To be occasionally quoted is the only fame I care for. – Alexander Smith

Sure I would like to be famous. Who wouldn’t want to get an invite to speak at TED on managing millennials or modern project management. Walking around the conference where everyone knows your name and wants to buy your drink – that’s the pinnacle of career success. At least it seemed like a good goal to put up on my Oprah® approved Secret* vision board.

So I dug in and read all the big blogs and books on personal branding. I was even tricked into reading Dan Schawbel’s rambling, self-serving, never get those three hours of my life back, take on the subject*. (Book Review Here)

About half way through my research, I was prepared to spend countless hours adding to my twitter followers and blogging every day. All I had to do, according to pretty much every expert in the field, was to start telling a lot of people I’m famous. It was self-help 101, you become a self-fulfilling prophecy. That’s right; that’s the secret: you tell enough people that you’re famous and you become famous.

As it turns out, it’s also quite a bit of work: find, follow, tweet – find, follow, tweet – find, follow, tweet. Comment on popular blogs and link back to your site (even if you don’t care about the content). Get out and be seen at the conferences and shows. That’s just too much work doing nothing.

I’m too lazy to be famous. I guess I’ll just have to stick to trying to be better at my actual job.

*These are hyperlinked ironically. You shouldn’t actually buy these books. They’re horrible.