. But that I have some ‘spokes’ for the deep dives - e.g. the YouTube Channel. It pointed out that the channels I’m trying to grow - Instagram and Threads - are personal channels so they should be about me rather than divided by project. It told me I should rationalise my various websites and make a feature of my practical projects (there’s more than just the EV, and all have some connection back to my futurist work) on my main site.
People buy people
Gemini’s best argument though was an old one:
“The fear of boring people is valid, but it's outweighed by the power of authenticity. The modern audience, especially in the expert/creator economy, buys into the person first. They are interested in the unique combination of skills and passions you have.”
This has been borne out by the work I did on the DIY EV. What started as lockdown project inspired by my daughters has become a key point of credibility in my work with the car industry. It has connected me to new people and resources. So I think it’s right that I hero it more in my work, along with my other practical projects.
So, that’s the plan for me: rationalise my outlets, focus on the personal, just be me! But what about the general lesson here?
Personality First
Most of us have a social media presence. Most of us are employed. More and more of us will find ourselves working multiple roles in the future. Or working in a single role that relies on us constantly promoting ourselves to stay busy. The single biggest defining factor in our success in these endeavours is unlikely to be our raw competence, or our qualifications. It’s going to be our connections, our relationships, our personalities. Let’s face it, we’ve all known some deeply mediocre workers who have sustained very successful careers through the power of their social networks, mentioning no names. The rest of us might aspire to greater capability, but we can learn from the power of personality. Unified, engaging, well-presented.
Humanity is what matters in business, even if it took an AI to teach me its importance.
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*Though I haven’t yet restored the scale of audience I had on Twitter here.