A Message From Jeff

Dear Friends,

With the Thanksgiving holidays less than a week away, we need to begin this letter by expressing our personal "thank you" to all of EC's connections--clients, friends, our business colleagues and staff, and newer business and personal acquaintances. The opportunities you have provided for us to work on important executive search, consulting and connections projects, along with executive coaching assignments, and the support and encouragement you have provided in relation to the positioning and development of our EC brand, is most appreciated by EC and has been invaluable to us in relation to our continuing growth and development.

In this age of increasing one-to-one marketing, where customers are in control and smart marketers are available to customers at whatever time and through whatever channel customers prefer, we believe in the power of giving thanks, and we encourage you to do the same. As you approach the end of 2007, take a personal inventory of the people, the clients, the projects you are most grateful for during this past year. Then reach out to all of these people, before the end of the year, and personally thank them and let them know the impact their friendship or business has meant to you and to your company. In CRM and customer loyalty programs, one of the most powerful communication devices is the "thank you" program, in which you receive an unexpected gift in the mail (i.e., a basket of fruit or chocolates) acknowledging you for the business you provided. Use this power of "thank you" during the balance of this year, to complete your important business relationships and set a strong foundation for continued growth in 2008.

This month's ezine returns to our three-part planning series on "Managing and Developing Your Personal Brand." This is a great time of year to take account of the areas in which you have personally grown and developed in 2007, acknowledge areas you did not accomplish but intended to, and set personal growth targets for 2008. Remember, if you are not pro-actively managing your personal brand, no one is. So use the templates we have provided and explore augmenting this by partnering with an executive coach. Ask your company to provide or pay for an executive coach, as an important personal benefit in 2008, and you might be surprised to hear them say "yes."

All the best for a safe, happy Thanksgiving holiday!

Jeff Gundersen, CEO
Executive Connections, LLC
jgundersen@executiveconnects.com
941-323-8300
Executive Search, Coaching & Consulting
http://www.executiveconnects.com

Your Personal Brand: Ponder the Plan

Last month, you drafted a personal brand plan for 2008 by creating a mantra, listing your accomplishments and creating a list of goals. This month, you'll continue your look back at 2007, choosing to leave behind the pains and take forward the gains. You'll answer three key questions: What (and whom) do you appreciate the most from 2007? What do you regret the most about this last year? And what do you need to wrap up or complete in order to move ahead with your personal brand plan? .

ASK OUR COACH

As part of our commitment to provide assistance and support to executives wanting to further their professional and personal brand, we have created the ASK OUR COACH email service where you can get confidential answers to your career questions. What's on your mind? Don't hesitate to ASK OUR COACH.

Here is our answer to a question we received last month:

Q: I am a global CFO at an advertising agency in a major U.S. city. As a result of my efforts toward restructuring and downsizing this global network, I have succeeded in restructuring myself out of a job. Since EC placed me in this position, how can EC support me now as I navigate the job market? How can an EC coach be beneficial to me at this stage? My references from my current CEO and the CFO of our holding company are excellent. I have also worked previously in the digital marketing services sector, so do you think I should focus on large agency networks or private equity for my next career opportunity?

-Displaced CFO

A: This is a situation we are seeing repeatedly these days affecting top-level CFOs who either restructure or merge/sell themselves out of a job within a two- to five-year period. The good news is you have done an exceptional job in restructuring this global agency business, so this short two-year stint has further enhanced the value of your personal brand. You also mentioned that you protected yourself well with an appropriate severance package, so this gives you the time to be strategic in your approach to your current job search.

In terms of the large agency networks, you should continue to speak with this sector, since you have proven credentials--and this category is facing major changes and restructuring, which can leverage your skill sets. Plus, many of the CFOs in this category have not demonstrated the ability to restructure a business, nor to establish appropriate planning, budgeting and control systems to effectively manage financial outcomes in the face of surprises that destroy the credibility of CEOs running these networks.

Having worked in a digital business previously, and having succeeded in building and selling a major digital marketing services business, you have to ask yourself this personal brand question: "Where will I get the best personal brand valuation over the next five years of my career--working for private equity or for one of the public agency networks?" Our feeling, as we wrote about in our recent ezine article "Are You Ready to Work for Private Equity?" is that the returns may be significantly higher in the "right" private equity opportunity than they are likely to be working for a publicly-traded advertising agency network. Since you have proven you can succeed in either environment, we suggest you focus a significant part of your search efforts in speaking with private equity firms. We expect you will see some terrific digital and mobile business opportunities on the horizon where you can create significant market capitalization gains for your brand and the organization that hires you over the next three to five years.

In terms of how EC coaching can support you, we provide a unique blend of executive search and executive coaching services. So, in addition to providing our executive coaching support, and acting as your advisor in weighing and evaluating various job opportunities, EC can also act as your "talent agent" and strategically target and introduce you to several of our clients and connections who may be interested in hiring you. Our commitment for star talent (especially those we placed previously) is to function like an "agent" to help you connect powerfully to our CEO connections and to identify new personal brand opportunities.

Connect with EC at These Conferences

Customer Engagement Symposium
Date: December 2-4,2007
Location: Ritz Carlton, Coconut Grove, FL
Phone: 800-803-3424 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              800-803-3424      end_of_the_skype_highlighting or 212-803-6093
Registration: $1,295

The most successful companies build deeply emotional relationships with their customers--relationships that go beyond rational boundaries. People stay faithful to brands that earn both their rational trust and their deeply felt affection.

Customers who are "emotionally engaged" behave very differently than those who are "rationally satisfied" or even "rationally loyal." The Customer Engagement Summit will feature companies like Lexus and Commerce Bank, who are well known for creating higher levels of customer engagement than their peers. Register for Symposium

AMA's Course for Presidents and CEOs
Date: December 03,2007
Location: La Playa Beach and Golf Resort, Naples, FL
Phone: Call 1-877-566-9441 for an AMA Training Consultant
Registration: AMA Members $5,000 / Nonmembers $5,500 / GSA $4,282
For more information

Before you spend valuable time away from your office, you have to ask yourself: "On Monday, will anything be different?"

NCDM 2007
Date: December 10,2007
Location: Mandalay Bay Resort, Las Vegas, NV
Phone: 817-277-7187
Registration: $1,295 - full conference
Register for NCDM 2007
Join us in Las Vegas, December 10-12, 2007, for NCDM 2007 at the fabulous Mandalay Bay Resort & Casino

Your Feedback to Us

My primary motive in writing to you is to let you know how much I appreciate the support and encouragement you provided during my search. Your insights and suggestions were of great value as I navigated through the networking puzzle that ultimately helped me identify several great opportunities. In particular, I greatly appreciate the time you spent with me on the telephone early in my search process; that helped get me better aligned and off to a strong start.

~Thomas M. Graham, Vice President-Growth Initiatives, The Hartford