Your Job Title Won’t Save You. Your Reputation Will.

I’m gonna start with a little story about two types of people who were laid-off in the same week. And while these stories are made up, I feel like I know both of these people well.

Sarah had spent eight years at a Fortune 500 company. Senior Director of Communications. She’d led massive product launches, managed crisis response, built the company’s thought leadership program from scratch. But when the layoffs came, her entire professional identity was wrapped up in that company’s logo on her LinkedIn profile. When she started looking for her next role, nobody knew who she was.

Marcus had also been at a well-known company for seven years. But he’d spent those years building his own voice alongside his job. He wrote about communications strategy, shared frameworks publicly, and engaged in industry conversations. He had 15,000 followers who knew his perspective, not just his employer. And when his layoff came, he let this community know. Three companies reached out within 72 hours.

The difference wasn’t their skill level. It was their credibility infrastructure.

Bear with me as I explain myself here. For decades, this formula of success had been that you work at a prestigious company, get a senior title, and let that brand carry you to the next role.

That playbook is broken because our working world is broken (including the budgets that go with them). And even our friends in full-time jobs are feeling this – the proof is in the narratives we hear in their leadership messages, like “don’t chase promotions or titles” and “I’m looking for the right role not the right title.”

This is a market signal, whether they meant for it to be or not. In a world where 30% of tech workers faced layoffs in 2023 and 2024, and where AI is eliminating entire categories of middle-management roles, having “Director at [Big Company]” as your entire identity is a catastrophic risk. I talk about this with in the latest Smart in Public episode (out Wednesday Nov 26), where we joke about our own cringy experiences when we first started building our own personal brands, forcing smiles for the camera at events (photo or it didn’t happen). But in all honesty, this cringe is a rite of passage even the most skilled comms leaders find themselves dragging their heels on, because we’re so used to being praised for being unseen. BUT just like we preach to our stakeholders - people follow people, not brands. So we’ve gotta do it.

Because when 500 people get laid off from the same company on the same day, you’re not unique. You’re one of 500 people with identical LinkedIn headlines, all competing for the same shrinking pool of jobs.

The market has fundamentally shifted. Companies aren’t looking for resumes anymore. They’re looking for people who can hit the ground running; who they already know, trust, and understand; who bring just as much credibility into the company, as the business does by validating their skills; AND they are looking for people who already have an audience that they can tap into through amplification programs.

And this hiring wish list isn’t just for full-time employees, it also applies to consultants and fractional workers.

Happy to be challenged on this, but to me independent credibility means people know your name, your perspective, and your capabilities regardless of where you work. It’s the CEO who reads your posts and thinks, “I need someone who thinks like this.” It’s the founder who sees your comment on a thread and realizes, “This person gets it.” It’s the network that reaches out when you’re between jobs because they already understand your value.

Building independent credibility isn’t about becoming an influencer. It’s about becoming known for your ability to solve specific problems in specific ways. When I build this out for myself, here’s how I approached it:

You can’t be credible at everything. You need to be known for something specific.

Don’t say “I’m good at communications,” say “I help B2B SaaS companies create founder-led content strategies that generate pipeline.”

The narrower your focus, the stronger your credibility gets because it’s easier to focus on the core problems you solve, which also means the more you’ll be able to find ‘your people’ (aka your ideal client) because you’re an expert at solving a specific problem. Specificity creates demand.

Most people make the mistake of treating their knowledge as proprietary. They think: “If I share what I know, no one will hire me to do it for them.”

The opposite is true. When you share how you think, how you approach problems, and what frameworks you use, you’re demonstrating expertise in real time. You’re showing—not telling—that you know what you’re doing. This doesn’t mean giving away your work for free. It means showing your thinking process so people understand how you add value.

Try to do this in your next post: Instead of posting “Just wrapped a successful product launch!” share your pre-launch communications checklist or the three-question framework you use to pressure-test messaging.

What kills most people’s credibility-building efforts is that they forget that they’re not building an audience, they are building a reputation.

There’s a difference. An audience will clap for anything. A reputation only gets built when people consistently see you solve problems, answer questions, and share frameworks that actually help them do their jobs better.

The internet is already drowning in noise. Algorithm gaming and AI have made it trivially easy to generate infinite posts that sound professional but say nothing. Every platform is clogged with people posting just to post because someone told them “consistency is key.”

That’s not your competition. That’s the noise you’re cutting through.

Your job isn’t to add more noise. Your job is to be the signal. This means every single thing you share should answer one question: “Does this serve my mission and help my audience?”

Not “Is this content?” but “Is this valuable?” Not “Will this get engagement?” but “Will this demonstrate my expertise?”

The network you build while employed is the safety net you need when you’re not. This means:

The person who texts you when you get laid off is the person you had coffee with six months ago for no reason at all.

There is an interesting flip side of this whole scenario. What if you land a gig at a well-known company? This is your golden window.

When you join a company that people respect, you inherit some of their credibility by association. This is a massive advantage if you know how to use it.

Here’s how to maximize this moment and use the company to boost your personal brand:

Don’t wait until you’ve “proven yourself” internally. Start building your external presence from day one. The best time to build your personal credibility is when you have a prestigious company backing you up. That affiliation opens doors and gets coffees, email responses, conference bonding moments, top talent co-worker exposure that you may not have had access to previously. Get in there.

Yes, you work at [Big Company]. But the reason people should care about what you say is because of your unique perspective, not because of your employer. This is a delicate dance when you’re in it.

In order to maintain your own personal brand, unique thought leadership, and also your job at said [Big Company], make sure your content reflects:

You won’t remember the details two years from now. So while you’re executing successful programs, make sure you document it.

This becomes the proof of your capabilities when you’re no longer at that company.

The company’s reputation gets you in the door. Your ability to build genuine relationships keeps those doors open.

Every conference, every partnership conversation, every cross-company collaboration is an opportunity to build relationships that outlast your employment.

People forget that building credibility compounds. Your first post might reach 50 people. Your tenth post might reach 200. Your fiftieth post might reach 2,000.

But it’s not just about reach. It’s about depth of connection. This starts with the problems you’re solving for your audience and the value you’re bringing them in your content.

When you show up consistently, people move through stages:

You can’t skip stages. You have to earn each one.

This is why engagement matters more than you think. When you respond to comments, when you acknowledge people who share your work, when you have genuine conversations in public you’re not just being polite. You’re building the kind of relationship that turns readers into advocates.

The person who comments on your post today might be the person who refers you for a six-figure consulting engagement next year. But only if you treated that comment like it mattered.

We’re entering an era where your portable reputation is your most valuable asset.

AI can write the press release. It can’t replicate the trust you’ve built over years of showing up, sharing your thinking, and proving your expertise. Companies can lay you off. They can’t take away the audience that knows your name. Startups can fail. Your frameworks and reputation follow you to the next thing.

The people that’ll thrive in the next decade aren’t the ones with the best resumes. They’re the ones who built credibility that exists independent of any single employer or client.

They’re the ones founders want to hire before they even know they’re available; who never have to cold-pitch because their reputation precedes them; and who realize that the job title is temporary, but the reputation is portable.

Building independent credibility while you’re employed or are maxed out on clients can feel risky. I get it. You worry about what your employer will think or you tell yourself you’ll start when things are less busy.

But to me the real risk is waking up one day without a job or down a client and realizing nobody knows who you are.