"I think of resilience as the ability to recover."
Joseph Rosenfeld was born to be a personal style strategist. He had an epiphany in high school that remains the crux of his work for over thirty years. He theorized that personal style could transcend physical attraction. Joseph developed a strategy that saved and transformed his life. And he has gone on to transform the lives of an esteemed clientele.
Clients know Joseph as a “style savant,” and he is most called to serve those on a quest for transformation. His hallmark style strategy encourages clients to sync their inner and outer energy. He guides top business leaders with empathy, creativity, and precision, especially fellow geeks. He shares their focus to ensure that they look on message. He also works with corporate attorneys and their teams to help them tip the scales in their favor at trial…ethically.
Quoted in The New York Times, NPR, The Washington Post, and NBC, Joseph loves sharing encouraging messages about style. He was once recognized by the San Jose Business Journal as one of its “40 Under 40.” And the Silicon Valley Magazine named him best personal stylist in its It List in 2020 and 2021.
In his spare time Joseph nurtures his interests in art, fashion, design, good food, and traveling.
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Table of Contents
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
Joseph Rosenfeld: You wouldn’t know it to see me today, but developing my personal style saved my life. People as far back as I can remember “othered” me. Peers ostracized and bullied me, and told me daily how ugly I was. Though I was alive, my self-esteem was dead.
That was until I discovered the power of personal style.
I resuscitated my wounded spirit from the outside in. From this, I learned about my values and passions, vision and purpose, and transformed my life.
This led to my life’s work of helping a select clientele to connect their outer style and inner qualities. While they don’t have my story, they need my solution so that they can tell their own visual story with confidence and ease.
Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?
Joseph Rosenfeld: When sharing with clients, friends, or family about how my success got to where it is today, I have to go back to nearly the beginning of it all. Since I am a storyteller and a personal transformation expert, I love to share the transformational story that brought me to this very day. It’s such an important story of my professional and personal journey that the story plays in the background of my mind like a favorite song’s catchy chorus. This is a little story about an interaction between my second retail department manager and me, and about how she led me to success.
I was hired as a sales associate by Neiman Marcus and started working for the company at its Chicago store, located on the “Magnificent Mile,” shy of my 20th birthday. The very first customer I waited on became a client of mine for many years. I didn’t think that I had the “golden touch” or anything like that. I just thought that I loved fashion and cared about my customers. If only developing relationships and loyalty were as easy and as simple as the first person I ever worked with.
During the first six months of working for the company, my co-workers, all of whom were far more experienced and older, hazed me like a college ritual gone wrong. I did know that, somehow, all of the harsh treatment reflected their fear that I was taking away from what they thought they were entitled to. This isn’t anything so unusual in a highly competitive sales environment. But, I always tried to “stay in my lane” and do the best work I could, whether it was merchandising the department or helping customers.
I wrote nearly every customer thank you notes, to extend appreciation for allowing me the opportunity to serve them. I also wanted to foster relationships that would turn customers into clients. Very little success came my way at first, and I was struggling to sell enough to satisfy the goals that were set for me by management. I also had very little guidance from the hiring department manager. Then, right upon the end of my sixth month there, she left quickly.
The new manager, Betsy, was hardly Lori’s replacement. Betsy was this petite and perky force of nature. She led me to success.
But, in order to get me to success, I had to have a rock bottom moment. On Betsy’s second day on the job, her first responsibility with me was to put me on 90-day probation. If I didn’t bring up my sales during this period of time, I’d lose my job there. That she was required to carry out this responsibility, as her first dealing with me, was unthinkable. It didn’t sit right with her.
Betsy began a very healthy dialogue with me, then a “green,” underdeveloped and aspiring sales associate. I distinctly recall her telling me how she wanted to help me turn this situation around and help me to become successful. She asked me what I thought I needed. I just as distinctively recall saying to her, “Betsy, I’m kind of high maintenance…” Those words still make me laugh. Continuing, “I have basically only received criticism without any suggestions about how I might improve. So, if you give me criticism, that’s fine. But, I need you to suggest how to do better. And, when you notice that I’ve done something really great in your mind, I really need the positive reinforcement.”
Betsy turned out to be the finest manager I ever had because she delivered exactly what I needed in order to turn the situation around. She led me to success, but not just the success I went on to enjoy in the world of high-end retail. She led me to the success I enjoy now.
On Betsy’s shoulders, I still use today the same common-sense approach that she took with me.
She focused on my strengths. She honored my natural abilities and showed me how to maximize my talents and gifts. When a weakness got in the way of my talents and gifts, she helped me to see it was happening and offered good advice about how to change course.
She treated me with great respect. She may have been my manager. But, she knew that she would get more out of me if she treated me as a peer who was part of her team. Together, we shared a common vision for my success and for her success.
She made it more fun to be at work. I realize that “fun” is not always part of the act of working. But, Betsy instilled in me the importance of having fun. Today, I tell everyone that I’m having so much fun that it hardly feels like work – not that I don’t put my heart, soul, and intellect to work 100%.
She and I shared a vision of what success would look like for me. She was less focused on herself, because if my abilities were strengthened, my success would be her mutual success.
Payback is not always a bitch, as the saying goes. I’d so much love Betsy to know what an incredible and positive influence her perky personality, mad humor, and joie de vivre gave me when I needed it most. Oh, and her obsessive love of Robert Clergerie shoes. It has sustained me all of these years. And, I hope to have that kind of impact on my clients as a way of perpetually thanking the Universe for my time with Betsy. After all, she led me to success.
Often leaders are asked to share the best advice they received. But let’s reverse the question. What’s the worst advice you received?
Joseph Rosenfeld: As I decided to leave luxury retail behind and start my image consultancy, one of my clients suggested that I could take clients shopping and charge, maybe, $30 an hour. The moment he recommend that, I knew that was awful advice. He had no idea how I wanted to truly impact my clients’ lives.But, it also helped me to quickly learn how to describe why my more in-depth service could help people in transformative ways.
Another horrible piece of advice I received came through peer pressure by belonging to a professional association. The association put tremendous pressure on members like me to achieve various levels of certification. This certification had prestige and validity within the association. But, no client ever asked me to prove my knowledge, skill, expertise, or genius to guide them. I always demonstrated it by being myself. The moment I left that association behind, my business soared to new levels.
Resilience is critical in critical times like the ones we are going through now. How would you define resilience?
Joseph Rosenfeld: I think of resilience as the ability to recover. When I work out with my personal trainer, he pushes me hard, but not harder than he knows I am able to handle. Even if the regimen feels very challenging, I stick with it, finish, and take time to recover afterwards. The same is true of how I have treated this challenging time. Instead of ‘pivoting’ away from my zone of genius and core services, I doubled down. The constancy and consistency of my presence produces a sense of reassurance that people have come to rely on. And it has, quite frankly, helped me to stay the course.
In your opinion, what makes your company stand out from the competition?
Joseph Rosenfeld: Longevity and actively working for more than 30 years creates a wealth of experience to draw upon in service to current and future clients.
Some of this experience is also deeply personal.
You wouldn’t know it to see me today, but developing my personal style saved my life. People as far back as I can remember “othered” me. Peers ostracized and bullied me, and told me daily how ugly I was. Though I was alive, my self-esteem was dead.
That is until I discovered the power of personal style.
I resuscitated my wounded spirit from the outside in. From this, I learned about my values and passions, vision and purpose, and transformed my life.
This led to my life’s work of helping a select clientele to connect their outer style and inner qualities. While they don’t have my story, they need my solution so that they can tell their own visual story.
My 3-part method to create a precise personal style:
- Inside – Explore who you are at your core and how people close to you perceive you.
- Outside – You come to appreciate the precise colors, clothing styles, and details that fit to your body and personality.
- Presto Change-o – Review the ideal wardrobe created to make it easy for you to exude a confident presence with gravitas.
You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success?
Joseph Rosenfeld: I’d say:
- Commitment to excellence – transforming good into great
- Strategic intuition – precise, efficient, and fast action
- Customized approach – celebrating individuality and meeting unique needs
What have you learned about personal branding that you wish you had known earlier in your career?
Joseph Rosenfeld: Tom Peters first uttered the words “personal branding” in 1997. Yet, back in 1985, as a 15-year old teenager, I was in a very dark place. As I discovered the power of personal style, the kids at school stopped telling me that I was ugly. It wasn’t that I had suddenly become attractive. The ‘it-factor’ that I was born with began to reveal itself. In the calm quiet of the mind, I began to ask myself wonderful questions:
- – What’s possible for me in the world, instead of how things have been until that point?
- – What am I alive to do?
- – What makes me special exactly as I am?
- – What do I most wish for?
These questions intrinsically relate to vision, purpose, values and passion, and they are the foothold of personal branding.
I took the dire circumstances of my early life and began to live an iterative life of repetitive questioning, seeking the deeper meaning of life, right up through today. And the beautiful journey continues as I now help others iterate to be the best they can be today.
What’s your favorite leadership style and why?
Joseph Rosenfeld: Servant leadership is the way I operate in the world and is how I serve my clients. I don’t put my objectives before others or try to compete for power in my relationships with people. When operating in my zone of genius, the objective is to serve with authority. I want clients to trust the actions I tell them to take, including how showing up will satisfy their wants and fulfill their needs.
Do you think entrepreneurship is something that you’re born with or something that you can learn along the way?
Joseph Rosenfeld: Being a business owner was not something I ever considered — until it happened! Just because I started a company did not mean it was my destiny.
In my luxury retail sales career, I told an assistant store manager that I wanted to interview for a management position. He asked with disdain, “What makes you think you’re so qualified?” He completely disregarded me. Within three months, I left the store, the company, and retailing itself behind, and started my own company. I was determined and strategic enough to find a better way to be me, use my gifts, and serve others. Along the way, I have taken plenty of risks, and continue to learn as I grow through what I go through. For a long time now, I can’t envision life any other way.
What’s your favorite “life lesson” quote and how has it affected your life?
Joseph Rosenfeld: “Your fortune is your life’s love.” This is a poetic song lyric by my all-time favorite singer/songwriter, Stevie Nicks. It’s from the song, “Think About It,” which is the fourth track from her debut solo album, “Bella Donna,” released in 1981.
I credit the entire song as being the mantra of my whole life, and for having saved my life as a despondent teenager.
Back then, amid daily contemplations of ending it all, I kept meditating on this and other lines from the song. Ultimately, I knew that creating my own ending was premature because I hadn’t yet held my fortune. The fortune wasn’t about money. It was about what she meant in the song.
I hadn’t yet determined what my “life’s love” was. And this is how I began to ask myself those questions that I shared earlier in the interview about personal branding. When I began to delve into the purpose and meaning of my life – and recognized that I had a birthright to exist – the question became a quest worthy of finding answers.
Today, I am a very fortunate human in many ways. Not every day comes up roses, either. I’ve never grown tired of the artist, the song, or the lyric. I use it as my touchstone any time I have a challenge, and it does for me today what it imbued in me back then: I have everything I need for right now.
Jed Morley, VIP Contributor to ValiantCEO and the host of this interview would like to thank Joseph Rosenfeld for taking the time to do this interview and share his knowledge and experience with our readers.
If you would like to get in touch with Joseph Rosenfeld or his company, you can do it through his – Linkedin Page
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