You are achieving your brand today. Right now. Whatever you’re doing is contributing in some way. And right there is the power and the danger. Because too often people act absent of any basis for what they do. And without thinking about how the short term impacts the long term. In...
Every organisation starts with a person or people. And in the early days of existence, founders (aka people who do the starting) understandably provide an outsize impact on its doing and being. Hopefully for the better, and recently, all too often for the worse. So, when it’s for the worse, can...
In 2016 Colin Kaepernick, a football player with the NFL, used his profile as a quarterback to take a stand and protest police brutality against African-Americans and other minorities. Instead of standing during the National Anthem, he ‘took a knee‘. The gesture reverberated throughout the league with others joining his action...
My Linkedin comment said: “How to use purpose is hugely unexplored territory. As you note the warm fuzzy aspect is well-covered. Less well understood and discussed is the work of bringing purpose into the messy and unheroic day-to-day work of organisations. Without that work, purpose has little chance of becoming a...
People talk about customer loyalty in terms akin to the Holy Grail; something all businesses seek, but few genuinely manage to find. In general, I believe customers want to be loyal. Unless you have a strong masochistic streak, continually searching out new places and comparing value for things you want to...
A brand is a result of the promises you keep and you keep those promises through every action and decision across the organisation. So, the processes used to achieve your goals play an integral part in the achievement. People see a process as merely a means to an end, but I...
Once you’ve established the foundation of identity (purpose and values) you’re all good right? Wrong. Now the work begins. Every day something will come up to test how much you care about and believe your purpose and those values. There’s a daily battle for your brand going on inside your organisation. Even the...
Cruising through my LinkedIn feed last week, a post caught my eye asserting customers now have their own brands that need catering to. I shouldn’t be surprised. Everywhere I look ‘brand’ is tacked on to other words. I’ll just add customer brand to brand experience, brand values, brand purpose, brand...
Reading the May edition of Gourmet Traveller magazine provided an unexpected example of the discipline of putting your identity to work for a brand result people care about. It was an excerpt from the book Brae about the famed Victorian restaurant of chef Dan Hunter, who writes dos and don’ts for his kitchen. The list...
At every point in the recent United Airlines debacle, people were following policies. Policies that had no flexibility, treated people like cargo to be displaced and sent later, and made physically dragging a passenger off the plane seem like a reasonable response to him refusing to give up his seat. And while...