In the book, ‘The Personal Branding Phenomenon’, author Peter Montoya deconstructs the basic principles of branding in terms of job search. In the present era of online communication, personal branding is no longer a choice; it is a necessity, particularly in fields such as reliability engineering and predictive maintenance that have very active professional communities. Either you become a brand and organizations line up to hire you or you continue to struggle for a job or career change. This post provides some basics on developing your personal brand.

Social networking websites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are the main platforms for personal branding. You can simply create an account, join your friends online and interact with them. You can use these websites to connect with other industry professionals from the field of reliability engineering. Join pages, communities or forums dedicated to reliability engineering or predictive maintenance. These websites are the best to build your general profile. To get started, we suggest using our link directory to find Facebook pages and LinkedIn Groups dedicated to reliability engineering, predictive maintenance and industrial maintenance.

In addition to these well-known sites, reliability and predictive maintenance professionals can get actively involved in a site like Maintenance.org, which is dedicated to our industry. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, Maintenance.org can be used to develop professional relations with maintenance and reliability professionals. This site provides access to subject experts, entrepreneurs and authors related to the reliability industry. For job seekers, it’s a great place to meet and network with other professionals.

Use these steps to build your professional brand on Maintenance.org.

• Create your account and complete the profile with full details about your education and experience.
• Expand your network by sending friend requests to other maintenance professionals.
• Use your status as your sales tagline. Write thought provoking status messages.
• Join events or discussions initiated by other reliability engineers or professionals.
• Develop your branding strategy in terms of your long-term career objectives.
• Go a step ahead and use your writing skills to expand your network. You can create your own blog or if you have an existing blog, link to it from your profile. We do.

Your profile on Maintenance.org can truly become another tool during your job hunt and one we suggest getting on board with.