How My Roots Shape My Personal Brand
People often talk about personal branding as though it begins and end with strategy. The conversation usually centres on visibility, positioning, networking and reputation. While all of those things matter, I believe that the strongest personal brands are rooted in something much deeper. They are shaped by where we come from, the environments that have moulded us and the experiences that influence how we see the world.
For me, that means acknowledging that I grew up working class and that I am Black British and British Nigerian. While my circumstances today are very different from those I grew up in, my working-class roots remain an important part of how I navigate the world. Social mobility may change your circumstances but it does not erase the experiences, assumptions and lessons that shaped you. If anything, moving between different worlds can make you even more conscious of where you started and how that journey continues to influence who you are.
One of the topics I rarely get the opportunity to discuss in business interviews is working-class guilt. Conversations about success tend to focus on the future. We are encouraged to talk about growth, ambition and what comes next rather than reflecting on the realities that shaped us. Yet my upbringing remains an important part of my story. Although I am no longer working class in economic terms, that does not mean those experiences disappear. They continue to influence how I think about money, opportunity, security and belonging.
Social mobility is often presented as a straightforward success story. Work hard, progress professionally and enjoy the rewards but the reality is usually far more nuanced than that. For many people who grew up working class, moving into different professional and social environments can create tensions that are rarely discussed openly. You can be proud of what you have achieved while still feeling connected to the communities that shaped you. You can enter spaces that represent progress while remaining acutely aware that those spaces were not necessarily designed with people like you in mind. You can feel grateful for new opportunities while questioning why access to those opportunities remains uneven in the first place.
As a Black British woman of Nigerian heritage, I have always been conscious of the fact that identity shapes how people move through the world. Growing up, I understood that certain spaces carried assumptions about who belonged there and who did not. I understood that competence was not always judged equally and that confidence was often interpreted differently depending on who was expressing it. Long before I entered the professional world, I was aware that race, class and background could influence how people were perceived. Those lessons stay with you, even as you gain experience, build credibility and establish yourself professionally.
This is one of the reasons I think conversations about confidence can sometimes miss the mark. Confidence is frequently framed as an individual responsibility, as though it exists independently of the environments people are navigating. If you doubt yourself, you simply need to believe in yourself more and if you lack confidence, you need to work on your mindset but that’s not enough! Some environments have historically been designed to exclude certain groups of people and when you enter spaces where very few people share your background, your experiences or your perspective, self-doubt is not always irrational. Sometimes it’s a reflection of the signals those environments are sending.
That is why I have become increasingly interested in the relationship between confidence and exclusion. What we often label as impostor syndrome can sometimes be a perfectly understandable response to environments that have consistently questioned people's legitimacy. Black women, in particular, are frequently required to prove themselves repeatedly while navigating stereotypes, scrutiny and expectations that others may never have to consider. When confidence is discussed without acknowledging those realities, the conversation risks becoming superficial. It places responsibility entirely on the individual while ignoring the structures that contribute to the problem in the first place.
What I have learned over time is that confidence is a long game. It is not something that appears overnight and it is certainly not something that remains fixed forever. The confidence I have today has been built through experience, setbacks, difficult conversations and moments where I have had to push through discomfort. It has been built through speaking before I felt completely ready and learning that capability often develops through action rather than waiting for certainty. Age has played a role too to be honest; there is something liberating about reaching a point where you become less interested in seeking permission and more interested in trusting your own judgement.
Another theme that has become increasingly important to me is the idea of permission, particularly the permission to pivot. Too many people remain trapped in situations that no longer serve them because they are afraid of being perceived as inconsistent or unsuccessful. We are often encouraged to build careers that look neat and linear when, in reality, very few careers follow a straight line. I have moved between entrepreneurship and employment and back again. Each experience taught me something different about myself, my ambitions and the type of impact I wanted to make. I do not see those shifts as failures; I see them as evidence of growth, curiosity and self-awareness.
There is often an assumption that success means staying the course no matter what but I think there is courage in recognising when something is no longer aligned with your goals or values. Allowing yourself to pivot is not a sign that you have failed. Sometimes it is a sign that you have learned enough about yourself to make a different choice. I wish more people felt able to make those decisions without fear of judgement.
When I think about my personal brand today, I do not separate it from my experiences growing up working class or from my identity as a Black British woman of Nigerian heritage. Those experiences continue to influence how I build relationships and how I navigate professional spaces. They have shaped my resilience, but they have also shaped my empathy and influence the stories I choose to tell, the people I advocate for and the issues I care about. They remind me that success is rarely linear, that belonging is often more complicated than people admit and that confidence takes time to develop. Most importantly, they remind me that authenticity is not about pretending your past no longer matters. It is about recognising that every stage of your journey has contributed to who you are today. My personal brand is not built in spite of my roots, it’s built upon them. The experiences of growing up working class, navigating professional spaces as a Black British woman and carrying the influence of my Nigerian heritage are not obstacles to overcome or chapters to leave behind. They are part of the foundation that continues to shape how I lead, how I communicate and how I show up in the world.