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As the author of
‘Living the Brand’ and as a consultant, people sometimes ask me what’s the most
important thing in a successful internal branding programme. There are
certainly some pre-conditions such as senior management involvement, a
willingness to see the process as more than just a communication exercise, the
involvement of human resources and a positive organisational culture, but there
is one mechanism that stands out: brand champions. These are the individuals in
groups, divisions and branch offices who willingly engage with the brand and
make it relevant for their colleagues. They do not have to be experts on
branding, nor the most senior people in the organisation – albeit the respect
of their peers helps. Rather the
most important attribute is enthusiasm. They should possess the confidence to
talk about the brand vision and values and what it means to the people they
work with, be capable of putting together workshops to generate new initiatives
to deliver the brand in day-to-day work and willing to share good ideas with
people in other teams and offices. When champions work well they are able to
transform the brand into something that has meaning for the whole organisation.
The evidence for
the power of champions is derived from my experience of running programmes for
both business organisations and non-profit ones. In an organisation of any size
it is not possible for a senior management team to impose its idea of the brand
on employees. To the surprise of
managers, employees sometimes ignore, or are even cynical, to centrally
produced messages from on-high about such things as brands. The idea of a brand only begins to
resonate when it begins to affect the way people do their everyday work and
that needs the involvement of people on the ground. People have to be inspired by the brand and see the benefit
of engaging with it. It must have
as much relevance to a finance manager as to someone in a call centre as to a
communications manager in a corporate office. Over the last 12 years I have been working with living the
brand processes, there are two clients (one commercial and one non-profit) that
really stand out as long term successes because they have both maintained the
brand ideas we developed together, for more than a decade. Both cite the network of brand
champions as the primary maintenance mechanism. Their brand champions are well
supported by the centre and given resources to develop localised initiatives. They think about the sort of people who
would make good champions. And
they have the humility to accept that new ways of working and innovations don’t
only derive from a small elite, but potentially from everywhere. Compare these two organisations to a
Japanese manufacturing company I tried to help with a brand champions
challenge. Each department had
simply told someone in their team to be the brand champion. These reluctant
individuals were then sent off to a meeting to discuss their roles. As well as a lack of infrastructure to
support people and a problematic culture, that key ingredient of enthusiasm was
notably absent.
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