Are Core Values Uncovered or Assigned?

I often get asked by executives how we come up with the words when we start the Vision, Mission, and Core Values process. Or, as one executive asked, “Do you already have this stuff written down somewhere, and you’re just making us go through these exercises?”

The short answer is no; we don’t already have predetermined answers. We work hard to uncover and discover the values within each company.

There are two types of organizational drivers to consider when thinking of crafting core behavior language:

Start-Ups and Assigning Values

It would be a mistake to say you assign values to new companies. You don’t, really, because companies are started by people with prior experience. And that experience is a launching point for the future company’s core behaviors.

If we’re working with executives starting a company, we dig deep to understand their vision for the future and what kinds of people can help them reach their goals. Similar to working with existing companies, we ask founders to describe the best people they’ve worked with in the past. Many founders may have a tough time articulating pithy strategy and value statements, but most can give you an idea of the kinds of behaviors they think will help their company and brand stand out in the marketplace.

Those behaviors rarely sound like, “We’d like people with integrity, who are accountable, and who feel empowered to do smart things.” Why? Because everything I just mentioned is common sense and fairly obvious. Stating the obvious isn’t differentiating.

Many startups need to have a speedboat mentality. They need to be nimble, responsive, able to take action quickly, try new ideas, and adjust on the fly. And so their core behaviors should reflect those needs to help ensure they recruit the kinds of people who embrace that kind of culture.

As a new company grows, founders need to demonstrate the behaviors in how they operate and treat people each day; then, new employees can embrace the core behaviors as simply part of the operating system. The key here is demonstration. If it’s just leaders telling people how to behave, that’s worst case assigning (imposing) values … and it rarely goes well.

Uncovering Values in a Change Initiative

Vision, Mission, and Core Values are standard fare in many organizational change initiatives. A trick here is understanding what’s driving the company to change. Are you fixing a problem? Restructuring? Changing business strategy? Coming out of a merger or acquisition?

If we’re starting from a positive position, uncovering the positive values can be a simple experience. We unpack the behaviors of the best employees, compare those to the behaviors of the worst employees, factor in executive goals and company vision, and articulate the values already present in the company.

If we’re starting from a negative position, we first have to understand how broken the culture is. Some cultures need to be healed before the new language can be introduced. If negative behaviors have been the norm for a while, no amount of positive thinking and well-crafted attributes will stand a chance. So, we fix the culture while talking about the behaviors that would set the company up for success.

In this case, it can be helpful to get the employees involved in discussions of the kind of culture they want to be a part of, how they’d like people to act, and how they’d like to be treated. By engaging employees and not just executives, people at varying levels within the organization can play a role in the change initiative.

Then, when the new core behaviors are introduced to the company, they won’t feel like something assigned to everyone out of the blue. It’s worth saying again: if the company culture has been broken, it MUST be mended before new language can be introduced. Otherwise, management is asking for a rebellion.

Values aren’t something to be assigned or imposed—they emerge from the lived experiences, aspirations, and demonstrated behaviors within an organization. Whether working with a speedboat company needing values that enable rapid innovation, or an established tanker organization, the key is uncovering and articulating authentic behaviors that will drive success. This requires careful attention to context and alignment between stated values and demonstrated behaviors, between leadership actions and company culture, and between the organization’s past experiences and future aspirations. When this alignment is achieved thoughtfully and authentically, values become a powerful force for positive change.

Core Values or Core Behaviors. What's the difference?

Back in 1994, Jim Collins and Jerry Porras identified core values as fundamental beliefs and guiding principles that helped the best companies keep everyone on the same page. But did they really?

A 2020 MIT Sloan Review study found that more than 80% of large companies published their core values online. Other studies place the number of companies with stated core values as high as 92%. This simply says that companies embraced the concept of stated core values.

But employee satisfaction scores tell a story of broken cultures. A Fond study of HR execs found that "only 22% responded that 60% or more of their employees know their company’s core values." A Gallup poll found that "just 23% of U.S. employees strongly agree that they can apply their organization’s values to their work, and only 27% strongly agree that they “believe in” these values." And a Leadership IQ study showed that "only 20% of respondents say their company always hires people who fit well with their company values."

If people can’t articulate what the values are, how can they be expected to be influenced by those values?

If leaders don’t demonstrate the desired behavior, why would they expect employees to act any differently?

This is why I believe that one-word values don’t resonate with people. They’re empty words. No one needs another poster with an eagle soaring over a canyon with the word “Respect” in giant Times New Roman. I’m pretty certain that no one has ever walked down a hall thinking disrespectful thoughts, seen a poster, and then changed their way of thinking.

Random statements don’t help, either. One company I worked with had a core value of “Fly Your Freak Flag.” What they meant, I think, was for everyone in the company to be themselves, uniquely, and build a better culture through intellectual diversity. That’s not what they got. When they asked employees to write their “freak flag” on large cards that could be hung outside offices, one male leader wrote, “I like to pee sitting down.” Another wrote, “I can burp in three different languages.” Funny, but I’m sure HR couldn’t use any of that for cultural enrichment.

Here are some examples of companies that have gone beyond one-word core values to create more nuanced and actionable core behaviors:

Zappos:

• Deliver WOW Through Service

• Embrace and Drive Change

• Create Fun and A Little Weirdness

• Be Adventurous, Creative, and Open-Minded

• Pursue Growth and Learning

• Build Open and Honest Relationships With Communication

• Build a Positive Team and Family Spirit

• Do More With Less

• Be Passionate and Determined

• Be Humble

Google:

• Focus on the user and all else will follow

• It’s best to do one thing really, really well

• Fast is better than slow

• Democracy on the web works

• You don’t need to be at your desk to need an answer

• You can make money without doing evil

• There’s always more information out there

• The need for information crosses all borders

• You can be serious without a suit

• Great just isn’t good enough

Zillow:

• Customers Are Our North Star

• Turn On the Lights.

• Do the Right Thing.

• Own It.

• ZG Is a Team Sport.

• Include and Empower.

• Think Big, Move Fast.

• Deliver Quality on Time, Every Time.

Tesla:

• Do the impossible

• Constantly innovate

• Reason from “first principles”

• Think like owners

• We are all in

These examples stand out in their simplicity and ability to inspire while clarifying the kind of culture the company wants. Employees can understand what the company wants from them. Executives can model the behaviors. HR can recruit individuals who WANT to live these values.

If you’d like help discovering the core behaviors within your organization and crafting the language, let’s talk.

What’s wrong with your core values?

Thinkhaus Idea Factory works with companies each year to define their vision, mission, and core values. Almost immediately, someone steps forward with a list of one-word values they found after a quick Google search.

You've seen them: integrity, accountability, empowerment, inclusion, passion, teamwork, respect ... the list can go on for a while. What's wrong with these?

For starters, they're vague. How do you define when someone has made an integrity breach? You'd have no problem firing an employee who padded their expense report by $500. But would you fire another employee for taking a couple of company legal pads and pens home for their kids? Both are technically stealing from the company. If you'd fire one but not the other, "integrity" is on a sliding scale at your company.

One-word values can be ambiguous and interpreted differently by different people. When that happens, you get inconsistent applications across the organization.

They're also hard to represent in hiring and firing decisions. Would you hire someone who doesn't act with integrity? Of course not. Do you want your employees to feel empowered? Probably. But empowered to what degree?

Let me give you a quick example of why one-word values are challenging. Enron, one of the poster children for organizational dysfunction, unethical practices, and accounting fraud, had four simple core values: Communication; Respect; Integrity; and Excellence. You could argue that some people in the company used these as behavior guides. But leadership clearly didn't.

A method I was taught early in my career is still one of my favorites: working with leadership, unpack the behaviors of the best people in the company. You know, those you'd hire in bunches if they were available. What do they do that makes them stand out? How do they act? How do they treat clients and teammates? Conversely, do the same exercise on the behaviors of the worst employees. What gets them on the bottom of the list? Why?

When you go through this exercise, you rarely end up with single-word answers. Instead, you'll hear things like, "I can count on her to do the right thing even when no one else is around," or "He lifts others up around him so the team becomes stronger," or "She's action-oriented and gets things done."

All of these can be used to represent Core Behaviors that will help with recruiting and evaluations and will ultimately help the organization stand out among its competition.

What do you think? What's your favorite example of a core value statement? Which one stands out as the worst?

Are You Solving the Right Problem?

In the fast-paced world of business and brand management, it’s easy to feel trapped in a cycle of addressing symptoms rather than root causes. As leaders, it’s crucial to step back and ask: “What problem are we really solving?”

Are you creating a better band-aid or addressing why the wound occurred in the first place? Both approaches have merit, but understanding which one you’re pursuing is critical for strategic alignment. This dilemma isn’t new. In 1919, Edward Bullard invented the hard hat to prevent head injuries from falling objects. This addressed the root cause, revolutionizing workplace safety. In contrast, others were focused on the symptomatic solutions of creating better bandages and painkillers.

Sometimes, addressing symptoms can be lucrative. The pharmaceutical industry often focuses on creating faster-acting, more effective painkillers rather than tackling the underlying causes of pain. As a brand manager, you might develop the best meal-replacement shakes while another team addresses poor eating habits. You might create a better energy drink while another team focuses on the issues of sleep deprivation. While challenging, both strategies can coexist within the same company, targeting different aspects of the same overarching issue.

Here are some steps to consider on your innovation journey:

1. Start by clearly defining whether you’re addressing symptoms or root causes. This clarity will guide your innovation strategy and resource allocation.

2. Consider developing parallel approaches—one for immediate relief (symptom) and another for long-term solutions (cause).

3. Regularly engage with your audience to understand their underlying needs, not just their immediate wants.

4. Foster partnerships between teams focused on short-term solutions and those working on long-term innovations. This cross-functional collaboration can yield powerful insights and more comprehensive strategies.

5. Develop KPIs that reflect both immediate results and progress towards solving fundamental issues, ensuring you’re measuring impact holistically.

6. Finally, future-proof your approach by regularly reassessing your problem-solving strategy. Ensure it aligns with evolving market needs and technological advancements.

Remember, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. The key is to be intentional about your approach and ensure it aligns with your brand’s vision and values. By thoughtfully considering whether you’re putting out fires or preventing them, you’ll position your brand for sustainable success and meaningful impact. In doing so, you're not just solving problems—you’re creating a legacy of innovation that addresses both immediate needs and long-term challenges.

Do you suffer from the "better mousetrap" syndrome?

I've dealt with many brands through the years that had interesting ideas and products and yet couldn't imagine why people weren't beating down their doors to get to those amazing ideas.

It's pretty easy to get laser-focused on creating things. Thinkhaus Idea Factory does plenty of innovation and strategy workshops to help companies develop new ideas to take to market. In some ways, this is where better mousetraps are born. But those mousetraps need to be grounded in something more than personal preference.

Before launching your next big idea, your better mousetrap, ask yourself: Does your audience even realize they have a mouse problem?

Here's a simple way to approach the issue:
1. Start by gathering consumer insights to drive innovation. This doesn't have to be some exhaustive study. It can be some simple engagements where the team turns observations into actionable insights that the innovation team can leverage for better ideas. Consumers are lousy at telling you what product they need.

The average house is filled with products people love today but would have never asked for prior to invention. No consumer said they needed a microwave oven before they were introduced to microwave ovens. People didn't ask for refrigerators, televisions, dishwashers, or even lightbulbs, either. The insights around convenience are what led to the breakthrough ideas.

This is why I make the distinction between observations and insights. You could observe someone washing dishes by hand. That's a task getting done. The insights come from the dishwasher's frustration with the soap, sponge, scrub brush, volume of dishes, dirty water, and more. From those insights, you can create solutions that will have an audience.

2. Check out the marketplace in the areas you're considering. What are you going to be competing against? For blue ocean strategies, you're looking for holes you can fill where there are no competitors.

3. Ideate freely.

4. Engage with your target audience to validate your concept and make necessary refinements.

5. Refine, iterate, and keep checking.

6. Solve the mouse problem.

Need help with your better mousetrap? Let's talk.

Forget About Age. Just Stay Relevant. Why Companies and Careers Now Pivot on Continued Relevancy

The business world loves stereotypes, where old-line companies (we call them tankers) boast about their age, stability, and staying power while young startups (we call them speedboats) scream about their pace, out-of-the-box thinking, and innovation. Seasoned workers at tanker organizations get cast as rigid and resistant while their speedboat counterparts are hailed as adaptable and tech-savvy.

There is a need for both tanker and speedboat organizations. But let’s be clear here: the only thing you get with age is older. Age isn’t an indication of wisdom, sophistication, or savvy. Age alone does not determine ability to deliver.

Companies and employees of all vintages must constantly prove their relevance. Those who remain vitally engaged in evolving buyer needs, marketplace shifts, and emerging best practices can thrive across generations.

Why? As disruption accelerates, customer loyalty and industry standing mean less and less on their own. Brand trust must be re-won daily through execution—and expertise constantly recharged as new challenges arise.

In this environment, the question is not "how long has this company been around?" but rather "how are they innovating right now?"

The key is nurturing a culture and ethos of perpetual relevance across the enterprise.

For companies, this includes:

• Evaluating and optimizing their product/service mix based on real-time customer data, not legacy assumptions

• Maintaining an innovation pipeline to continually improve and pilot future offerings

• Tracking shifts in demographics, attitudes, and industry dynamics to get ahead of changes

• Breaking down outdated bureaucracy and silos slowing responsiveness

• Ensuring branding and messaging aligns with emerging buyer preferences

• Forging win-win partnerships with those driving disruption

• Empowering all levels to rapidly sense changes and solve problems

For individuals, it requires:

• Clearly understanding your differentiating value—where your strengths and passions intersect with critical problems to solve

• Proactively acquiring skills and knowledge that will retain relevance as the field evolves

• Expanding your network to gain new perspectives and potential collaborations

• Demonstrating adaptability and quick-study abilities that reduce the perceived risk of irrelevance

• Mastering new tools, processes, and systems before they go mainstream

• Establishing thought leadership by sharing forward-thinking insights

• Quantifying your impact through measurable contributions to goals

• Staying curious and engaged as the fresh face, not jaded or change-averse

In essence, continued relevance must be earned, not assumed—regardless of age or experience level. This holds true across disruptive startups and legacy giants, seasoned veterans and emerging talent.

The companies and careers that will thrive are those taking a relevance mindset into the future. One that embraces flexibility, innovation, and delivering enduring value as the only path to sustained success.

Use “Tell” Stories to Capture Your Brand’s History

There are plenty of storytelling models out there that break down the elements of how to tell a good story. Before getting into the weeds of the hero’s journey, antagonists, twists, issues overcome, etc.—which is where too many people and good brand stories go astray—it might help to consider two simple vectors that frame the types of stories being told: Tell and Make stories.

In this post, we will focus on Tell stories and cover Make stories in the next post.

Tell Stories

Tell stories are historical in nature because they address things that happened along the company’s journey to the present. They come in a variety of forms, often starting with a company or brand origin story and growing from there. Because they deal with the past, Tell stories are typically editorialized to get those unseemly rough spots out of the narrative. And they can be revisionist in the sense that history is often rewritten by those who come later, scrubbed of things we might find offensive, and enhanced to make them more exciting.

Something to keep in mind with marketing writing is that it is not generally held to the same standards that journalism once was. So, many narratives can seem more like historical fiction than a biographical telling of the events as they happened. For the most part, this is fine.

Origin Stories

All companies and brands have an origin story, whether they choose to leverage it or not, which is why they are so common. A classic example is Hewlett Packard getting its start in a Palo Alto garage in 1939. Or maybe you’re an Apple fan and can recite the details of how Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak created a new way to think about the personal computer.

Have a Cup of Pequod

The Starbucks logo has gone through a number of evolutions since its origin in 1971 to match the growth and personality of the brand.

Origin stories can be short and to the point or longer, epic tales. Most brands opt for brevity. Consider Starbucks. The Starbucks origin story includes the brand almost being named Pequod, the whaling ship in Moby Dick, until clearer heads prevailed and the name of the first mate in the Moby Dick tale (Starbuck) won the day. Howard Schultz joined the brand about 11 years after it was founded and was inspired to bring a little bit of Italy’s classic coffeehouse warmth to Seattle. With this new position in place, Starbucks grew to become a household name and coffee aficionado must-have all around the world.

It’s a nice, clean, simple story. As it should be. If you want all the sordid details of the naming struggles and times before Schultz joined, his trips overseas to find the perfect experience, Schultz starting his own Il Giornale brand before merging the two companies together to form what became the model of today’s Starbucks, etc., find a biography, curl up with a nice cup of coffee and read away.

Shoes for Good

The TOMS name is derived from Blake Mycoskie’s concept of Shoes for Tomorrow. Shorten Tomorrow, add an S, and you get TOMS. Tomorrow’s Shoes.

The TOMS brand was founded in 2006 by Blake Mycoskie, pioneering, as the company website says, “the One for One® model—giving away one pair of shoes for every pair sold, supporting larger health, education, and community development programs through strategic partnerships.” The first shoes were based on the Argentinian Alpargata designs. Consumers caught wind of the concept, embraced the idea and the shoes, and the TOMS brand was off and running.

We could go on with dozens of brands such as Tesla, Purple, Dollar Shave Club, Airbnb, Warby Parker, Netflix, GoPro, Yeti, and many more.

The importance of origin stories is that they provide a cultural foundation for the brand. They help ground the company on what happened in the early days and remind people of the inspiration, determination, and hard work that helped get the company started—even if the company changes course over time and produces things far outside of their origin.

One additional thought to point out here is that origin stories are often updated over the life of the brand. Some details that might have seemed relevant or important in one generation can fall out of fashion for the next generation. When that happens, the story gets tweaked and everybody keeps moving.

Key EventS

Key events are important aspects of every brand narrative. As you might expect, they capture the key moments that happened in the life of the brand. They can be good, great, bad, or catastrophic. They are almost never the forgettable chatter that makes up the noise of everyday life.

For clarity, when key events happen in real-time they are “Make” stories instead of “Tell” stories. We’ll talk more about that in the next post. Sometimes brands celebrate their moments when they happen. Sometimes the moments take a little while to come together well enough to get the story right.

Made for Dunking

According to Mondelez International, factories in 18 countries around the world produce 40 billion Oreo cookies every year. That’s enough to circle the earth five times.

For Mondelez International, maker of the Oreo cookie brand, a key event came during the 2013 Super Bowl game being played in New Orleans. For those who don’t remember the details, the Mercedes Benz Superdome, where the game was hosted, experienced a 34-minute power outage. Like many brands, the Oreo team was already prepared for social media interactions with fans during the game. But what do you do when the power goes out?

Oreo used Twitter and Instagram to remind fans, “you can still dunk in the dark.” While everyone else screamed about the inconvenience of the blackout, Oreo found its groove and its voice. Social media loved the play. They gained 8,000 Twitter followers that night and another 34,000 Instagram followers, with somewhere near 16,000 photos posted from fans.

Obviously, this was a huge Make story in the moment. As the days and weeks passed, more details were added, statistics updated, and sources cited. It’s in the passing of time that it became a Tell story.

Brand Trivia

More often than not, there is a wide range of interesting bits of information that find life in the narrative arc because the stories that get told at parties slip out and become part of the lore. This is the trivia that not only makes for great games, but also keeps the brand story alive in the culture.

What Motivates You?

Nike’s logo and the story behind it are well-known in branding lore. The story behind the equally iconic tagline is less well known but just as interesting.

Sometimes it’s hard to know which version of the story is true. For example, the official version of how Nike’s iconic Just Do It tagline came to be has been shared by Dan Wieden who wrote the line and was a co-founder of Wieden and Kennedy, the agency behind the work. In a Creative Review article, Wieden says “In reviewing the work the night before the client presentation, I felt we needed a tagline to give some unity to the work, one that spoke to the hardest hardcore athletes as well as those talking up a morning walk.” The article goes on to say, “Wieden drew on a surprising source for inspiration. In Doug Pray’s 2009 documentary about advertising, Art & Copy, he confesses that the idea for the line was sparked by the last words of convicted murderer Gary Gilmore, who said “Let’s do it!” to the firing squad before his execution.”

It’s an amazing tale with a deep and inspiring source. But there are other versions of the story as well.

In a presentation in the mid-1990s, art director David Jenkins, who was the other half of the creative team working on that night before the client presentation shared the story from a different view. As he told the story, he and Wieden were frustrated by their inability to nail the last details of the campaign they’d be showing the next morning, including the tagline both agreed they needed. Well into the long night, they took a break, visited the bar next door for a drink, some food, and a chance to clear their minds, and got back to the work with Jenkins on the layouts and Wieden on the tagline. After a short while an irritated Wieden showed up with an idea. “What if we say something like ‘Just get off your a** and do it?’” he supposedly asked partly in frustration and partly in jest. Jenkins replied with something along the lines of, “I don’t think that will fly.” Wieden walked off grumbling under his breath that he agreed. A short while later Wieden returned with a piece of paper with three words written on it. He held it up and asked, “What if it’s ‘Just Do It’?” Jenkins said they both smiled and knew they had something good. How good was to be determined later.

Which version do you believe? Does it matter? One version gets cleaned up and goes into the history books, creative journals, and company websites. The other gets shared amongst friends. That’s what happens with Tell stories. They get told to others, the edges get polished, and the versions that seem to be best received go into the archives for future generations.

Connecting WITH the Past

Something that gets overlooked in brand storytelling is the ability to use Tell stories to connect the dots in the brand’s past, make sense of some random events, and rationalize or explain away behaviors.

More Than Just Bubble Wrap

Sealed Air Corporation gets its name from the company’s original product: Bubble Wrap. The name is a literal interpretation of air sealed in plastic. The company is now a global leader in packaging and food protection.

While working with Sealed Air Corporation in the mid-2000s for a major corporate rebrand and turnaround, the newly appointed CEO was challenged with finding the language to help Wall Street understand why a traditional packaging company with a division focused on food protection would purchase a large industrial cleaning chemical company. The acquisition had been made by the previous CEO, doubled the size of the company and the debt, and investors were hammering the company because of it. Our team dug into the archives and found a line from Sealed Air’s 1973 Annual Report (well before the acquisition in question) that said, “selection of packaging products which are more efficient are a positive step toward meeting all three sides of a crucial triangle: Energy, Environment, and Economy.” Three sides of a crucial triangle matched the three companies and the direction the new CEO was trying to go and gave us a hook we could use to tie the story together. It had been there all along but nobody knew it was there.

It became a classic Tell story and was very effective in helping investors see that though the company had lost its way for a while, it was back on course and on a trajectory to change the game. The company made significant changes, investors bought in, and the stock price tripled in value in just over 15 months.

Connecting with the present

As we’ve discussed, Tell stories are great for covering the start of the company, significant events, capturing bits of trivia and insider information, and helping rationalize things that happened in the past and are only now coming into clarity. Most companies are bad at capturing the events as they happen, which is why Tell stories are often written and revised by the people who come afterward. It’s a natural flow. The important part is to capture the stories. Keep them alive. They are critical to each brand and company and should be woven into the fabric of the culture.

In our next post, we will break down Make stories and why it’s so important to make something of the catalyst moments as they happen.

What about you? Have any great Tell stories to share?

If you would like some help in telling your brand stories, let’s talk.

Understanding the Narrative Chain for Brand Storytelling

If you’ve been watching the Bud Light conversation in recent weeks you’ve gotten a master’s class example of how brand storytelling isn’t always under the control of the brand. At least in the ways people like to believe it is. Social media has only accelerated the public’s ability to derail the grand schemes of brand managers all over the world.

There are lots of ways to talk about storytelling and the principles of what makes a good story: protagonist, antagonist, hero, tragedy or issue to overcome, twist, outcome, etc. Those are all extremely valuable and it’s good to understand what it takes to create an epic story. But far too many brand storytelling models put the brand squarely at the helm. As we’ve seen lately, it’s not that simple.

Brand storytelling doesn’t follow a linear path. It never has. A linear model doesn’t allow for the chaos that comes with dealing with real, living, breathing humans and constantly changing markets. It certainly doesn’t take social media into consideration.

The Brand Narrative Arc Isn’t Linear

Brand storytelling doesn’t follow a linear model. Because all of the variables are not controlled by the brand.

If you’re not careful, you could fall into the trap with some narrative arc models that, though they account for some issues with the brand, often do so with the issues in the rearview. As if the challenges the brand has faced in the past will somehow predict what the brand will face in the future.

Instead, look at brand storytelling as a narrative chain made up of many stories in “S” curves.

The Opening Stage

At the beginning of every brand story, the brand is in complete control. This is the story the brand intends to bring to the market and use to attract audiences. It’s the new baby ready to be presented to the world.

The Narrative Phase Begins

At the beginning of every brand narrative, the brand is in complete control. This is the story the brand intends to bring to the market to attract audiences.

The Swell Stage

Next, the brand enters into the Swell stage or stages. Sometimes these are guided by the brand. Think of Dove’s Real Beauty campaign. The brand chose to go against the tropes of the beauty category and celebrate real women in all shapes, sizes, colors, and personalities. The campaign was embraced by consumers, the press, investors, and has allowed Dove to enjoy a steady wave of positive press and sales.

The Swell

During the Swell, the narrative builds whether by design or reaction.

What Bud Light is experiencing is the other side of the Swell, when the brand loses control of the narrative by contrasting forces. This isn’t unique to AB InBev.

For those old enough to remember, and for those who want to know the story, J&J and Tylenol went through a horrendously negative Swell event in the 1980s.

A brief recap of the events: In 1982 Chicago, people started dying of cyanide poisoning. Random people with no connection with each other. Except that officials quickly discovered someone was lacing Tylenol with cyanide. It induced panic in the community to the degree that police and rescue vehicles were driving through neighborhoods announcing to people to get rid of their Tylenol. 

In all, seven people died. J&J had a crisis on their hands and decided to just pull all Tylenol products from shelves. ALL of it, since they didn’t want anyone else to die, and no one could be sure what products were affected.

That someone would put poison in a consumer product was well beyond anything J&J could have predicted. It was out of the brand’s control. What came next was where the brilliance happened.

J&J went to work and took control of a shocking event and a little while later reintroduced the world to Tylenol. But to make sure people knew this edition of Tylenol was significantly better and safer, they launched new innovations including sealed boxes, tamper-proof bottles with a shrink-wrapped outer barrier, and a foil seal glued to the top of the bottle. All of these are commonplace today but were huge innovations at the time. They were great examples of a brand guiding the story through the downside of a Swell event.

J&J’s response ended the Swell stage for this event. It didn’t end the overarching narrative, and that’s the important part of how to think of the narrative chain. Brands don’t have control over everything that happens in the Swell, but they do have a responsibility to manage it. J&J chose to pull all products and rethink their approach. Yes, it took a while, but they also took control of the situation.

Some stories, like Dove’s Real Beauty, catch the right cultural wave and enjoy a long, healthy, positive ride. Their Swell has been stretched for years, with most of those years under the control of the brand.

For other brands, the misery is self-inflicted which makes it harder to overcome. Examples include Volkswagen’s rigged emissions testing scandal and Samsung’s exploding Galaxy 7 batteries, but there are dozens of others we could talk about.

At some point the story changes. When that happens, we conclude that narrative story phase and start a new one.

Closing the Swell

The Swell stage may go quickly or last for years. When the story changes, that marks the conclusion of that narrative phase.

Writing the Next Chapter

Thankfully, every brand gets chances to start a new story. Depending on the circumstances, it may start off with “we screwed up, we apologize, and we’ve changed.” In the case of Tylenol, J&J effectively said, “we didn’t start this and could have never seen it coming, but we are changing to try to ensure this can never happen again.”

If the brand fails badly enough, the narrative may shift to the new owners who see the value in the brand and have a chance to tell audiences “the previous owners stumbled and we’re fixing those issues.”

The True NarraTive Chain

The total brand narrative isn’t one, long, continuous story. It is made up of dozens and sometimes hundreds of stories.

Linking the stories

Over time, brands link a wide range of stories, some very positive and others not so much. It’s the natural result of ongoing brand building. And it’s a reminder of why shepherding brands is so important at the executive level. It doesn’t take much these days to turn your once-loyal audiences against you and find yourself rebuilding your brand. In the end you worry about what you can control and adjust to things you can’t.

If you would like help building your brand story, let’s talk.

Healthy Arguments Can Lead to Healthy Companies

How good is your organization at having healthy arguments? If you're like most companies, the answer is probably not that great. And that's probably a bad thing.

I've worked with dozens of leadership teams to define their company purpose, vision, mission, organizational strategies, and more. And almost all of them were bad at having healthy arguments. Much more common was bullying behavior and passive-aggressive stabs at the other executives, especially after key meetings instead of during them.

I believe healthy arguments start with a healthy executive culture, where executives feel free to express their honest opinions without punishment. Wait. Shouldn't executives already feel free to express their ideas? Yes. But too many company cultures allow executive cliques, or a CEO plays favorites and has "untouchables" who can do no wrong even as they torch the business.

In a healthy executive culture, executives have the freedom to express their ideas and are encouraged to challenge norms. They must have protection from the cliquish trolls. They must be encouraged, to a person, to bring something new to the table and argue for and against the merits of the ideas.

It takes time and patience, and it takes courage from the C-suite. But building a culture where healthy arguments can take place can positively change the trajectory of any company.

If you need help with organizational health and strategy, let's talk.

Want more resources? Check out this MIT Sloan article

8 Lessons I Learned Waiting Tables That Apply to All Business

I think everyone should work in some form of hospitality at least once in their lives to get a taste of dealing with people in a service environment. For me, the chance came when our first child was born and we needed extra money to pay off medical bills. Waiting tables became the most viable option as a second job because the shifts started after I got off from my day job and still allowed me to pick up enough hours to earn real money.

At the time, I thought waiting tables was merely a means to an end. But as the years have passed, I have found that the lessons I learned have helped me navigate all kinds of relationships and business engagements.

Eight Timeless Lessons:

1. Greet your guests quickly and sincerely. I was taught to acknowledge guests in person and at their table within the first 45 seconds of them entering the restaurant. There are three parts to this: quickly; in-person and; where they are. We all want to be acknowledged and for others to recognize who we are. We don’t want to be yelled at from across the room, and we don’t want to be generally passed over. This applies to any engagement with people, personal or professional.

2. Get on the level of your audience. The chain I worked for taught us to kneel or crouch by the tables so we were at eye level with our customers, not towering above them and looking down. This seems like a mindless point, but it has stood out to me over time. When talking to children, get on your knees so they see you eye to eye. If wearing sunglasses and talking with someone, take them off so they see your eyes. Make the other person comfortable and make it easy for them to communicate with you.

3. Get the big things right, but pay attention to the little things. When you place your order at a restaurant, you have every right to expect your order to be correct and delivered in a timely fashion. That’s the big thing. But your experience at the restaurant is made up of dozens of small details that can make or break your time there, from getting drinks right and refilled without you asking, to silverware, napkins, condiments, bread, chips and salsa … all coming and going in a seamless choreography. Business is this way, too. Customers expect the big things to get done. But it’s the hundreds of small details and levels of service that make the experience worth repeating.

4. Your attitude makes a difference. Ever had a waiter show up to your table with a bad attitude and act like it was somehow your fault they were working that shift? It happens in business, too. When waiting tables you get immediate feedback about whether you did well or not in the form of tips (not always true, but let’s stay positive here). You learn very quickly that a positive attitude can influence your performance and thereby impact how much money you make in a shift. In business, people bring their bad attitudes to work with them and drag down their teammates, their clients, and their companies. The feedback loop is longer, so it may take a while to see the damage, but the damage will show itself eventually.

5. Consolidate and look out for others. In food service, this means leaving the kitchen with full hands taking things out to your table or helping a teammate, and coming back in with full hands as you grab dirty items off tables you pass by so the restaurant can turn the tables faster. In a well-run restaurant, the tables turn very fast because everyone is working together. In business, the best teams move seamlessly and have ideas going to the customer while bringing new challenges back from each visit. They are problem solvers always searching for ways to surprise and delight others. When business groups act as individuals and not as a team, the company is sluggish, inefficient, and likely to struggle with the details.

6. Suggestive sell with an eye on delighting your customers. When you have a great waiter, you are guided through your dining experience with timely suggestions, hints, and tastes of options you might like—and you likely have no idea you’re on a journey. That’s what great service is like across most platforms. The sales coach, Zig Ziglar, said “people love to buy, they just hate to be sold”. When done well, the user experience is so delightful that customers want to return for more.

7. Deal with issues quickly and directly. Ever had your order show up undercooked or overdone and then either have to search for your waiter or listen to him or her ramble on about how someone in the back was having a bad day and just couldn’t get it right tonight? It’s infuriating. Business is like that, too. When things are off or poorly delivered it’s best to address them quickly, acknowledge the miss, and map out the solution asap. No extra words or additional promises. Just fix the original issue and keep moving. But make sure you don’t screw up things again with that customer because you already burned through your grace period.

8. Worry about what you can control and not about what you can’t. This lesson shows up across a lot of platforms for me. In hospitality it was the reminder that sometimes you can do everything right and things can still go wrong, the kitchen could burn the food, someone could spill a drink on your customers, your customers could have a fight with each other and scream at the staff or run from the building. All of those things are beyond your control. Business is a lot like that, too. You can do everything right and still have things end badly. It happens. Take a deep breath, shake off the dust, and move on. Your other customers still deserve your best.

Every job, every role, every company has lessons to teach if you’re willing to learn. These are my top lessons from food service. I’d love to hear about other experiences that have stuck with you.

Feel free to add them in the comments section below.

How a Backyard Treehouse Can Teach Us to be Better Leaders

Remember when you were eight years old and wanted a treehouse in your backyard more than anything in the world? You pleaded with your dad, your mom, your grandfather, your uncle, and anyone who would listen. You had seen one at a friend's house, or on the television, and a ‘fort’ was the answer to all of your dreams.

Now if you grew up in a solidly middle-class or lower family, you knew there was no custom-built treehouse in the budget. If, after much pleading and all the sales acumen a preteen could offer, you got approval for said treehouse, you got to work. You would start scrounging the neighborhood for scrap 2X4s, milk crates, old plywood, anything that could be used to build your dream. You promised that you would do a myriad of chores to make as much money as possible: clean your room, feed and walk the dog, take out the neighbor’s trash each week, leave your sister alone, not fight with your little brother … whatever it would take.

When the day finally arrived for the building to start, you were there for every nail, helped with every measurement, sometimes even twice, and tried to cut every board. You and your father/grandfather/mother/uncle spent countless hours, countless weekends making sure your treehouse was just the way you wanted. It might not have been the best treehouse ever built, but it was yours and you helped build it.

As you played with friends in your treehouse over the next few weeks, fighting mock battles, sleeping below the stars, or just enjoying the wind blowing and the tree swaying back and forth, you first understood what it meant to make a dream come to life. 

The lessons you learned in the building of that treehouse apply to your business life.

1. Dream big. Jim Collins called it the BHAG, or Big Hairy Audacious Goal. Treehouses are big dreams. Kids can dream big. Get back in touch with that ability.

2. Do your research. Find out what else is out there that you can model. Once you knew you were getting a treehouse you looked at every treehouse-related concept you could find and made notes on what you liked about some, and what didn’t work about others. You learned early on what you could live with and without.

3. Plot your plan of action. As with the building of the treehouse, this is about bringing your dream to life. What supplies do you need? Who do you need to help you make it happen? What are your biggest barriers and how can you overcome them?

4. Choose your team. No one wants to be in a treehouse by themselves. It takes a crew to make a treehouse come to life, hoist the baskets of snacks, defend against intruders, and keep watch over the area. Your treehouse crew was made up of friends you could trust. They watched out for you, you watched out for them, and everyone was better off for it. You need the same in business: people you can trust and who share your passion for achieving and living your dream.

5. Build and adjust along the way. When you were a kid building a treehouse you built the best you could at the time. You didn’t build the perfect treehouse. That would have taken too long and cost money you didn’t have. You built and adjusted as you learned what worked for you. The same holds true in business. Don’t let perfection get in your way. Build and adjust.

6. Celebrate the lessons and successes. Treehouses are easy to enjoy. Sometimes we forget that business can be enjoyable as well. Once you’re done, even if just done with a stage, celebrate the progress, invite others to the party, and keep the positive energy going.

As kids, we’re hardwired to use our imaginations and chase dreams that seem too big. Somewhere along the way many of us learn to tamper our creativity and keep our ideas to ourselves. Maybe it’s time for you to get back in touch with that kid with the imagination and the willingness to fight to make the dream a reality. Chances are you’ll be a better leader, a better teammate, and have things you’re proud to share as a result. 

How is your treehouse these days? Let’s start a conversation.

7 Ways Resourceful Companies Navigate Turbulence

In turbulent times, companies must discover what kind of adjustments are right for them to stay relevant. It can seem overwhelming. But there are a few ways to think about resourcefulness to help companies of any size manage through stressful environments.

In our Dandelion Strategy model, resourcefulness is key. Dandelions send down a taproot first and go deep so the plant can hang out all winter and wait for the perfect time to emerge. This foundation gives them some stability for the battle ahead. By the time you see what's going on the dandelion is way ahead of you. The dandelion has a plan for survival—but it also looks out for the surrounding ecosystem. They bring up nutrients that help surrounding plants. They loosen and aerate the soil in some places and hold on to it in others to fight erosion. They even fertilize the ground around them ... and people rave about the iron and Vitamins A, C and K, Folate, Calcium, and Potassium dandelions add to salads.

How would you rate your brand on resourcefulness? How do you take advantage of the opportunities around you? How are you using what you learn?

Dial up your resourcefulness with these seven steps:

1. Embrace the chaos. Business and life are rarely linear. When you plan for the chaos and build teams that can adjust on the run, challenges are just puzzles to be solved. And you can hire good puzzle solvers.

   Computer programmers and mathematicians use chaos theory, instead. This says that instead of keeping to a predictable pattern, we’d be better off—and find solutions faster—by moving in non-linear ways. The author and economist Tim Harford put it this way: “When everything is perfect, when everything is tidy, we're on autopilot. And we're not necessarily living in the moment, we're not necessarily paying attention. And that's a problem for us.” Embrace the chaos, live in the moment, and thrive in the turbulence.

2. Listen to the people on the front lines. That’s where people are making real-time adjustments to the market and customer and supply chain issues to keep things rolling.

   Plenty of companies put up posters or engage in employer branding campaigns to motivate staff or remind employees that their ideas matter. Those can be effective. They can also be vacuous and empty. What we’re talking about here is really listening to the people who see and hear the needs, frustrations, wishes every day. I’m always surprised at how many amazing—and amazingly simple—solutions come out of conversations with the teams on the ground. Management can’t see it all and should never think it is their job to solve every issue. Get on the ground, listen, and act on the information provided.

3. Expand your market. You may need to change your game a bit. Some say if your organization is not evolving, it is dying! How are you evolving to meet new, emerging demands?

   Uber launched UberEats in 2016 in mostly large markets. By 2018 they were expanding into smaller markets and competing with challengers like DoorDash and GrubHub. Adoption wasn’t hitting the numbers everyone wanted in part because consumers saw food delivery as a solution to a problem they didn’t have, and restaurant owners saw the costs as too high. Then the pandemic happened and restaurants were effectively shut down. This put UberEats, DoorDash, GrubHub, and the rest of the delivery industry in the spotlight as viable and necessary solutions to both consumer demand and restaurants staying in business. To put this expansion into perspective, consider that Uber made $10.4 billion in 2019 from its legacy business, but only $7.3 billion in 2021. Over that same time, Uber Eats grew from $1.9 billion to $8 billion in revenue.

4. Consider new ways to deliver your product or service. If customers can’t get to you, how do you get to them? How can you meet them halfway? If you can’t stock what you had before, how can you still deliver delight and surprise for your customers?

   For example, there are all kinds of rumblings about looming toy shortages this Christmas. That’s going to be a problem but it’s not top of mind yet. It will be. If Christmas is part of your game, how could you change the game and be the hero?

5. Partner with other businesses. Dandelions don’t just look out for themselves. And neither should you. Who else could help you thrive? How could you help them? How could you link arms with companies offering adjacent services so your combined services solve even more challenges for your customers?

   During a past recession I worked with a company that specialized in community waste services dominated by mom and pop operations. We found their customers couldn’t afford to take a week off to attend elaborate trade shows in Vegas. We interviewed a number of these business owners and found they wanted the information and exposure to new ideas, but all of that had to be more convenient for them. Our solution was to partner with adjacent companies and conduct regional shows so customers could drive over—not fly—get the information they needed and get back home the same day. It solved a number of issues for the manufacturers and their customers.

6. Stay connected with your customers. What’s your feedback loop? Who’s keeping their finger on the pulse? Make sure the person or people you put in charge of monitoring customer feedback are in the right seat. Look for someone who thrives on collecting information (good and bad), mining for insights that can make a difference, and then turning those insights into actionable data.

   I once worked with a start-up company that had a senior leader in charge of monitoring customer response. According to reports inside the company, customers were in great shape and loved everything about the brand. By contrast, a little social listening indicated the company was far behind on deliveries, didn’t return phone calls, and was quickly building a reputation for bait and switch. It turned out that the executive was only responding to good news from customers. He was ignoring the complaints. And those complaints were piling up. The company had to put another exec in place fast to save and rebuild the company’s reputation.

7. Celebrate the lessons. I encourage you to build a learning culture, not just a good news culture. In good news cultures, executives make it clear that all they want to hear is what worked, the good news. Bad news is punished as are the people responsible for it. As a result, people learn to avoid risk because taking chances means you might fail. And failure of any type could get you fired. That’s never the case in resourceful and innovative companies. They stretch, they stumble, they bump into things. Take 3M, for example. Scotch tape and Post-it Notes are just two of the many products that came to life because 3M empowered their people to tinker outside of their box. Scotch added adhesive to cellulose strips for an auto body paint masking solution while Post-it repurposed a light adhesive that didn’t have a reason to exist into a tool used all over the world.

   Resourceful companies do exactly that. Like 3M, they give people permission to try new things and stray from their normal course of work. Sure, some of those things won’t work, some will underperform, and some might take off into outer orbit.

   That’s why it’s important to celebrate the lessons learned and share the highs and lows as a group. Google’s former Head of People Operations Laszlo Bock stated in his book, Work Rules!, “it’s also important to reward failure” so as to encourage risk-taking. Scott Cook, co-founder of Intuit, said, “At Intuit, we celebrate failure. Literally: Intuit has a Greatest Failure Award. Because every failure teaches something important that can be the seed for the next great idea.”

   Resourcefulness requires being able to imagine solutions that don’t exist yet. That kind of thinking happens best when people feel safe from prosecution within the company. Build a culture that enables courageous thinking and exploration. Celebrate what you learn and grow from them.

What ways have you found to be resourceful in these turbulent times? Let us know by commenting below.

Foundations are Critical for Resilient Companies

Dandelions put out a taproot from the very beginning to give themselves every advantage possible in journey ahead—because they don’t know if that journey will be easy or tough.

Unfortunately, too many companies don’t operate with the basic principles of dandelions and as a result, start with weak foundations, don’t plan for adversity ahead, and falter when the economic winds change. If we’ve learned anything from history it should be that change is inevitable. It can be sudden and unpredictable or like a slow-moving glacier.

What are you doing to give yourself a shot at success even against all odds?

Establishing Your Organizational Foundations

At Thinkhaus, we work with companies to build strong foundations. Depending on where you are as a company, this may be defining your purpose, vision, mission, values. You might use all of these or only a couple. These are your taproots.

Some companies never bothered to write these down, or maybe they did but the language was off. Some companies discovered that somewhere in the pandemic their foundations shook loose and didn’t hold up that well. One of my personal favorites here was created by the brilliant writers for the show The Office and their fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. Their Mission Statement reads:

“Dunder Mifflin Incorporated provides its customers quality office and information technology products, furniture, printing values, and the expertise required for making informed buying decisions. We provide our products and services with a dedication to the highest degree of integrity and quality of customer satisfaction, developing long-term professional relationships with employees that develop pride, creating a stable working environment and company spirit.”

The statement is purposefully packed with corporate babble that is neither clear nor differentiating. It worked great for a comedy show, but you can find similar statements in organizations across the globe.

Generalizing foundational language can also lead to shaky cultures. For example, all those companies that promised their employees that they worked like a family had some soul searching to do when things got tough and they laid off half the “family”. Because that’s not really what we do to family. We don’t push our kids out the door when things get tough. We tighten our belts a little, maybe cut back on extracurricular activities, take fewer trips, etc. But the family stays the family.

It's one thing to say you want a culture that treats people equitably and does everything possible to maintain a collegial environment, but a little clarity goes a long way, especially in difficult discussions and markets.

In mid-2022, Netflix sent out a memo to their staff saying they are not like a family. They are like a high-performance team. And they evaluate based on performance, move people in and out as needed, and optimize to keep the machine performing.

“The thing we most value is working with talented people in highly creative and productive ways,” the statement read. “That’s why our core philosophy is people over process, and why we try to bring great people together as a dream team. Of course, any growing business requires some process and structure. But with our people-first approach, we can be more flexible, creative, and successful in everything we do.”

Further, Netflix went on to say, “As employees, we support the principle that Netflix offers a diversity of stories, even if we find some titles counter to our own personal values. Depending on your role, you may need to work on titles you perceive to be harmful. If you’d find it hard to support our content breadth, Netflix may not be the best place for you.”

It’s a much more honest approach: You matter to us. You bring a lot to the table. But don’t forget what we all agreed to build together when we joined.

You don’t have to agree with Netflix. And that’s exactly the point. If their foundations aren’t right for you, choose another place to work that matches who you are.

Is it time for you to take another look at what your company stands for?

Clarifying Brand Foundations

Maybe for you it’s at the brand level. In brand strategy, we use the equity pyramid as a framework to clarify the elements of the brand. The model itself isn’t that important. I want to focus on the bottom two sections for a minute: Points of Parity and Points of Difference. Points of Parity are those things you need to do to be seen as credible in your category but aren’t all that unique. Points of Difference are things that only you do and a fast follower would have a tough time matching within six months.

Something we run into all the time is companies that are shouting their Points of Parity and wondering why people don’t understand what makes them unique. Dandelions do NOT do this. The dandelion doesn’t worry whether they’re like everyone else. They are not. They know their purpose and what makes them unique, what separates them from the competition, and they go on to proudly do their own unique thing.

Why Worry About Foundations?

If you were to construct a building and didn’t quite finish the foundation before putting up the walls, you would expect things to get shaky when it came time to build the second floor. It makes logical sense when talking about a physical space. But companies launch on shaky business principles every day and wonder why they can’t hold on when times get tough.

Establishing a dandelion strategy and getting the foundations right from the start won’t keep recessions, pandemics, or competitors away. But they will help you be best prepared to weather the storms when they happen.

Tell us your thoughts on building strong foundations.

Brand Storytelling: The art of conversation

They say great conversationalists are first really great listeners.

The communications master Dale Carnegie put it this way: “If you aspire to be a good conversationalist, be an attentive listener. To be interesting, be interested. Ask questions that other persons will enjoy answering. Encourage them to talk about themselves and their accomplishments. Remember that the people you are talking to are a hundred times more interested in themselves and their wants and problems than they are in you and your problems.”

Keep in mind that Mr. Carnegie wrote these words in the mid-1930s. This is not new material. The not-so-subtle jab at the general populace is this: we love to talk about ourselves. We love to talk about what we’ve done, who we’ve seen, the hurdles we’ve crossed and triumphs we’ve realized. If we’re not careful, we can talk about how amazing we are and leave our guest completely out of the discussion.

Brands do this all the time. Agencies do this all the time. All this chest thumping and self promoting leaves consumers and customers on the outside looking in … if they even stay around long enough to keep looking.

So how can brands master the art of conversation in their storytelling?

Stop talking about you

As a young copywriter I was taught to talk about the benefits of each product feature because the benefit is what the consumer/customer is actually looking for. It’s the solution provided by the feature.

But many companies want to talk about their accomplishments, size, scale, equipment … features. This is a TELL approach, as in, “let me tell you about me.” It almost makes sense. After months and years of product and brand development, people want to get credit for their hard work. The problem is that no one wants to listen to you talk about you.

Start listening to them

I have a friend named Karen who is amazing at this. Karen is the kind of person who circles a room meeting people and comes back within a few minutes knowing personal details on every single person. People open up to her and share their inner thoughts, goals, and challenges as if she’s the therapist they never knew they needed. It’s magical to see in person.

So what’s her secret? Karen asks great questions and doesn’t interject her own stories while other people are talking. People open up to her because she is genuinely interested in them. If the other person doesn’t ask about Karen, she’s fine to leave those details out.

Obviously brands can’t work a room in their daily communication. But they can spend a lot more time listening to the wants and needs of their customers. Those wants and needs often show up as frustrations.

In an earlier post I talked about Command™ Brand hanging solutions. The brand had tried for years to talk about the superiority of their technology over other options but consumers didn’t care. It was the better mousetrap no one wanted. But in research consumers talked about their frustrations with punching holes in walls and having to repair them, about not being able to move things around, about wanting to hang some things for the holidays and take them down later without making it a big deal. Those frustrations opened up new opportunities for the brand. By repositioning the brand as “Damage-Free Hanging Solutions” that can let you change the position of your hanging as quickly and easily as you change your mind, the Command™ Brand found audiences who couldn’t live without the brand.

Be nice. Be real.

You might think that being nice should be a given in brand storytelling, but it’s not. Brands should choose their tone of voice and brand personality with purpose, teach the fundamentals to everyone who interacts with customers, and reinforce the principles on a regular basis.

When helping organizations launch or rebrand, we spend a healthy amount of time on brand personality and how that will come to life in the marketplace. That may include call center scripts, ad copy guidelines, online content guidelines, etc. Everyone on the brand team must be clear how the brand communicates and what tone of voice is supported. Wendy’s might be able to get away with snarky tweets, but your brand might not. And you should know before you damage the brand.

Let them be the hero

Dale Carnegie said people “are a hundred times more interested in themselves and their wants and problems than they are in you and your problems.” Essentially, we’re all fascinated by ourselves. Think you’re different? Find a group photo you’re in and see who you look for first. Yup. You look for you first. We all do. Then we look at our friends and enemies (hoping they look horrible in the shot), and filter out everyone else as visual noise.

In the brand storytelling world, we must let the customer be the hero. The brand’s position is to help solve their issues and take their pain away. That means helping them be better cooks, better at lawn management, better at home repair, cleaning, office work, workouts, weight management, and many more.

Brands exist to help make the world a better place. They do that by enabling and empowering their customers to take on new challenges and be amazing in their efforts. That means the customer is the hero.

No, really, it’s all about them

We’re only focusing on four steps to brand conversations here because it shouldn’t be that complicated:

1. Stop talking about you

2. Start listening to them

3. Be nice. Be real.

4. Let them be the hero

There are times when brands need to cover details about themselves, but more often than not, the focus should be on the customers and how the brand can help solve their challenges.

If you’re in the market for storytelling help, let’s chat to see how we can support you.

Brand Storytelling: When in doubt, be Q

One of the most common mistakes in brand storytelling is making the brand the hero. It’s an easy mistake to make. Companies work hard on their brands and products, dig to understand what differentiates the brand from its competitors, how it connects with target consumers, etc. After all that work, one naturally wants the brand to get all the credit.

But that would be a mistake.

No, most consumers/customers don’t think of themselves as James Bond. They see themselves living life and facing a wide range of challenges that get in the way of their ultimate goals. When I say wide range, I mean it stretches from cleaning floors and bathrooms, to shaving and grooming, to financial products, to medical devices. People aren’t looking for a brand or product to come in and take over. They are looking for help solving their challenges so they can go on with their lives. This means that the brand needs to act less like James Bond and more like his problem-solving counterpart, Q.

Let’s look at a couple examples:

1.    Cleaning products: Many consumers know Mr. Clean for his handsome good looks, confident smile, and cleaning strength. It would be easy to position Mr. Clean as the guy who comes to the rescue and does all the hard work, but that’s not how consumers see it. When it comes to removing rings around the bathtub, it isn’t Mr. Clean who rolls up his sleeves and scrubs away. That’s mom’s (and dad’s) job. Mr. Clean has permission to be the guy who helps make her job easier by giving her the best solution to cut through grime. He is Q to her James Bond.

2.    Hanging solutions: 3M’s Command brand is an incredibly convenient way to hang just about anything around the house. The adhesive strips apply easily and remove just as quickly once you’re done. This is a classic Q solution. The frustration consumers faced before Command strips showed up was having to punch a hole in the wall to hang something, which required tools, the willingness to damage a wall, and the need to patch a hole if you missed the first time or changed your mind. James Bond in this case was trying to make her space more functional and beautiful but was frustrated by the hole in the wall problem. Then came Q with “damage-free hanging solutions”. Now Bond could change the location of a hanging as quickly and easily as changing her mind.

The model holds true across endless categories. In banking, the financial products offered are tools that enable consumers to succeed. In the kitchen the disposer is the magical device that enables homeowners to clean up in a hurry. In surgical devices, the devices are specialized tools that enable surgeons to perform amazing feats in the operating room. In heavy industry, the valve actuators enable the engineers to route their chemicals to create products that will solve industrial-sized issues.

One CEO of a large multi-national company we worked with liked to say that everything his company did was to help their customers win. He understood that even though his company made some incredible products, the reason his customers bought those products from him was because his entire company functioned as Q. Their job was to deliver amazing solutions that enabled their customers to be the heros.

That’s exactly the right way to think about your brand.

James Bond is always on the run, always getting himself into unexpected situations in his quest to save the planet from the evil of the hour. He desperately needs someone looking out for him and creating solutions Bond doesn’t even know he needs yet. When brands get their position and story right, consumers and customers embrace the brand as part of the family. When the brand tries to be the hero, they compete with the consumer and are more likely than not to suffer a painful demise or, worse, languish in the world of the irrelevant.

When in doubt, be Q.

Stop Calling All Groups of People Teams!

Every year I work with companies on organizational health and building strong teams. One of the fundamental issues is distinguishing between groups and teams.

Managers often place high performing individuals together and expect them to work well together. Then they are usually disappointed when those same individuals fail to reach even basic goals and objectives. But this shouldn’t come as a surprise. There are countless examples of high performing individuals fighting one another to reach the top of some mountain while happily sacrificing others around them.

Welcome to the dynamic of a group versus a team.

The late motivational speaker and sales guru, Zig Ziglar, liked to share a story about Belgian Draft Horses. As he told it, one Belgian Draft Horse can pull around 7,000 pounds (think high performing individual). Harness him to another Belgian Draft Horse and together they can pull over 15,000 pounds (think a group of two high performing individuals). But—and this is the difference between groups and teams—teach them to work together and the team can pull up to 25,000 pounds.

Teams leverage individual strengths and work with agreed upon operating procedures to accomplish a common goal.

How teams work versus groups:

1. Leverage individual strengths—I often tell people it’s important to embrace the OCD in others. Let them obsess in their own areas while you obsess in yours. Groups of people tend to try to establish their boundaries and gain positional advantages. Great teams don’t do this. They work to the strengths of those around them and outproduce their counterparts by exponential factors.

2. Agreed upon operating procedures—Strong teams are clear what’s expected, how they are supposed to conduct themselves, and who is responsible for getting things done. I’ve run into plenty of companies that seem to believe groups will make up their own rules and somehow those rules will work out. That hasn’t been my experience.

3. Accomplish a common goal—The best teams know what they are trying to accomplish together. I have found that good teams can fall apart when the goals aren’t clear. It’s as if you lined everyone up on a starting line, fired the starter’s pistol and everyone ran to a different destination. That’s chaos. Make the goals clear.

Building strong teams is critical to building healthy organizations that can consistently tackle big challenges and change the world. They don’t happen by accident, and they often don’t happen by themselves. The deliberate guidance of executives and managers to leverage their strongest players can have a profound impact on how well their company performs—or whether their best performers decide to leave the company for greener pastures.

Need help building healthy teams and a company culture? Let’s talk.

Making the 5 Consumer Segments Work for Your Brand

Part 2 of a 2-part series

This article builds on the previously-posted piece Five Consumer Segments Every Brand Should Understand.

Somehow the notion that five consumer segments can cross channels and categories seems too simple. That may be partly because many people have been led to believe that understanding target audiences is hard and better left to the experts. It can be complicated. I don’t think it should be.

I believe brands can make significant progress on company goals without overthinking or overspending on the concept of consumer segmentation.

As a reminder, the five segments I discussed in the past piece are: Value; Practical; Performance; Prestige and; Experiential. To make the most of these primal behaviors, we need to consider the language and activities as related to specific filters. I’ll only use a few here for example, but you can apply as many as necessary to help gain alignment on your brand.

Filters Add Depth To The Five Segments

Generation—A common misperception is that segmentation must be age-related, as in you must separate the Boomers, Gen-Y, Millennials and Gen-Z into individual pillars. You don’t. Why? Because there are a wide range of types of people in each group. That’s why I start with Primal Behaviors: they hold true regardless of age.

A Value consumer who is a Boomer will look for a good deal, but may use some more traditional means to get the information such as coupons, direct mail or word of mouth whereas a Millennial may be more likely to download an app and crowd source a deal from some niche Web site. The difference is HOW they look for a deal, not the fact that they look for a deal. Gen-X Practicals want products that work, but may use older brands as reference than their Gen-Z counterparts.

Income—Some marketers believe income determines how people make decisions. It can. But as behavioral economist Dan Ariely covers in his excellent book Predictably Irrational, most of us don’t make rational, cost/benefit analyses when we make purchases. Income is only a marker of how much money someone MIGHT have at their disposal to make a purchase. We all know people who have made great sacrifices, rationally or irresponsibly, to purchase things they want.

Category—Auto/Sports/Outdoor/Dining/ Beauty/ Family/Baby, etc. A key point to understand is that in categories that matter to them, people will make irrational purchases and spend whatever they need to accomplish their goal. If you’re in a different primal group than the one making the choice, their decisions may make absolutely no sense to you. The Value group has a really hard time comprehending why someone would pay full price for any item. But this doesn’t matter all that much to the other four groups—especially when it comes to passion areas. This can get confusing for some people.

One Guitar. Many Buyers.

Taylor Guitars manufactures guitars that cost from a few hundred dollars to upwards of $10,000 each. Now consider a 600-series model that costs roughly $4,200. At that price, you have to be pretty serious about buying a guitar. A guitarist who leans towards Value will look to get the guitar at a deep discount, maybe buy it used, or even barter for the deal. A Practical might evaluate the same guitar for how it is engineered, the woods used, and compare the reliability of the Expression pickup system with others on the market. If these pass the test, the Practical may pay full price without batting an eye. The Performance segment might love the green or blue designs because they would draw attention, plus the guitar’s acoustic abilities onstage would seal the deal. $4,200 might be a lot of money or not much at all. It’s not about whether you or I think any of these people can or should buy a guitar at this price. Each segment would evaluate the cost based on their own criteria. They could all buy the same guitar and fall in love with their choice, but for decidedly different reasons. You just can’t market to each segment using the same language and approach. What excites one segment can completely turn off the others.

 Communicate WITH Your Audiences

No one wants to be talked AT, as in generic words meant for anybody. That’s not communication. That’s patronization.

When you try to speak to everyone you communicate with no one!

If your brand wants to focus activities on narrow bands, start with a primal segment or two, say Performance and Prestige for a high end beauty brand, and work from there. What other filters need to be applied to consider your Performance and Prestige consumers’ preferences in the beauty category? Whatever you do, don’t try to water down the message so some random Practical consumer might not be offended by your Prestige message. Please. If you want to add Practicals to your brand plan, talk to them separately.

Choose The Filters That Work For You

I prefer to NOT create additional pillars because pillars without a specific purpose become a dump zone of sorts. Brands that allow dump zones in their architecture or segmentation set themselves up for longer term confusion. At some point that dump zone data is going to have to be sorted. Why not start with an organized plan?

Start with the primal segments and use your filters to help you determine how each segment acts or reacts when considering other factors such as Quality (good, better, best); Involvement (beginner, aspiring, elite); Need state (Sensitive skin or dietary/health issues, family or individual, etc.).

Subdivisions Within Segments

You can subdivide the segment if it’s helpful to bring clarity to your brand and marketing efforts. For example, you might subdivide the Value group into four parts: Down & Out, Fixed Income, Life Events, Students. The difference is situational events that impact behavior change. So instead of becoming new pillars, consider these to be horizontal filters

The Down & Out group have limited purchasing abilities and blame the world for their situation. Unless you’re in the therapy business, this group usually doesn’t warrant a lot of your resources. The other three groups tend to have positive outlooks and are worth the calories it takes to understand them better. Fixed Income might be retirees who don’t have a lot of spending flexibility, but they’re okay with their situation. Life Events might be people who went through job loss or a divorce and have limited resources for a short period. They’re in the Value group now because some unusual circumstance caused them to be there. When they can, they’ll be back to their usual behaviors. The last group, Students, share a lot with the Life Eventers, in that they see their situation in life as temporary. They plan to have more resources in the near future and then they’ll have more options.

When In Doubt, Go Back To The Basics!

I recognize there is a lot of material to consider here. And if you’re not familiar with it the subject matter can become overwhelming. Don’t let it get to you. Start with the five primal behaviors: Value; Practical; Performance; Prestige and; Experiential. When you understand these core segments you might just be surprised by how easy it is communicate with people who fit into those segments. In workshops, I often hear clients say they know friends and family who match each segment. When we break down the similarities, this simple exercise can kick an innovation workshop into a higher gear.

That’s the hope with all of this: that more brands will find a way to target their innovation and communications to specific audiences in ways that change lives and maybe even change the world.

If you have questions or thoughts on this topic, add a comment here or send me an email.

The 5 Consumer Segments Every Brand Should Understand

Part 1 of a 2-part series

Strategists and planners have long recognized the benefits of directing products and communication towards key audience segments. It’s no secret that aiming your message at the masses minus any key insight to help some group connect with your message is a good way to blow your budget without having anything to show for the effort. But how do you decide who to talk to?

Paralyzing effect of too many choices

There are plenty of models to wade through. You could start with Jungian archetypes as a foundation and search for the balance between your brand archetype and your consumer archetypes. You could use a Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or DiSC profile, or maybe even the nine Enneagram types to deep dive into your audiences. You can dive into the behavioral subsets, or geographic, demographic, psychographic samples. You could add filters of age group, lifestyle, income, section of the country or world, background, life stage, shopping habits, and so much more.

You could. But should you?

Simpler may be better

I have found that when I’ve tried to discuss this kind of approach with the average brand or marketing manager not already well versed in the concept, they get frustrated and aim for something simpler. Worse still is when I’ve worked with a brand that insisted on spending the money on an expensive study only to get a report back that was so complicated that few in the company wanted to use the results in their daily activity.

Brand foundation tools that people don’t use are a waste of company resources and may actually cause well-intentioned staffers to go off on their own directions not out of any desire to damage the brand but to simply get something done.

I think there is a way to frame the audiences for almost any brand, whether B2B or B2C, so that internal groups can begin to make progress on how to innovate and communicate with people the brand personnel know intuitively.

I think we need to get to strategic tools brands will actually use.

Primal behaviors

After being involved in consumer and customer segmentation studies for more than 20 years and in dozens of categories, we took a look at unifiers and differentiators in the various studies and came to recognize that at the root of all the studies are five essential, what I’ll call primal, behaviors.

Think of these as how we each are hardwired and not necessarily influenced by external factors. The five primal behaviors are: Value; Practical; Performance; Prestige and; Experiential.

Before I break them down let’s set a few ground rules:

First, people may very well float between different behaviors depending on categories or balance two behaviors at the same time. That doesn’t create hazy profiles. Instead, it helps clarify the emotional continuum most of us move through seamlessly every day. 

Second, these behavioral groups aren’t meant to be the exhaustive psychographic profiles. They serve as a base on which each brand can build common understanding of who they want to pursue and how to speak to that group. Run your volumetric, market size and market impact studies. Just don’t think you can’t make any progress with innovation and marketing communication without them. You can, and many brands do so every day.

Five Behavior Types

Value:

This group looks for a deal and considers themselves savvy shoppers. They can’t imagine paying full price for an item when they could just as easily get the same item or something very close to it for significantly less somewhere else. (think TJ Maxx’s Maxxinistas). It doesn’t mean they want to compromise on quality. They don’t. They would rather search for coupons and bargains for the kind of quality they would like to have instead of rushing to conclusions and spending money unnecessarily.

Practical:

Practicals want reliable products and services that live up to their promises. They look for function over form. They are willing to give up style points in favor of products that do a job very, very well. Many of my engineer friends and family fit in this category. They’re the first to check for manufacturing details and can tell me all about the product specs. For example, Practicals can tell you whether that Kenmore product you like is made by Bosch, Whirlpool, Samsung or Jenn Air. Why would this matter? Because Practicals pride themselves on knowing the details.

Performance:

This group can sometimes be the other end of the continuum for Practicals in that they look for function WITH form. They want products that work, but they also want the style points that can come with it. This is a big point for the Performance group: style matters. For example, while the Practicals might choose a Ford F-150 pickup truck for its towing capacity, durability and proven track record, they often draw the line on the extras that make the truck look or feel better to riders. Not the Performance group. They would also choose the F-150 for the durability and track record, but they would consider the upgrades, from 10-speed automatic transmission on a high output, twin-turbocharged, 450 horsepower, 3.5-liter EcoBoost engine to driver-assist technology and an integrated SYNC system to keep all their devices connected. All that technology just has to make the truck perform better.

Prestige:

Stepping up one more notch is the Prestige group. This group would prefer to stay out of discussions about F-150s because while Fords may have a proven track record, they don’t have the badge and talk value the Prestige group craves. They like having stories to share with others about the brands and products they choose. Why have a regular wristwatch when you could have a Breitling or Patek Philippe? Why just have shoes when you could have shoes by Jimmy Choo, Brian Atwood or Stuart Weitzman? This is a group who prefer the best of the best in categories that matter to them, from clothes to oral care, restaurants to technology.

One key note here is that having money isn’t always a big factor. The Prestige group are willing to compromise in some categories in order to have what they want in categories they care about. We all know people who have gone into debt to afford a lifestyle that fits their desire for the best.

Experientials:

Everyone has a friend who is an Experiential. They like variety, colors, textures and change because, well, why not? Style matters. A lot. Engineering matters, but not nearly as much. This is not to say they don’t like quality. They do. But they are willing to compromise a little on quality if that compromise means they could have two items for about the same price, as in having both a red and yellow handbag for $X+ versus only a red handbag for $X. In doing research for a pet food brand, we found this consumer group sought variety in diet for their dogs and cats because they found it hard to believe their pets would enjoy the same thing every day. In oral care, this consumer buys a different color toothbrush and with different textures each time because she gets bored with the one she’s used for the last three months and is now ready for a new color.

Upon this foundation we build

These five groups form the essential foundation of an actionable segmentation plan almost every company or brand can build from without waiting for the million dollar study. We use them in workshops to rapidly get executives, engineers, marketers, chemists, designers, biologists and plenty of others on the same page and universally understanding that we can’t talk to everyone and certainly can’t talk to them the same way if we ever hope to connect personally.

In my next article, Making the Five Consumer Segments Work for Your Brand, I’ll break down some of the influences you can use to narrow these primal behaviors to fit your category.

15 Essential Rules for Effective Brainstorming

Getting great results out of a brainstorming workshop can be challenging, but less so if you stack the odds in your favor. Use these tips to maximize your output.

As a workshop facilitator and participant, I’ve been in thousands of brainstorming sessions. Some great, some good, some horribly forgettable. I’ve found that helping set the tone for the meeting ahead of time can be critical in two key areas: 1, if the people attending the workshop aren’t brainstorming professionals and; 2, if they aren’t used to getting their ideas out of their own heads and in to the team workspace where others may build on the ideas and make them even better.

I prefer to send the principles out to the team prior to the meeting and usually with the workshop agenda, which is tailored to suit the challenge at hand.

PRINCIPLES OF BRAINSTORMING

QUANTITY OVER QUALITY

When we brainstorm, we want to get as many ideas out as possible, and think out loud so others can share in the creativity.

THERE IS ROOM FOR JUDGMENT—BUT NOW RIGHT NOW!

Start with the mantra: there are no bad ideas. In brainstorming, every idea has merit. Get them out first. Assess later.

BUILD ON OTHER IDEAS

Every idea is a building block for something new, something different, something breakthrough and never seen before. Remember, we need your ideas so the collective team reaches better solutions.

DIFFERENT PEOPLE MEAN DIFFERENT IDEAS

It’s critical to have people on your brainstorming teams who think differently than you. They need you on their teams for the same reason.

WELCOME WILD IDEAS

Brainstorming is non-linear. You can’t always do it sitting at your same old place at the table. Be willing to mix it up. Have fun, get expressive, get away from the norm. Your brain, and your team, will thank you.

The Rules of Engagement are meant to be used during the workshop to unite the people involved and give everyone permission to deliver their best. One trick is balancing the personalities in the room. Some people need help releasing their inner genius while others need guardrails on the types of behavior that won’t be permitted. You can’t let the neighborhood cynic and curmudgeon crush the fragile ideas of one or two people in the room and still expect to have dramatic results. But you can give the room license to laugh, smile, have fun and create something magical.

RULES OF ENGAGEMENT

THINK FAST AND OFTEN

Don’t dwell on your ideas. Get them out quickly.

CAPTURE EVERY IDEA

In brainstorming, the only bad idea is one not captured. Remember, it’s your responsibility to make sure your ideas are expressed. They might not win in the end, but they must be expressed in order to help the team.

THERE ARE NO BAD IDEAS!

Reserve judgment until the proper time. Just get the idea out.

BE OPEN TO NEW THINKING

Your ideas are great. So are the ideas of the other members of your team. You need their weird, oddball, left field ideas as much as they need yours. Share and share alike.

THINK “AND” NOT “BUT”

It’s hard to build a house when others keep removing the supports. Be a good builder. We all know that anything preceding “but” in a conversation is irrelevant. Instead, rephrase responses along the lines of: “That’s an interesting idea AND I think I have a way to make it even stronger ...”

ONE CONVERSATION AT A TIME

Especially when it’s time to share with the whole group: Everyone has good ideas. Let’s make sure we can hear all of them—but not all at once.

STAY PRESENT IN THE DISCUSSION

You can’t be a good participant if your brain and interests are on something else. You owe it to yourself and your team to stay engaged physically and mentally, or be honest and take care of your other priorities first. Laptops and phones should be off limits until breaks or unless needed for research in the meeting.

STAY POSITIVE

It’s almost impossible to get to a new idea when you’re being negative. Brainstorming is “yes we can” territory.

THERE ARE NO DEVIL’S ADVOCATES!

Playing Devil’s Advocate is a cheap way to excuse yourself from any negative comments you use to kill someone else’s thoughts. Don’t do that. Ever. Own your ideas. When it’s time to critique the session output, you speak for you and no one else.

HAVE FUN!

This is brainstorming, not brain surgery (unless you’re brainstorming about brain surgery)! Enjoy yourself. Smile. Laugh a little. And come up with something really, really big!

If You Do Only One Thing, Do Great Work!

The one unifying aspect of affecting your current situation or enabling you to change for the better comes down to three simple words: Do Great Work!

Over the past few weeks I've had conversations with college near-graduates, recent hires, people searching for what's next in their current situation, a few people who have lost or left jobs, and a couple who are ready to jump shops. With very rare exception, the theme remains the same: do great work!

Vince Lombardi once said "Practice does not make perfect. Only perfect practice makes perfect." Which is exactly the point, though it's not what people really want to hear. Let's break this down.

Do great work where you are
Almost every manager and employer wants and needs impassioned employees who throw all of who they are in to what they do. Look around the typical work space and you'll find loads of people wading through their day, shuffling paper or moving widgets from one shelf to the next. These same people tend to be the ones who complain that they never get noticed, they never get promoted, they never get a raise or a bonus or the good office or (fill in your choice of frustration here).

Want to get noticed? Get a raise? Get a bonus or a good office or a better shot at doing what you really want to do? Do great work! Take the initiative and make a difference. Understand how to compromise without settling for forgettable. Upper management is looking for people who rise above. You can do that. Do that.

What if no one notices you where you are? Do great work, and network. You may very well be in a space where people just can't see the value in what you do. But someone will. And someone else will be glad to have you on their team doing exactly what you're doing.

Fear losing your job? Do great work!
In times of tight economies and business fluctuations, tough decisions have to be made on who stays and who goes. If you really want to be one of the ones who stay, you need to do great work. It's the differentiator. No company wants to see the best talent walk out the door, and if it comes down to you versus your neighbor, the one who's getting it done most often gets to stay.

Sure there are exceptions, so let's say you do find yourself in the firing line. I've been there a number of times. It's not fun. But here's a key nobody ever seems to talk about: it's incredibly hard to join a new company and kick into a higher gear if you left your last job stinking up the place. Your next employer is going to evaluate you based on where you've been and what you accomplished while there. Do great work!

If you get laid off and have an amazing track record of successes, you're already in a better position than the next guy who coasted and got laid off, too. There are other companies that need someone like you. Do great work!

Bad bosses are out there. I've known a few. Even if you're the top performer in the company you could be fired. Fine. Chances are good that your next interviewer had a bad boss or two as well. You have an excellent track record of successes that will play out very well in your interview. And they need someone like you. Do great work!

Newly hired? Do great work!
Once you land that new role, assess the landscape and the people around you, join the community, find others who want to make a difference in the world and do great work together. Seriously. Pour your passion into what you do and make it count.

I challenge people to find one thing each month that they worked on that makes them proud. One thing. You'd be amazed at how many people struggle to find one. I then ask them to identify the top one or two things they accomplished for each quarter. For the calendar challenged, that's three months of effort that far too often blows by us because we get caught up in doing work, but not great work. Break that habit!

Make it a point to find at least one thing each quarter that stands out for you. One per quarter is just four per year. Stay at your job for three years and you'll have twelve great stories to tell in your next interview. Every HR manager on the planet will tell you that number puts you ahead of the game. And every HR manager is looking for people who do great work.

At the end of the day, it all boils down to one simple idea: Do great work!

You'll make a difference where you are and could seriously impact where you're going. It takes effort. It takes courage. It takes looking at the world in whole new ways. But the world is looking for people willing to make a difference, for people who will change the trajectory. The world needs you to do great work.