A reputation is mostly other people’s memory of your last few months. Your next few months get a vote.

Reputations are shorter than they feel. What people hold is a rough impression formed from recent behaviour, not a permanent file, and it updates whether you want it to or not. Which is uncomfortable if you have had a good run and reassuring if you have had a bad one. The last few months are already fading; the next few are still unwritten.

Pick the one thing people would currently say about you that you do not want said, and work on it in public for a month. Turn up on time, hand things in, follow through. Consistency over weeks is what changes the record.