
LEAD THE FUTURE SHAPE YOUR BRAND

In today’s connected world successful CEOs are like pop stars: authentic, popular and unique. Building your own CEO brand increases trust, motivates employees and customers and provides rapid responses to trends and crises. Both senior managers and aspiring ones require curiosity, courage and a clear strategy to do so.
Experienced business reputation and branding expert Oxana Zeitler shows you how to establish and strengthen your brand, using the examples of the most successful CEOs – from Richard Branson to Satya Nadella. Great brands are made! Learn how to make your competence visible and bring your company to the forefront using the guidance of CEOs heading the biggest companies in the world. People trust people and visibility creates credibility. This is why successful leaders rely on social media. Make your voice heard before others do: Shape your brand and make a difference!
FEATURED BOOK
TRAIN OF THOUGHT

Prologue
Read, Post and Lead
Extract...
While I was writing this book Lead the Future - Shape your Brand, two executives stepped down from two major global German concerns: after ten years as the CEO of the German software giant SAP, Bill McDermott switched to the smaller cloud provider, ServiceNow. T-Mobile US, a subsidiary of Telekom, also announced a change in leadership: in May 2020 the current CEO Mike Sievert will take over from the charismatic head of Mobile, John Legere.
In the following pages, both John Legere and Bill McDermott serve as ambassadors and role models for a new form of leadership. One that is self-confident, open and connected. Both considerably increased the market value of their companies.
The announcements by Bill McDermott and John Legere caused a flurry on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. The news crossed the globe in seconds, attracting a lot of attention and messages expressing approval, confusion and excitement.
In the past, these changes at the top would have been mainly dealt with by business journalists, who would have reported them on the basis of information provided by the management: a terse factual bulletin, some praise, some thanks, the outlook for the future and something about the successors, Mike Sievert at T-Mobile, Christian Klein and Jennifer Morgan at SAP. Followed by silence. Even if a crisis or conflict was not behind the change in leadership, communication was meant to be restrained. If a CEO left, they were not supposed to talk about it. A couple of months later, the interested public would learn that the manager had been hired by a new company, under a new flag and a new brand.
READ THE PREFACE

"A perfectly timed and relevant book about successful Leadership Brands in the digital age. Inspiring!"
Hagen Rickmann, Geschäftsführer Telekom Deutschland GmbH

"An inspiration for all those who suspect that social media is more than just sharing announcements. A confirmation for all those who already care and successfully use it for strategic positioning. Well written."
Stefan Ettwig,
Head of Communications at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems

„Leaders will benefit from this captivating read. The book contains a wealth of great examples of valuable CEO Brands and their social media strategies.“
Thomas Fuhr, CEO at Grohe AG

"Tired of boring business manuals? Oxana Zeitler has written a compulsively readable book turning your leadership challenges into solutions. Social Media is much more than sharing news; it’s about connecting! Time for the social connected CEO!"
Dr. Marcell Vollmer, Chief Innovation Officer at Celonis

"Leadership defines the brand! A timely and powerful message that we can't ignore. And a refreshing read after leaders have been repeatedly told that Personal Branding isn't a real business asset..."
Markus Sontheimer, CIO/CDO at Schenker AG
REVIEWS
THE AUTHOR

Oxana Zeitler is a brand strategist and expert in personal branding and digital communication. As an entrepreneur and founder of vision2brand Management Consultancy (Berlin), she and her team advise well-known CEOs and top managers from leading companies. She has extensive experience in the integration of digital technologies and the implementation of communication strategies in international groups. Her CEO branding approach helps top managers to align business decisions with social trends. She provides strategically oriented reputation management. Great brands are made!