my brand

After sending out 12 forms requesting a personal assessment to be done by selected friends and family members, a Personal Branding picture of Kyle Murphy (the subject) was painted. Aside from a few road bumps regarding the punctuality of respondents, the assessments were not only more accurate and concise than the subject had expected, but also more agreeable to his own assessments of himself. Traits selected by the participants and subject alike seemed to pile into groups highlighting cooperative nature, outgoing/humorous personality and creative/imaginative mindset. Opinions on the subject’s greatest strengths mirrored most of these traits, while nearly all participants agreed that procrastination and lack of focus were the subject’s Achilles’ heel. Car and cereal comparisons seemed to convey ideas of solid, reliable foundation with a subtle flashiness. The culmination of these opinions reflected predictably in the ‘Team Role’ suggestions, and agreeably with the VALS survey results. Creator and Doer comprised 70% of the participants suggestions (73% if the subject’s opinion is included) for team role while the VALS survey categorized the subject as an ‘Innovator/Experiencer’.

Going back to respondents, most were prompt, and some were surprisingly prompt (Wesley and Anthony) while others needed constant verbal or personal reminders that the survey needed completion (Claire, Dave, Meagan and Michael). The most reliable person on the list (Meagan) was impossible to get a hold of and never even returned any results. So apart from a few surprises most of the response results were positive and as expected. However it required far too much time and effort to ‘reel in’ Dave and Michael so they would not be contacted for any future survey assistance.

The subject chose 6% (8 of 127) of the available traits to describe himself the best he could. It was shocking to find that those 8 traits, or 6% of the available whole, comprised 36% (31 of 85) of the traits that the respondents used to peg his personality. Also, this data does not take into account the other traits chosen by respondents that are synonymous with the 8 that the subject picked himself. This proves that the subject was fairly in tune with his strengths and flaws relative to how others perceive him. As the attached ‘Personal Percentages’ graph shows, all the selected traits can be grouped together in 7 separate and broader categories. When grouped properly the 85 traits taken from the respondents speak to the subject’s Cooperative Nature, Personality Plus’, Ethics, Creative Capacity, Passive & Aggressive Indicators and Overall Poor Personality Traits. Refer to the attached graph for percentage breakdown.

The Car and Cereal prompts give a more intangible opinion on the ‘make’ of the subject. It was here that results were most closely related, 40% of cereal choices were Lucky Charms and 40% of car choices were Luxury vehicles. Even more striking is the fact that the Lucky Charms were selected for the exact same reason Luxury vehicles were, they both represent a good foundation and just enough flash and style not to overdo it (according to the respondents). The strengths and weaknesses outlined by the respondents are a perfect blend of the structured trait selection and open-ended car/cereal comparison, and are quoted in the attached “Source A” and “Source B”.