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Which story will they tell? 9 possibilities for pitch stories

By Mark Di Somma

What's their story?As I explained in this post, the purpose of a pitch is not to sell what you do. It’s to explain in the clearest terms why someone should look forward to doing business with you. And while you’re explaining your story, you can bet that every other participant in the pitch will be telling theirs.

It’s well worth surmising where your story lies and what their story/stories might be:

1. The authority – the trusted source of knowledge. This is a brand and credentials story. It focuses on being the market leader and on the ability to take matters in hand and deal with problems efficiently and effectively. The emphasis is on de-risking and delegation. Works wonders with clients looking for someone to take charge.

2. The safe bet – the best pair of hands. This is a reassurance story. It focuses on the proven and time-tested partner, diligent, hard-working, who always hits targets. Not necessarily the most exciting answer or the most original, but a choice that most will be more than happy with. Works well with clients looking for someone to shoulder the heavy lifting.

3. The price saver – the budget option. This is about getting the work done at the best price. Works well when the work itself is not particularly valued, the organisation feels budget-conscious or there is scrutiny (and therefore repercussions). Even if this participant doesn’t get the work, chances are their pricing will form the basis for negotiations post-appointment. Works well, as expected, with clients looking to get the work done for the least investment.

4. The creative answer – the wild card. The lateral play. This approach scrutinises the problem from another angle and comes back with an answer that is bound to take everyone by surprise. This approach can be particularly effective in situations where the people calling the pitch feel hemmed in and are looking for a different approach. Done properly, this pitch can be magical – but it can just as easily fall flat on its face. Works well in crowded pitch situations where you need to get cut-through. However, don’t hold your breath, if you do get appointed, that many or any of the ideas you suggested will be taken up.

5. The disruptive model – the extreme card. This approach throws the current business model out with the bathwater. Perhaps the most risky play of all – but worth a shot if you absolutely believe that the current model is irreconcilably flawed or if you want to demonstrate your ability to completely rethink a situation. All of the reservations about the creative answer apply here to an even greater degree.

6. The underdog – the great unknown. This approach is all about using your relative anonymity to surprise and delight the people you’ve pitched to, slipping in under the radar only to emerge victorious. It’s the pitch that uses frankness to great effect – “We know you’ll be worried about …” – to drive home some home truths and pick up respect for daring to speak out. Works well with organisations looking to appoint beyond the familiar faces, and will particularly appeal to pitch panels that contain mavericks and that want to be seen to have gone the extra mile in search of the right fit.

7. The case study/research case – literally the case in point. This pitch headlines with research or a recent case study that deals directly with or parallels the issue that the organisation appears to be facing. It works not just because it delivers proof and insights that the organisation will be interested in accessing, but because it helps a pitch panel feel that they are teaming up with people who understand and can help overcome their challenges. Very useful if the research is groundbreaking and/or the case study is well known and well respected.

8. The star – “look who we’ve got”. A superstar in the field leads the agency into the pitch. This is a variation on the authority story – except often it’s a key player front and centre and a slightly less illustrious team backing her up. Very powerful because it helps an organisation feel personally connected with the ‘best in the business’, and all their credentials and achievements are ‘owned’ by the pitcher even if no-one else on the team had anything to do with the achievements.

9. The process – trust the methodology. This pitch revolves around a “world class” process. It’s compelling because it gives everyone something to follow and the process’s track record are often taken as proof of success. Excellent if you’re pitching for work that is highly process or project oriented and being managed by people who are focused on completing tasks on time and to budget.

Chances are you are using one of these storylines yourself. Nothing wrong with that. But you can’t just focus on your own story. You need to make sure that your story will be more compelling than the storyline others choose; that it explains in the best possible way why someone should look forward to doing business with you.

To test that, put yourself in the shoes of another team compiling another story. Build a case using that storyline. Then compare your story with theirs. Analyse your strengths and weaknesses and adjust your storyline until it is outshines the alternative. If necessary, bring in an independent adjudicator to judge the stories on the merits.

If you have time and resources (i.e. if the pitch is big enough), have two other teams develop two other scenarios and then run an internal competition – first against one alternative story and then against the other, adjusting your story as you go to make it stronger.

Judging your story in this way is an excellent way not just of thinking through how your competitors may shape their arguments but also of sharpening and honing your pitch so that it is robust, direct and well told.

Acknowledgements
Photo of “23” by miggslives, sourced from Flickr

How do you prevent your corporate culture from stalling?

By Mark Di Somma

How slow should a culture goThere is plenty of discussion, quite rightly, about the fact that people are overworked, that they are under ridiculous pressure, that they feel undervalued and unmotivated – but a couple of conversations this week have got me wondering whether the opposite, an unpressured culture, whilst not as destructive, may nevertheless be undesirable, albeit for different reasons.

I’m always concerned for instance when people inside a culture tell me that the place they work at is comfortable or that it has a real family feel. In a corporate cultural setting, too often those terms are code for a work force that is happy to leave things as they are. The other word that always rings alarm bells is “busy”. When people tell me they work in a busy workplace, that too is often code – this time for a lot of activity, noise and meetings, but without focus and without measured and effective outcomes.

So how much urgency do you need in a workplace? Is some degree of turbulence necessary to keep people on their toes? And if so, what form should it take? Does a culture have a stall speed?

First let’s clarify what’s not necessary. What’s not needed, and what there is no excuse for, are the ways of working that some managers still use to incite action: bullying, discrimination, bad behaviour, disrespect or other equally destructive behaviours. What is useful though is the adrenalin surge that comes with doing good work well, and with looking to achieve change that is surprising, inspiring and competitive. ‘Good urgency’ focuses on exactly that.

Generating urgency

Philip Kotter’s study of the effectiveness of change in organisations, cited here, found that 70% of all major change efforts failed, or were completed significantly behind schedule or over budget. The most significant reason for this was a lack of urgency.

Kotter suggests that true urgency encourages productivity and innovation: “It is often believed that people cannot maintain a high sense of urgency over a prolonged period of time, without burnout. Yet … true urgency doesn’t produce dangerous levels of stress, at least partially because it motivates people to relentlessly look for ways to rid themselves of chores that add little value to their organizations but clog their calendars and slow down needed action.”

Of course there is no universal ideal speed for a corporate culture to compete at. Some sectors simply need to move more quickly than others. The key is finding a speed that is quicker than comfortable, but measured enough to ensure responsible and consistent behaviours. Here are my five rules for doing that:

1. No gain, without pain – a culture won’t react with urgency without a pain point. Unless the consequences of not changing dramatically, demonstrably and emphatically outweigh the consequences of bringing change about, people will generally opt to leave things as they are. If you’re the one making the case to up the pace, bring proof – lots of it.

2. No gains without meaningful context – unless people have a clear and inspiring framework to work within, there are no reasons to be urgent. Purpose decides more than what you’re aiming to achieve; it defines what you’re asking your people to expend energy on. Simply put, meaning engages people – and engaged people work better. According to McKinsey, “The opportunity cost of the missing meaning is enormous … employees working in a high-IQ, high-EQ, and high-MQ [meaning quotient] environment are five times more productive at their peak”.

To gain that sense of meaning, McKinsey suggests framing what needs to get done around six stories simultaneously:
1. the turnaround story – the business case for significant improvement
2. the good-to-great story – which stresses the capability to be the undisputed leader
3. the societal impact story – the intention to make things better in the world
4. the customer story – why customers deserve more and how they will benefit
5. the working team story – the support that the team will receive
6. the personal gain story – what each participant stands to gain from getting involved.

Logical stories don’t impel actions. Emotional stories, based around things that people really care about, do. The article cites the example of a cost-reduction program at a large US financial-services company. When the need for action was sold to staff on the basis of the need to bring expenses into line with revenues, it bombed. Retold, as a story about society (more affordable housing), customers (increased simplicity and flexibility, fewer errors, more competitive prices), working teams (less duplication, more delegation, increased accountability, a faster pace), and individuals (bigger and more attractive jobs, a once-in-a-career opportunity to build turnaround skills, a great opportunity to “make your own” institution), buy-in leapt. Observes McKinsey:“The program was still what it was—a cost-reduction program—but the reasons it mattered were cast in far more meaningful terms.”

3. Not just urgency, but a culture of urgency – unless there’s a sense of urgency across the whole business, take-up will be sporadic, and may even see ‘motivated’ groups choosing to silo themselves from others they consider lazy. Urgency requires unity – or at the very least, agreement on the need to move forward in a co-ordinated way to achieve agreed goals. Kotter again: “With a culture of urgency, people deeply value the capacity to grab new opportunities, avoid new hazards, and continually find ways to win. Behaviors that are the norm include being constantly alert, focusing externally, moving fast, stopping low-value-added activities that absorb time and effort, relentlessly pushing for change when it is needed, and providing the leadership to produce smart change no matter where you are in the hierarchy.”

4. Measured achievements – Urgency can devolve to panic unless all involved have a clear timetable for what is being done. The key to finding the right level of urgency is agreeing the pace that people need to work at in order to achieve the purpose. Using the organisation’s biggest and brightest objective as the pace-setter puts everything in perspective, adds deep underlying reason and encourages measures that also prevent rash actions. Regularly reporting on progress against the purpose and against specific goals gives people context and the momentum to push for the next level of achievement.

7 ways to maintain urgency

Interestingly as I was writing this post, I came across this piece in Fast Company that sets out how organisations with big goals keep people motivated. Much of what they discuss seems to inform how we should be looking to maintain good urgency in cultures:

1. Encourage resilience. With the pursuit of purpose come good days and bad days. What matters most is the ability to quickly rebound from failures.

2. Celebrate the journey not just the destination. Make victory about solving every problem rather than just big accomplishments.

3. Share the energy. Be single-minded, and use the singularity of that end goal to unite and energise people.

4. Believe in the ability to do hard things. Don’t be stymied by fear of failure.

5. Do work that has an impact. Aim to create change at scale by asking your people to address and resolve world-changing questions. The McKinsey article gives the example of David Farr, chairman and CEO of Emerson Electric, who asks four questions consistently of people in the organisation:
(1) how do you make a difference? (testing for alignment with the company’s direction);
(2) what improvement idea are you working on? (emphasising continuous improvement);
(3) when did you last get coaching from your boss? (emphasising the importance of people development); and
(4) who is the enemy? (directing energy towards an external threat).

6. Demand balance. People need opportunities to be renewed and reinvigorated. They can’t do that if they are chained to their desks and (by extension) their mobiles.

7. Push your company as far as you can every day. Have specific and actionable items to complete each day that move you closer to your goals individually and collectively.

Acknowledgements
Photo of “Slow Down” by Loozrboy, sourced from Flickr

The future myth

By Mark Di Somma

BarometerTransformation isn’t about plotting a meeting point for your brand with the predicted future. It’s not about getting to where the puck will be, to paraphrase Wayne Gretsky. Because depending on the arrival of the next big thing or that breaking wave, that hot new trend, the long-awaited demographic or anything else for that matter is conjecture. Banking on it is simply speculation.

To evolve successfully, brands must grow out of what they have into what they need to be. They cannot shape the future. They can only shape their future.

That is what they have control of. That is what they are responsible for. The customers they take with them into the future. The actions they drive in the future. The products they will make. The culture they build for the future.

All strategists and decision makers can and should read out of the macro-trends, and even the supposedly “specific” future trends for that matter, are the broad indicators of the change that’s coming and perhaps a sense of where it might be coming from. Nothing more – certainly not the exact nature and timing of that change.

But what brands can do, indeed must do, is use what they’re hearing and what their data is telling them to quantify what must be dealt with today: the instability of the present; the intensity of the competition; the changes in the world that they want to take charge of; and the degree to which they may be able to build on, or reject, what they have as they push forward. Being aware of those things will help quantify receptivity for what they have planned.

Deal with what you know, but look beyond what you have.

Acknowledgements
Photo of Barometer by Matt Wharton (electricinca), sourced from Flickr

Thank you for your interest …

By Mark Di Somma

View of the VaticanHas the temptation to template ever been greater? As the volume of conversations between organisations and stakeholders continues to rise, so does the urge to have “ready-to-go” responses. Our interactions with organisations are increasingly governed it seems by autoresponders that look to slow down or divert real contact.

Granted, there is too much traffic today for every query to be answered personally – but I can’t help feeling that an opportunity is being missed here; that the lack of personality in the interactions we do have has made them trite and meaningless. People feel fobbed off, even if that wasn’t the intention.

When was the last time you listened to the patter that precedes you waiting in a call centre queue? How closely did you read the last rejection letter you got from a publisher? What did the voice message say when you called after hours?

You don’t remember – because it doesn’t matter. You’ve heard it all before. And you’ll hear it all again … and again … and again.

Too often, organisations miss the opportunity to make a powerful and distinctive impression because they are so focused on the process of responding or complying that they forget to invest in the substance of that response. Answers become bland, legally-approved statements: and those statements mirror every other tried and true response from every other quarter. A wonderful opportunity to stand-out is lost.

By way of illustration – intended to highlight and not to offend – imagine a “standard” Human Resources response to those who were unsuccessful in the bid to secure what has surely been the most important leadership position on offer in the world this week:

15 March 2013

Dear Cardinal X

Re: Position VATC266

Thank you for your interest in applying for the role of Pope. We received a high number of applications for the position and the Committee was generally impressed with the quality of the candidates. Regretfully, as you will have seen from the white smoke, you were not successful on this occasion. Thank you so much for taking the time to come to Rome to take part in the election process. It was great to meet you.

Should the position become vacant again, we would welcome your application.

Please accept our blessings for your career development and professional success in the future.

Thank you once again for your interest in the Holy See.

Yours sincerely,
Cardinal [name]
Project Supervisor, Executive Management Selection Committee

Acknowledgements

Image of the Vatican by xiquinhosilva, sourced from Flickr

 

The global challenge of doing business openly

By Mark Di Somma

All Good logoCongratulations to All Good Organics, the first New Zealand company to make the prestigious Ethisphere Institute’s World’s Most Ethical (WME) companies list. All Good may be tiny but this ranking puts them in some great company – one of just 145 companies, chosen from more than 5000 entries. Judge for yourself.

In the light of this win, interesting to read Raz Godelnik’s take on the difference that CSR actually makes for companies in this post on TriplePundit:

A MIT Sloan Management Review and BCG survey showed 40% of executives polled believed the greatest benefit to an organisation in addressing sustainability was “improved brand reputation”.

Godelnik goes on to cite evidence that CSR initiatives help companies retain stock value when facing corporate governance scandals and product recalls, and that firms viewed as having weak CSR suffered stock declines twice the size of firms viewed as having strong CSR after riots surrounding 1999 WTO meetings in Seattle.

While consumers might not be willing to pay higher prices for greener products, he says, they will more likely purchase goods from firms that are more socially responsible. However, consumers are often not aware of a firm’s CSR activities and that in turn limits the extent to which CSR reputation actually makes a difference in customers’ decisions.

Godelnik’s conclusions? “In all, it looks like studies support the notion that CSR can impact companies’ reputation positively, helping them improve their reputation with stakeholders and be more resilient in times of crisis. Still, companies need to work hard to make sure stakeholders are aware of their efforts and that these efforts are sincere.”

Two questions. In the light of Godelnik’s findings, is CSR more than just a marketing exercise for many companies? And is his conclusion specific to CSR – or could one just as easily replace CSR with the word “actions” and the statement work just as well? That’s not intended as any belittlement of what the writer is saying – simply an observation that I think the conversation that’s been centred around CSR has been too narrow. The discussion can in fact be broadened to include the ramifications of actions (and reputation) generally, and from there to a closer inspection of the radically different way in which business is being done now.

To me, CSR is the symptom, not the subject. We are in the middle of a wider and much more radical transition than the move to ethical. I have stated on a number of occasions that to me, the key issue is one of responsibility. But the broader adaption I think is about how brands adapt to a world of unparalleled openness. It’s about the fundamental challenge to closed trading that the internet introduced and now encourages – and the questions that openness generates. How do you continue to make money when everyone can see more and more of what you’re doing? Companies are still struggling in my view to find a path through what feels like the conflicting pulls of ethical behaviour and competitive behaviour.

A truly social business world is do-able – but it’s far from done. In her excellent e-book “11 Rules for Creating Value in the Social Era”, Nilofer Merchant makes this salient point, “Things we once considered opposing forces – doing right by people and delivering results, collaborating and keeping focus, having a social purpose and making money – are really not in opposition … But we need a more sophisticated approach to understand business models where making a profit doesn’t mean losing purpose, community, and connection.”

I think those business models are still very much in development. Some, like All Good and those on the Ethisphere list, are addressing that by, quite literally, competing ethically – and inviting the world to watch and emulate. Contrast for example Godelnik’s analysis of what companies are looking to get out of CSR (a reputational insurance policy in a world of insatiable scrutiny) with All Good owner Chris Morrison’s view, quoted in an article on Stuff, of why they are in business: “”All Good believes we can’t ignore the consequences, humane or environmental, of growing the food we eat and enjoy, even though it may happen a long way from New Zealand.”

It’s one thing to incorporate CSR initiatives into a traditionally strategised business in a bid to win ethical brownie points. It’s quite another to view responsible behaviours as part and parcel of a broader and longer term transit to a globally competitive environment based on no harm and no secrets.

The capitalism of yesterday thrived on winning. The capitalism of today (with its need to work in a socially connected world) thrives on sharing. But the capitalism of tomorrow will need to succeed by giving. Thanks to ethical companies like All Good we have started to see the capacity for brands in the future to actually give more by trading more. Cradle-to-cradle thinking might even suggest that, going forward, new competitive models may pivot on that greater generosity, so that the more people trade, the more poverty is reduced, the cleaner the environment becomes and the better off the whole world is.

I’m excited to see where that might lead.

Whose buying – and whose purchasing?

By Mark Di Somma

Buyers and purchasersAt first the question appears nonsensical. But only if you assume that buying and purchasing are synonyms. Most financial systems treat them as exactly that because, from their perspective, the result is the same. Income. But there is a difference – and being able to define and quantify that difference is important.

Semantics doesn’t just split hairs. It splits customers. It isolates loyalties and behaviours. And in so doing, it potentially defines different actions. But it only does so for those prepared to look for the nuances.

As big data hands marketers and decision makers more and more detail, the ability to read between the lines and find the nuances of behaviour in the numbers will be more important than ever.

In this case, being able to tell the difference between your buyers (“the people who actively choose to buy from us”) and your purchasers (“the people who happen to have bought from us”) reveals two very different parties in terms of inclination.

The first will be back. The second may not.

Things become a little more complicated when trying to read between the lines of more abstract decisions. Here, nuance offers opportunities to isolate and granularise priorities that, just like the numbers, can easily be swept up in generalisations.

Which would you rather have?

A workforce. Or staff.
Reasons. Or purpose.
Suppliers. Or providers.
Obligations. Or responsibilities.
Story. Or history.
Social media. Or social interaction.
Conversations. Or dialogue.

What do you have right now? And more particularly, can you tell or have you never asked?

Acknowledgements

Photograph of “Mystery Shopper” by John Goode, sourced from Flickr

Talking a culture through change

By Mark Di Somma

the language of culture change

Change programs are so often about actions. So much so in fact that the dialogue that surrounds and informs those changes can be dismissed as “just talk”. Time and time again, in working on transformation projects, I have faced an uphill battle in trying to persuade decision makers to give their proposed changes the air-time that staff need to talk over and through what’s happening.

But such talk is vital. Actions really do speak louder with words – and they do so because they allow people to come together and to work through what is happening. Change presented on a slidedeck is change imposed. Change discussed in forums over time, and with a built-up understanding of its implications and opportunities, is change absorbed and applied.

Further than that though, language has a huge role to play in the bedding in of new ways of doing things. Language actually defines a culture because it is literally how people connect – changing it significantly shifts the parameters of, and the context for, what is defined, accepted and encouraged.

Here are five interconnected ways you can change your language to better complement the actions you intend taking.

Change the category – when you change the perception of who you are as a company and who you’re how competing against and for what, you can also change how you compete. You can literally invigorate the current culture with the characteristics of a new category – particularly if that category is perceived as more desirable, faster, smarter and more contemporary.

Change the purpose – when you change where you compete and with whom you compete, you have the opportunity to redefine what you compete for

Change the story – when you change your purpose, you have the opportunity to change the story that you tell yourselves about what you are doing and what constitutes success. You quite literally reframe the parameters. You also need to reset the notions of what you talk about and reinforce before you redefine the operating rules. That way, changing the actions becomes proof of your new history and the way things will be going forward. Telling your stories in new ways redefines your traditions as a culture.

Change the values – when you change the story, you have the right setting to redefine your priorities as people interacting with each other and with customers.

Change the permissions – refreshed values provide the best backdrop for resetting what constitutes success and therefore how people feel empowered to behave. When you highlight humanity over greed for example or teamwork over individual brilliance or balance over dedication, you not only change how people can behave, you also change what they feel they can celebrate and emulate.

Just as every culture was generated and sustained by what people chose to highlight and reinforce, shifts will come when people get the chance to reset the boundaries through conversation. Words are much more than the means to that end. They are the most powerful and vibrant signals because they actually define how actions continue to be talked about. Without that, you have a dumb organisation – one muted into doing, guessing and, inevitably, politicking.

Acknowledgements

Image of “ch-ch-changes” by Rafa Garcés, sourced from Flickr

CSR has failed. Now what?

By Mark Di Somma

Has CSR failed?

That’s the question being asked by Wayne Visser in this thoughtful and searching paper that raises significant concerns about how companies pursue responsible ideas. But, alongside those areas that he has identified as needing to be addressed, Visser proposes his vision of CSR 2.0. I was keen to explore what some of the ideas mooted here might mean for brand behaviours going forward.

First – a brief recap of Visser’s argument. If you define CSR as “an integrated, systemic approach by business that builds, rather than erodes or destroys, economic, social, human and natural capital”, then we have no choice, says Visser, than to mark CSR as a fail because communities and ecosystems are getting worse. While at the micro level there have been improvements, at the macro level, social, environmental and ethical health is in decline. And that’s because most sustainability and corporate responsibility programs are really about being less bad in pockets than actively good across the board.

CSR, he says, transits through five Ages:

1. Greed – limited corporate sustainability and responsibility practices are initiated but only if and when it protects shareholder value

2. Philanthropy – companies support various social and environmental causes through donations and sponsorships, but that’s the limit of their involvement

3. Marketing – the ‘greenwash’ phase, when CSR is looked upon as a public relations opportunity to enhance brand, image and reputation

4. Management – CSR activities are aligned to core business in some way, and undertaken through adherence to CSR codes and systems. (Watch the Dame Anita Roddick video referenced below for the Body Shop founder’s withering take on how management and accounting firms have fostered this in order to make huge amounts of money.)

5. Responsibility – activities actively focus on identifying and tackling the root causes of unsustainability and irresponsibility, through business models, disruptive processes and offerings, and lobbying for changes to national and international policies that benefit the wider community.

The first four phases doom CSR to failure, says Visser. But Responsibility is a step-change. Brands in the Responsibility Age of CSR in other words are actively looking to change the world rather than simply engaging in change processes that suit them.

Three pointers then, based on Visser’s thinking, on how brands might choose to pursue responsibility in the years ahead.

1. Purposeful creativity: Brands will need to focus on creatively solving truly pressing needs through a social business model. That of course means that brands will need to identify those globally-based needs, develop market-attractive products that address those needs and monitor how effective change really is. As part of that, they will need to candidly appraise, at least internally, whether the models they use are part of the solution or part of the problem.

These ideas align directly with my own ideas of the “opinionated brand”, the pending changes in disclosure (“what have you done to truly change the world?”) and the need for brands to pursue a true purpose not just the paperwork of vision and mission.

2. Scaled sustainability: Brands will need to make the same commitment to scaled sustainability that they have made to scaled growth. CSR solutions that cannot match that scale and urgency, says Visser, “are red herrings at best and evil diversions at worst.” He dismisses the organic and Fairtrade movements essentially as tinkering and cites Wal-Mart’s supply chain decisions as a true example of 2.0-level scalability.

Based on this, real change needs to be vast to be effective – and therefore will probably need to happen at the distribution level. To deliver that scale and attract significant momentum, global and regionally scaled brands will need to convert their sustainability and responsibility initiatives into meaningful B2B conversations and pack them with repercussions for failure.

3. Accessible fairness: Ethical must democratise if it is to be adapted at scale. In other words, consumers shouldn’t have to choose between the right thing to do and the right price to pay. “CSR will no longer manifest as luxury products and services (as with current green and Fairtrade options), but as affordable solutions for those who most need quality of life improvements.” The Prius, says Visser, is laudable but largely unaffordable. As such it can never be more than an incremental answer.

Brands must open up responsible actions to everyone not just those who can afford them. The tensions in this suggestion are obvious. I wonder if this is an opportunity for VJ Govandarajin’s concept of “reverse innovation” – products that are affordable and that, through their affordability, help everyone participate in changing the world for the better?

I have argued for some time now that CSR gives out the wrong messages and that the term itself needs to be simplified in order to be clarified.

We need to lose the “corporate” in CSR in my view because it implies a big business approach and therefore reputation-focused activities associated with Greed, Philanthropy, Marketing and Management.

We probably need to lose the “social” because the issues that organisations are grappling with, and the answers they will need to find in response, reach far beyond the purely social arena.

But we should retain “Responsibility” because to me that is the focus: the onus on organisations and the individuals within organisations to be responsible and take responsibility. It’s clear. It’s far-reaching. It requires everyone to take a position (and that position is active). And it sets a clear benchmark for every brand in every sector going forward.

“How responsible are we being?”

What do you think?

Acknowledgements
Image of “News Paper Origami Dragon Monster” by epSos.de, sourced from Flickr

Further

Connecting your brand and your social responsibility policies

Video of Dame Anita Roddick on why CSR has failed in her view: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4sHbOcd8HTI

CorporateWatch on the arguments against CSR

9 things you should know about branded language

By Mark Di Somma

President Obama word cloud

1. Language is one of the most important definers of any brand. The language you choose, the language you don’t choose and the language you choose to replace are a reflection, and in some senses a definition, of your priorities.

2. Language underpins perspective: it not only reveals how an organisation feels about a matter, it also signals how that organisation might be expected to approach and resolve that matter in the future.

3. Language defines relationships. Your tone reflects how at ease you feel in your own brand skin. Formal brands use formal language, and that formality rubs off into their dealings. Relaxed brands use more informal, chatty language and help their customers feel at ease. If your tone and manner don’t reflect your values and your personality, your communications will always feel awkward.

4. Language is instinctual. You may need rules to start with – but in time you should know whether a communication is “on brand” or not from how it feels. The best brands have language that goes without saying. It is embedded in who they are, and therefore how they express themselves.

5. Language must communicate. Truism, yes – until you look at all the gunk that pours out of brands and realise that too many of them have too little to say of any significance or interest. If you’re not adding to the meaning, say nothing. It means more.

6. Language should be jagged. It should have sharp edges that cut across the normal patter. Here’s an interesting challenge. Run a word-cloud on your website like the one that Jason Morrison ran on Obama’s speech to Congress (above) and see what it comes back with. If you spy nothing but the same, safe, predictable language as everyone else, you need to make some changes. Try finding new and exciting ways of talking about what you do. Take your language cues from your values, your worldview, your personality (naturally) and most importantly of all the personas of your customers. Talk with them, not at them about the things they want to hear about. Take your cues for this from your social media results – most searched words, hashtags that people are interested in, most popular categories for you etc.

7. Language is keywords. In addition to re-expressing your brand, look to own a small collection of words in the minds of your customers and your staff. Martin Lindstrom found 74 percent of consumers associate the word “crunch” with Kellogg’s. Another 59 percent consider the word “masculine” and Gillette as one and the same. Disney, he says, owns a whole lexicon built around its kingdom of fantasy, dreams, promises, and magic. over 80 percent of the world’s population directly associates “dreams,” “creativity, “fantasy,” “smiles,” “magic,” and “generation” with Disney. The result is what Lindstrom describes as a “smash-able” brand. You can take any piece of any experience and, even with no visual cues, it is instantly recognisable as Disney. Same with Absolut vodka. In their case, their name is so integral to their language that it functions as a language anchor.

100 Absolut ads
8. Language changes perceptions. As Frank Luntz says it so perfectly, “It’s not what you say that matters, it’s what people hear”. When NGOs talk about what’s wrong in the world, customers hear a brand that is negative. When they talk about what could happen and what they’re aiming to improve, people “hear” a brand that is uplifting. When Oxfam found that their “against poverty” message wasn’t working, they very successfully shifted to a way of talking that was “pro-humanity”. Receptivity surged. That’s because changing the language changes the premise. It redefines/ refreshes/challenges meanings that people feel they know. It requires people not just to rearticulate what they believe but to express that belief in a way that they may well never have thought of before.

9. Language should shift. Or at least it should as you become more familiar with people and they become more familiar with you. The way you talk to a prospect should be noticeably different than the dialogue you have with a loyal buyer. Plotting those transitions is critical. See this post on the MotivationMap we use at Audacity for more details.

Acknowledgements
Word cloud of Obama’s speech to Congress generated at wordle.net and posted by Jason Morrison. Sourced from Flickr.

Image of 100 Absolut ads sourced from Absolutad.com

Further reading
http://www.jasonmorrison.net/content/2009/word-clouds-what-are-they-good-for/