Building
your Personal Brand
(First published in the Canadian Immigrant Magazine)
1095 days, or 26280
hours, or 1576800 minutes or 94608000 seconds ago, my feet touched Canadian
soil at Pearson International Airport, Toronto.
From being a full
Indian citizen, in a few minutes from now, I would achieve landing rights and formally,
Permanent Resident status.
It took me 5 and a half
years to get here, no I was not crossing the Sahara desert, I was merely a
statistic in the skilled worker queue, a faceless file, lying on a shelf in the
Canadian High Commission in New Delhi before they breathed life into it. It
seems so very long ago but here I was, in true live blood and flesh, standing
at the doorstep of my new home, Canada.
A wait, a real long
wait, one many of us have experienced in our own journey between application
and finally receiving the PR visa stamped in our passport. While the wait was
long, the period after receiving the visa had its own share of anxieties.
We were now in the
queue, there was a limited number of months within which we had to land in
Canada and like many others, we too had nights of panic and days of anxiety.
Were we doing the right thing? Could we unattach ourselves from our well
settled life? Could we leave the cocoon of family and friends that provided us
behind? Do we liquidate a lifelong of belongings and fly half way across the
world? So many choices, so many decisions and so much emotion.
We took the plunge,
closed up shop and moved - literally 6 weeks after receiving the visa, and were
on the flight to Canada. A clean cut heals the fastest they said.
Many who came before us
and those who followed share the emotions that emerge after getting the visa in
your hand. What was a vision earlier turns into a reality and a mixed bag of
excitement of the adventure ahead yet fear of the unknown.
And soon enough, here
we were, in a taxi with our limited baggage going down the streets of Toronto
to what would be home for the next 8 months.
That was October 2008,
this is November 2011 - three years have passed under the bridge and much
water. I landed a mere statistic, a stranger in a new country and without any
safety net. I am now a partner in a leading multicultural strategy &
communications firm based in Toronto; I received the Top 25 Canadian Immigrants
Award 2011 and have been felicitated by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.
This column is all
about how one navigated the waters in this new country of choice, how one
overcame the barriers of settling in a new country and how one rose from being
a mere statistic to a recognized individual. I hope to be able to place before
you my journey, my learning’s, my experiences for you to take away what fits
your path. Far from over, many more miles before I sleep, please join me in my
journey as it unfolds.
-
Note: Gautam Nath is Partner at Monsoon Communications
and serves on several Boards and Committees across Toronto. He is one of the
earliest newcomers to Canada to be featured on CBC National Television on
Canada Day as well as receive the Top 25 Canadian Immigrants Award in 2011. Follow
his bi monthly column in the Canadian Immigrant magazine, where he shares his journey underlying the importance of
building a personal brand and the value of giving back in Canada. Stay tuned.
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