What Do People Think When They Hear Your Name?

Summary

In this episode of the Earn Your Title podcast, Danny Dumas explores the significance of personal branding and how it impacts one's readiness to face the world. He discusses the importance of curating both external and internal brands, emphasizing the need for a professional appearance and aligning personal values with outward expressions. Dumas encourages listeners to take actionable steps towards self-improvement, including upgrading their digital presence and dressing for success, while also fostering community and support among men.


Takeaways

• Your name and reputation are crucial in the world.
• Curate your external brand to reflect your true self.
• Upgrade your email and digital presence for professionalism.
• Dress for the role you want, not just the one you have.
• Align your internal values with your external appearance.
• Being punctual and reliable builds your internal brand.
• Invest in quality clothing that reflects your values.
• You can be content while striving for more in life.
• Community support is vital for personal growth.
• Take actionable steps towards self-improvement.

Chapters

00:00 The Importance of Names and Branding
02:49 Curating Your External Brand
05:27 Dressing for Success
08:40 Aligning Internal and External Values
14:13 Taking Action and Building Community

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Transcript

0:10

Hey, welcome back my friend. My name is Danny Dumas and this is the earner title podcast. My goal here is to help you to become a better husband, father and leader. So I'm going to say a few names. When I say these names, I want you to just think about the first thought that pops into your head and your idea behind these names. So Nike, Apple, Harbor Freight, T-MU, Milwaukee, Festool, Arteryx, Patagonia. Ferrari, Porsche, Kia. I'm assuming every time I said one of those names, you had an instant idea of, know, it's a car. It's a cheap car, it's an expensive car, it's a tool. It's, know, maybe you didn't know some of those names, you've never heard of them. But the name was important. And I think I've been thinking about this a lot more because my son is graduating and I've talked about this a lot, but I'm wanting to make sure he's ready to go and to graduate. And so I've been thinking about like, what makes a person ready to go out into the world? What can we do as men to get ready? We don't necessarily know where we should be going, what the next step is. And while this could apply to young men, I think as a 45 year old, I'm still always thinking about the next thing and how, what people think of me, know, like what my name means. And so I'm going to break down some of my thoughts on my name as a brand, my name as a business, my name as a my reputation and how I can curate that to make sure that I am putting out what I truly think is important. So when I think of a brand, I think of the internal brand and the external brand. think of a name. think of, you know, when I think of Apple products, I use Apple products. I'm recording this on an iPad and it means something to me. It was funny yesterday, we had some training and my officers were on a group text. And I sent out a text, hey, we're doing training at this time. We're meeting somewhere. And everybody with iPhone showed up and the one officer, he's very responsible. He didn't. And we give him a call. like, yeah, I didn't get it. And I'm like, he has an Android and that it's the group text, you know, when the bubbles different, you know, it mattered to me. Like, you know, it was messed up and it's not an Android phone or an Apple. I don't know. Maybe it's one or the other, but he has an Android device and that means something. It actually said something about him and it wasn't good or bad. I just know when I send out group text messages, I should probably text him separately. It means something like the device he used means something. So I started to reflect on my life and we'll talk about the external brand if you will. And I really hate to use the word term, the term brand, but it is what it is. You know, like people think something about you based on your outward appearance, based on the way you speak, based on your online profile. So I'm going to talk about what I've done to curate my outside brand to make sure that people are seeing what I want them to see and not something else. So a few things that are very simple and this took me a little while to figure out is like my online presence. And just from a simple matter of my email address, when I was 14, maybe 15, I got my first email address and it was sonicdd at hotmail.com. Why Sonic? Well, at one basketball practice, I was wearing a pair of blue, like warm up pants and I was running around, was pretty hyped up. And one of my buddies said, chill out there, Sonic, referencing blue Sonic the Hedgehog. And somehow that stuck and playing basketball, uh they would, you know, I was be Sonic. I was fast and I had blue pants on one time and like that became like my nickname on my warm-ups with Sonic. I thought, what? I'm getting an email address. I'm just learning about what this is. And I became sonicdd at hotmail.com. As I got older, I realized that, you as I'm applying to jobs and I'm saying this out loud, no, Sonic DD wasn't that bad. I've, there's been some that are much worse. For instance, my mother, my mom, bless her heart. ah She was very dedicated to me and my sisters and us playing sports. She literally went to every single game and We were the, I went to school called greater life Academy. We were the greater life Academy Cougars. So obviously in the early to late nineties, when she got her email address, she became Cougar mom 97 or whatever it was, not realizing. And this was before being a Cougar meant you dated a younger boys. So for a long time, my mom was Cougar mom. And eventually like mom, I think what, what it used to mean is not what it currently means. So she needed a change. So are you still like NBA superstar 927 at yahoo.com? Dude, upgrade your email address. Try to get something with your name in it. It seems silly, but like I literally bought my domain name. owned dannydumas.com and then I pay yearly to have dannydumas.com or danny at dannydumas.com as a Gmail address. It doesn't say Gmail, but I run it through Google. It's just, want, because you know, like this podcast. I wanted to seem professional and at some point I think I would like to go and speak to men and if you want me to come speak to your organization, I would love to. I'd like to take this somewhere and I think danny at dannydumas.com is better than sonicdv.com. So just something as simple as what do you look like when you present yourself to the world? Now, most of you probably have a business email and that's totally 100 % fine, but if you don't, or if your personal email address is something that you're slightly embarrassed of, when you say it, you cringe a little bit, I'm giving you permission, go change it. Go get a good old, you yournameatgmail.com. Everybody, you it's okay. You can no longer be, you know, hotmama2744 at heywell.com. It's time to upgrade your digital life. When you're, you know, I'm not big, I do have a LinkedIn profile, but I'm not big on that. But there's lots of people who are professionals at helping you look professional on LinkedIn. But just think of what you're putting out in the digital world. Now, what do you look like dressing? I've gone through multiple phases in my life. At one phase, 13, 14, maybe 15, I cared. I really wanted to be cool. And then when I got 16 or 17, I decided that I didn't care. And I remember we had a big event at my church. It was actually a pretty dress, like people really dressed up. I they're wearing suits, they're looking sharp. And I decided I didn't wanna be like those people. So I wore jeans and a sweater. Which is funny because I didn't want to dress up, but I did want everybody to know that I didn't wanna do that. So I wore jeans and a sweater, because I just didn't care. And I've gone back and forth in my life and I've settled on that, well, I don't think you need to dress like everybody else. I do think you should put some thought into it. For instance, if you're watching this on YouTube, I have a fairly plain black sweater on. It does have a small logo, but almost all my t-shirts and all my sweaters have, are one solid color. I don't have very many more, I don't have very many graphic tees that I wear anymore. I just decided as a 45 year old man, that one, I want to be a jeans and t-shirt kind of guy, but I also want to take it up a little bit and be a slightly, more refined jeans and t-shirt kind of guy. I am not 25 years old. I'm not 18, I'm 45. And I decided that I'm gonna put that out there. I'm going to change what I wear and I'm gonna pay attention to what I wear. That's probably better. That's probably better. Now, if you, today I'm gonna do some yard work after I record this podcast. I'm gonna be wearing a ratty pair of jeans and I'm sure I'm gonna have a logo t-shirt because I'm working around my house. But when I go out, I... Attempt to dress slightly better than what I would consider the average 45 year old. That's a decision I've made because I'm wanting to Progress slightly more than the average 45 year old now. I'm not going out wearing a shirt and tie every day I hardly ever wear a shirt with a tie But I have that like if I go to a wedding I do I try to dress nice. I have a nice suit I don't have six suits. I know guys that have 20 suits because they wear suits every day I don't have that but I do have a suit that fits me pretty well It looks good. And I have that look. I don't want to be the guy that shows up to a wedding with a flannel, because it's the nicest shirt I have is my button up flannel. Not saying that that's wrong for you to do that if you're in that lifestyle, but I want you to make a conscious decision. Don't just wear things because that's what you've always worn. I always wear a band t-shirt because that's the guy that wears a band t-shirt. Is that what you want to project? And if it is, awesome. Good for you. That's cool, man. Go wear your Nirvana shirt, because you saw him in concert. That's cool. But is that what you want everybody to think about you? If you're trying to progress in your career, be taken more professional, maybe it's not. Maybe you just step it up a little bit. And again, I am not that guy that like, I don't read GQ magazine, but I have decided that I want to put my outside appearance. I'm going to step it up a little bit. I would encourage you to think about what you want out of life and then dress for that. That's my outside appearance. Some of the other things that I curate on the outside is the way I speak. One of my New Year's resolutions a couple of years ago was not to say the word at at the end of something. Like for instance, where did you get that t-shirt at? Where did you get that t-shirt is a false sentence. You don't need to add at at the end of it. And I don't know why I did it. And it took me almost a year. had to keep, I had to do it, but I decided I wanted to speak better in public. I am a terrible speller. AI and spell check have really made me look way more professional than I ever am. But I go out of my way to reread what I've written down because I am really bad at spelling and I don't want to project my incompetence of what it truly is a deficit in my, you know, ability to do something as spelling and even correct grammar. not that great. So I have spent time to go back and I reread almost every text message and every email, cause I know I'm bad at it. And I let AI now help me figure that out so that I look at what are you putting out? ah I worked with a chief and he's a great dude. I like him a lot and he misspelled stuff all the time. And it's like, man, chief, there's tools. just, you know, as the chief, we want to be confident. And I know being a good speller and being a good fire chief have nothing in common. but you get judged by that stuff. And so what are you, what are you putting out into this world? You know, you're having a clean car when people get in your car and it's clean. Does that say something about you? It does. And I don't want you to be fake. I'm not saying, Hey, you know, be an absolute tool and scumbag, but just try to trick everybody into thinking that you've got it all together. That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying do your best to decide what kind of person you want to be and then put that out there into the world. That's the outside. So what is the inside? Now, if I said, you know, Harbor Freight and you think, the cheap tools, and maybe that's a good thing, or maybe that's a bad thing. But what does that actually mean? Now, I know I bought some hand tools, some wrenches from the Harbor Freight Icon version. If you're not familiar with Harbor Freight, maybe that's not your part of the world. ah It's a very cheap place to buy tools. Almost everything comes from China. But there's a brand inside of Harbor Freight called Icon. If you snap an Icon wrench, all you have to do is you go to Harbor Freight, you say, here's the wrench, you give it to them, and they give you, they'll open up a package of the other ones and take that wrench out and give it to you. That means a lot. That's the internal side. The external side is Harbor Freight's a pretty cheap place to buy tools, but they actually, from a warranty standpoint, it's pretty good. It's kind of like the old craftsman. You had a craftsman, you cracked it, you went to Sears, they gave you new one. There are no more Sears. Craftsman's probably made in China, it's probably not made in America anymore, I don't know. But it's what's on the inside, it's what you can actually do. So as uh a young man or a man that just wants to make a difference in the world, what can you actually do? And there's a few things that I've focused on in my life that I wanna be known for. One of them is I wanna be known for, if you tell me to do something or we make plans, I am going to be there and I'm going to be on time. And if I'm not, I'm going to communicate it. And that is time and effort that I put in. If I'm gonna tell somebody that I'm gonna do something, I try extremely hard. For instance, I was in a meeting, someone said, hey, if you don't see an email from me today, so which is actually today, will you let me know in case I forget, I just got a ton on my plate? I said yes. So in order to ensure that I put a note in my calendar to do that, because I don't have great, my memory is not as good as it used to be and that's a challenging thing, we were very busy, but I wanna be the guy that when someone says, hey, can you do this for me? And I decide to say yes and I truly decide and I don't just blurt things out, yes. I think about it, can I do that? Because I, when I'm committing, I'm committing, I'm going to do that. And that's what I want in my life. That's the inside. You know, it's like when you buy a pair of, you know, there's a clothing brand that I really like, Artterix, very expensive outdoor clothing. But when you buy their stuff, you have a guarantee that it's good. There's a brand I like, Origin, Origin made. make USA made clothes and boots. When I buy that, I know everything that they, well, at least what they're telling me is made in the United States and that's important to me. And I'm willing to spend more money. And when I call them to say, hey, this is not fitting right, can you fix it? I expect to talk to somebody that's based in the United States that said, yes, I can fix your problem. That stuff is important to me. What in your life could you become excellent at so that when people ask you to do something that the product you're delivering matches the outside. you're wearing, you know, Three piece suit and you're looking sharp, but your life is chaos and you never respond. And that seems like someone who's just slick. That seems like someone who's trying to get something over on somebody. You're outside and your inside should match. So what is it in your life that you could commit to doing? Could it be committing to having a project that's done perfectly? That maybe you're never gonna be fast, but when someone said, hey, can you do this project? you know without a shadow of a doubt that when you deliver it, it's as good as it possibly could be. Maybe this means you'll never be the one that's the fastest, but when someone says, hey, could you do this? Let your inside match your outside. um And really decide, make a decision and then execute on that decision. I think that's really, really important. I think it's important that we do curate it, not to the sense of pretending, not to the sense of that you're... not really what you are. And maybe sometimes you are faking it a little bit. Maybe you're faking a little bit when you first start your career that you don't really have it all together, but you're going to show up dressed like you have it all together. And that can boost your confidence. That can allow people to give you a chance to actually get it all together. And I think it's important. You know, it's something that I've been talking to my son a lot about that you don't know what you're doing and that's okay, but you can do these things. You can increase your network. You can. curate what people think about you by being good at your job and coming up with actual skills. And as a man, as a husband, as a father, as a leader, I think this is something that you can do. So get out there and maybe dress a little bit nicer. Commit to earning skills that will push you above your competition. I like to talk about teamwork and I really think that men should have a community of other men that can help them. But when it comes to the business side, A lot of us are on our own. If you're going to make it, it's because you put in the work, you put in the time, you put in the effort. So why not make that uh reflect your priorities and your values of what you want out of life? And if you're going to do all that, I would also encourage you to go big. You know, think of a bigger life than what you currently have. I think sometimes we settle and while being content is okay, I think you can be content and still want to have a great life and have a little bit more than what you currently have and go after it. And if I can help in any way, reach out. If you've got some questions about this, my email is danny at dannydumas.com. I would love to talk to you. So this has been the Earn Your Title podcast and my name is Danny Dumas and I will talk to you later. Bye.