Organisations are made of unheroic work — those thousands of everyday actions and decisions that keep your particular engine turning. Hidden and often unexamined, it is the lion-share of what people do in their jobs.I call the gap between what you say is most important and how people do that...
You know the page. There might even be one in your organisation. At the top is purpose, and from there, the cascade continues…PurposeVisionMissionCore ValuesStrategic pillarsBrand promiseBrand valuesEssencePersonalityExperience principlesPositioningEtc. I frequently see organisations that have the entire shebang including some I haven’t even listed. It’s madness. No one can hold all of...
The book “Noise, A Flaw in Human Judgement” by Daniel Kahneman, Cass Sunstein and Oliver Sibony explores the information and choices that interfere with judgement when people make decisions.Reading it got me thinking about noise of a different kind.Brand noise.The interference comes from many quarters (and here I am adding...
Values are not there as a billboard for your goodness.Frankly, I don’t care what someone who doesn’t work for me, with me and buy from me thinks of them and nor should you.So, when I talk about good and bad values, it’s not with any moral judgement. Instead, it’s the...
Are you a trust given or a trust earned person?In my experience, everyone is one or the other, and like oil and water, the two don’t mix. When earners run into givers, things quickly become the trust edition of a Mexican stand-off.It’s one of the things I look for when...
Consequences always follow promises, and the nature of the outcome is determined by whether you keep or break them.At first glance, broken promises appear to exert a more significant impact. And indeed, the hurt caused deserves attention. Less examined are the gains from keeping them.It’s easy to overlook the rippling...
Anyone who has ever tried to change an organisation’s culture can attest to legacy’s sticky hold, where the pull of the past routinely stymies good intentions.How to break through the inertia is the question wrestled with by every organisation taking a deliberate approach to their culture.Culture is built one action...
These days, it feels like every damn thing I do is called a journeyI’m not buying a drill. I’m on a home improvement journey.I don’t need to make a different choice. I’m on a change journey.I’m not visiting my doctor. I’m on a wellness journey.I don’t deposit money into my...
Untethering a brand from day-to-day marketing activities can leave people feeling at sea about what remains. If it isn’t all the markers such as the logo, the campaign, the name, etc., what is it?Try thinking about brand as a warehouse for storing the value created by peoples and organisations day-to-day...
The term ‘unheroic work’ first landed in my language via a book by Jedediah Purdy1 about the commons of politics and community.The quote reads,“Yet a political achievement cannot be taken for granted. It is always either a continuing accomplishment or an eroding one. It requires the sustenance of unheroic work.”Despite...
