Enhance Your Reputation

A good reputation is more valuable than costly perfume. Ecclesiastes 7:1

Here’s a quick anatomy lesson: The area of your brain that controls the sense of smell is right next to the area that controls your emotions. That’s why certain aromas, such as perfumes or Grandma’s oatmeal cookies, produce such strong emotional responses.

The author of Ecclesiastes understood the emotional power of a reputation.

Costly perfume elicits a strong emotional response, but he says that this is nothing compared to the emotional strength of your reputation.

How do you smell?

Your image influences people’s attitude toward you more than anything you say or do. Your reputation is the aroma that precedes you. It colors the response people will have to your leadership, even before they meet you.

People follow leaders with whom they have a strong emotional connection. Your reputation—your image—is the glue that holds that connection together.

Do you pay attention to how you are perceived?

Your reputation precedes you. What does it say before you arrive?