Bio

Paul Copcutt

& Square Peg

Paul Copcutt is Canada’s leading personal brand consultant, combining a passion for people and branding with a realization that strengths and specialization are the keys to success, he guides his clients to that outcome. His own specialty is to leverage his unique communication skills and genuine caring approach to support and inspire North American professionals and executives, and the corporations that hire them, in connecting with their true selves to reach their professional and personal goals.

Whilst appreciating the benefits of formal education, Paul has developed his own sales and marketing career through his unique ability to relate with all levels of people and approach all situations with an open mind and become an incredible source of information and personal connections – quite often referred by clients and colleagues as a ‘human google network’.

This has resulted in gathering successful experience in a variety of industries including biotech, medical devices, professional services and consumer goods and several years in executive recruitment both in North America and Europe where he sourced talent for a variety of global corporations at all levels.

He first recognised the personal branding term after reading Tom Peters 'Brand You 50" in the late 90's and soon realised that many of the actions and suggestions that Peters wrote about were exactly what he had been doing through a corporate career that started in banking and ended in biotech - ironically two subjects that he would not place at the top of his academic achievements – it took two attempts to pass his Math ‘O’ level and his biology teacher even had him labeled as an idiot!

Square Peg was always going to be the name of the company that he one day would found, it sits with his English humour and more importantly his desire to make people realise that being a square peg is a great choice - provided you are maximising your strengths and unique abilities to do what you love doing.

One of the world’s first Certified Personal Brand Strategist’s and the first Certified On Line Brand Strategist globally, he is a regular contributor and specialist for several leading on line resources including WomensWeb.ca, the Career Hub blog, Beyond.com and also Higher Bracket.ca, Canada’s only $100k+ job board. He is also the top global Career & Training contributor on the Knowledge Forum at Marketing Profs.com. His innate ability to connect and inspire has resulted in his taking several leadership roles with various organizations including the Career Professionals of Canada and as President of Hamilton & Area Coaching Association. He also was for a number of years responsible for the facilitation and certification of future personal brand strategists for Reach the global leader in personal branding methodology.

Recognised by Forbes as one of the top certified personal brand strategists he is a much sought after speaker, delivering inspiring and informative talks to a variety of corporate clients, professional organizations and national conferences.

A regularly sought out media resource having been recently interviewed for Elle magazine, he is often quoted in The Globe & Mail, Canada’s leading national newspaper as well as The National Post, Toronto Star and other regional press. He has also appeared on several local and national television and radio shows, including Report on Business TV.

Paul is also committed and passionate about the future of Canada and the youth that will be taking that responsibility forward and is actively involved as a mentor and specialist with the non-profit Youth in Motion and their Top 20 Under 20 program, a network of dynamic community leaders dedicated to helping youth make meaningful career and life decisions, while inspiring them to be contributing Canadian citizens.