This interview is with Libby Crossland, Co-founder at Leadership Visibility Co..

Libby Crossland, Co-founder, Leadership Visibility Co.

Can you introduce yourself and share a bit about your expertise in personal branding?

I’m Libby Crossland, Co-founder of The Leadership Visibility Co. I’ve spent more than twenty years helping people talk about what they do, from writing leadership CVs and building executive brands to now helping founders and small business owners show up in a way that actually feels like them.

Personal branding gets a bad rep because people associate it with oversharing or being too “salesy.” I see it differently. It’s just communication, learning how to tell the truth about your work in a way that connects and attracts the right audience.

At LVCo, we make visibility feel human again. We help founders, leaders, and small business owners show up confidently, attract the right people, and build reputations they’re proud of, without the cringey stuff or the hard sell.

What inspired you to focus on personal branding, and how has your journey in this field evolved over time?

It started long before I knew personal branding was even a thing. I built my first recruitment agency at 19 and one of the first UK CV-writing agencies not long after that, in my mid-twenties. I’ve always been fascinated by how people tell their stories, and how often they undersell themselves. Over time, that turned into a bit of an obsession. I worked in HR, marketing, and leadership, but the thread running through all of it was the same: helping people articulate their value. When I launched The Leadership Visibility Co, with my business partner, Suzie Thompson, it was really about fixing the part everyone skips… being clear on who you are and what value you add before you start showing up. So many founders and leaders do brilliant work behind the scenes but go unseen because they don’t know how to talk about it without feeling awkward.

You’ve mentioned the importance of honesty in personal branding. Can you share a specific instance where being transparent about a challenge or failure actually strengthened your brand?

A few months ago, I wrote a LinkedIn post about burnout and why I left corporate life to start my own business. It wasn’t a pretty, glossy story. I shared how I’d hit a wall, how I’d said yes to everything, and how I’d tried to be the glue for the senior leadership team at the company I worked for and for my own marketing team, and how that nearly broke me. How I’d ended up on medication because of it. I expected it to flop. Instead, it became one of the most-viewed things I’d ever written. People didn’t see weakness; they saw themselves. And I got a lot of DMs on the back of that post.

How do you advise leaders to balance showcasing their professional achievements with revealing their authentic selves when building their personal brand?

I always say it’s not about sharing everything; it’s about sharing the right things. Leaders don’t need to post their life story to be authentic. What matters is showing the human behind the results… the thinking, the lessons, the moments that shaped how they lead.

The sweet spot is this: talk about the work, but in a way that shows what you stand for. If you’ve led a big transformation, don’t just say “we hit target.” Share what it taught you about people, resilience, or communication. That’s the stuff that makes people lean in.

When you strike that balance, you build credibility and connection at the same time. People trust what they can see, not just the numbers, but the person behind them.

In your experience, what’s the most common mistake you see executives make when trying to establish their personal brand, and how can they avoid it?

The biggest mistake I see is a lack of clarity. Most executives haven’t taken the time to really define what they stand for, what they want to be known for, who they want to reach, and what message they want to get across. So they end up talking about everything, and nothing sticks. When you’re clear on your story, your values, and your focus, everything else gets easier… your LinkedIn profile, your content, your conversations.

You’ve worked with hundreds of C-level executives. Can you describe a transformation you’ve witnessed in a client’s personal brand and the impact it had on their career?

One of my favorite moments was working with a client who genuinely didn’t see how brilliant he was. He’d been avoiding putting himself forward for an industry award for five years because he didn’t think he was “that kind of person.”

We sat down, unpacked what he’d achieved, and wrote the entry together. And he won.

It wasn’t about the trophy; it was about what changed in him afterwards. He finally saw what everyone else already did. And it made his leadership peers really sit up and pay attention. That’s the power of this work. It’s about holding up a mirror so they can see their own value.

How do you recommend leaders maintain consistency in their personal brand across different platforms and in-person interactions?

Honestly, consistency just comes from being the same person wherever you show up. If you sound one way online and completely different in person, people notice. It’s not about having a “brand voice”; it’s about knowing what you stand for and letting that run through everything: how you write, how you lead, how you show up in a room. The leaders who get this right are really clear about who they are. You can hear the same tone in a LinkedIn post that you’d get if you were sitting across from them with a coffee. That’s what makes people trust them.

Looking ahead, how do you see personal branding evolving for business leaders, and what advice would you give to those who want to stay ahead of the curve?

It’s getting more human. People are tired of leaders hiding behind logos or scripted posts. The next phase of personal branding is about real connection. The leaders and founders who’ll stand out are the ones who sound like themselves and have something honest to say.

We’re moving into a time where trust matters more than tone. If you can show what you believe, share what you’re learning, and stay consistent even when you don’t want to or when things go wrong, you’ll be miles ahead.

The advice I’d give is just stop worrying about being ahead of the curve. Focus on being real, useful, and visible.

Thanks for sharing your knowledge and expertise. Is there anything else you’d like to add?

I guess I’d just say this: Being visible and building a personal brand doesn’t have to feel weird. You don’t need to sound super-clever, or turn into someone else online. You just need to start showing people what you care about and what you’re good at. And have an actual opinion on things. That’s it. The rest builds from there.