変更

This is always a brand steward’s nightmare. Boardrooms talk about the importance of innovation to keep the company vibrant and ahead of the game. Yet many companies translate this into change simply for the sake of change. Without clearly understanding the brand relationship with the customers change can be fatal to a brand.

Wendy’s is an example of how a brand lost its way with the sudden death of its founder, Dave Thomas, in 2002. The company continues to struggle to find its brand voice without Dave leading the way. This is often a problem when the owner/founder of a company is also part of the brand.

The biggest dilemma facing many brands is internal boredom. The desire to change the look and feel of a brand. The need to make it new and modern. The aspiration for brand managers to put their own mark onto the brand. Make sure the purpose for making changes to your brand is clearly understood and doesn’t attempt to change the brand’s DNA.

Pizza Hut has been struggling trying to find its brand positioning (a very costly way of understanding how the brand is connecting with its customers). Unfortunately, they keep changing the messaging and executions in the hope of connecting to their customers. They should spend more time and money on understanding their relationship with their customers than continually changing their advertising direction.

Brand line extensions are another brand folly. There are some natural and obvious line extensions and there are some ambitious attempts to get customers further embracing the brand. Virgin Group Ltd., the parent company’s to the over 200 Virgin branded company under the control of its billionaire founder, Sir Richard Branson, has shown that a relevant brand position can extend beyond many business sectors ranging from mobile telephones, to transportation, travel, financial services, leisure, music, holidays, publishing and the list goes on. If you visit the Virgin Group website they state that “Virgin stands for value for money, quality, innovation, fun and a sense of competitive challenge.” It is through these brand values that allow the Virgin brand to transcend across a multitude of businesses as a unique and distinct brand. While BIC pens brand promise didn’t allow them to extend their brand into pantyhose (what where they thinking!). They did successfully extend the BIC brand to water sports equipment (go figure!). Whoever heard of disposal surf boards?

The more unique, relevant and credible the brand promise is, the greater the chance its brand extension will be successful. That’s why Paul Newman’s food products succeed and Willie Nelson Biodiesel Fuel and Lance Armstrong’s LiveStrong mutual funds failed. Consumers may love Nelson’s music and respect Armstrong for his many “Tour de France” cycling races; their brand promise has no connection with consumers concerning car engines and finance.

The moral of this story is don’t mess around with a successful brand unless you truly understand the brand connection with its consumers. The Virgin Group’s example shows how a brand promise is bigger than a product (a plane, cell phone etc) but is intricately linked to the core values that drive the entire Virgin group of products. This brand promise connects each product strongly to the brand and to the consumer. A Virgin medical centre may not succeed.

Derrick Rozdeba – I am a connoisseur of fine brands. Using my brand appreciation and insights, like a sommeliers, I will impart my knowledge and opinion in savoring the many brands that identify our lives. Visit my blog http://derrickrozdeba.blogspot.com/

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Why is there resistance to change? Are people just naturally perverse, or are there concerns which if understood and correctly dealt with will create the buy-in required to turn resisters into supporters and generate the momentum needed to overcome the gravitational pull of the status quo?

There are six layers at which resistance can occur.

We Do Not Agree on the Problem

Go into any poorly performing organisation and ask people from various functions what the issues are. In all likelihood, within each function you will find different opinions as to what the problem is. The situation is not unlike the six blind men in the rhyme, who went to see the elephant. Each honestly describes his experience, but none of them captures the essence of the whole.

This is why different initiatives are launched in each department to try and solve the different problems. But if we remember that organisation are systems and departments/functions are interacting parts of a whole, we then realise a more holistic approach is needed. This is where the method outlined in the last article is useful. Through a combination of rigorous logic and experience based intuition, we build tight cause effect relationships that lead us to the core problem.

Usually disagreements as to the problem disappear once this approach is used.

We Do Not Agree on the Direction of the Solution

If a problem is long standing, its persistence indicates that there are conflicts preventing its successful resolution. An example of such a conflict is where management proclaims quality as number one and generally supports actions that guarantee quality until sales volumes are threatened. Then the quality mantra is quickly abandoned – especially if we are talking about the last quarter of the year. When the pressure eases early in the new year, quality becomes important again.

Another case is the conflict between delegation – to improve speed of operations and customer service on one hand, and control – to contain costs on the other hand.

By questioning the assumptions behind each of the conflicting positions, erroneous paradigms can be unearthed and thus the basis of the conflict eliminated. Thus a particular direction for solving agreed problems can be pursued. A powerful tool for resolving conflicts is the Evaporating Cloud which is part of the TOC logical tool set.

We Do Not Agree that the Proposed Solution Resolves the Problem

Even with the problem and the general direction of the solution agreed, it may be difficult to convince stakeholders that a particular solution completely solves the problem. In this case just as logical cause effect relationships can be used to construct a diagram to represent the problem (as described in the last article) so also can they be used to construct a diagram logically relating the proposed solution to the new desired states.

Thus such a logical description can be used to convince stakeholders that all the original problems are eliminated when the solution is implemented. Yes But… the Proposed Solution Will Create Other Problems

It is not unusual that the designer of the solution is blind to the shortcomings. So even though stakeholders now agree that the solution solves the stated problem, they may claim that it creates other problems in their place (like the case where eliminating a pest causes a proliferation of other undesirable creatures that it preyed upon).

The solution here is to acknowledge the concern and then work with those affected to eliminate it by the same logical process already described. Involvement of affected stakeholders creates even stronger buy-in. At this point every one is ready and willing to go ahead, but…

Yes But… there are Huge Obstacles to Implementing the Proposed Solution

The solutions proposed may require skills, resources, technologies, approvals that are currently unavailable. The obstacles are attacked in a step by step manner. The outcome of the process is a sequence of prerequisites needed to overcome the obstacle and thus implement the solution.

At this point there is complete buy-in along with a plan for executing the required changes.

Unverbalised Fear

At the end of the day, any residual resistance is most likely due to unverbalised fear – a vague feeling of unease arising from the fact that we will be doing something entirely new. Leadership is what is needed here to provide the inspiration and confidence to go forth and just do it!

Samuel Okoro is the CEO of Leapfrog Alliance Ltd, a management training and consulting firm that helps organisations to reduce costs and improve quality through better business processes. His personal passion is to help move Third World business to world-class levels. For further details please visit [http://leapfrogalliance.com/resources.html]

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Many business owners today are faced with the challenge of too much to do and seemingly insufficient time in which to do it. It is easy to become overwhelmed-there is always a lot to do and it all seems to need to be done NOW!

As an entrepreneur you may need to wear the many hats of CEO, receptionist, sales manager, marketing director and janitor all rolled into one, so you can quickly lose focus and become snowed under. It’s easy to get caught up with the busyness and just do what we’ve always done. But in order to maintain our sanity, increase our efficiency and live balanced lives while growing our businesses we need to step back, take an objective look at our situation, and make some needed changes.

To stay competitive and grow requires innovation and that inevitably means change. As Charles Darwin said, “It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” Change is vital for our survival and growth, but often presents our greatest challenge. Developing new habits isn’t easy-old habits, however unproductive, are comfortable and usually demand little thought or effort. Staying in the status quo may be easy, but it probably won’t get you where you want to go.

Easy Keys to Make Positive Changes

Below are three keys that have helped me to make needed changes.

1. Keep Your Eyes on the Prize

Take some time to clearly define where you ultimately want to take your life and your business and why. Ask yourself what you want your life and your business to look like in the future. Conceptualize it-see it, feel it, smell it. Think about what you want to be remembered for.

In order to achieve this, note down the changes you’ll need to make.

2. Consider the Price

Weigh the costs and the rewards. Reflect on what these needed changes will cost you personally. You may have to reach beyond your comfort zone-perhaps learn new technology, work in unfamiliar markets, brush up on skills you haven’t used lately or do things you don’t especially enjoy. Be realistic and understand the price you’ll have to pay to change. Also consider the possible consequences of failing to make these changes.

3. Commit to the Process

Write a step-by-step plan to reach your goal. It needn’t be complicated, but it needs to be documented. Now, commit to work your plan.

It helps to share your plan with someone else and ask him or her to hold you accountable to make the changes and do what you’ve committed to do. It’s also encouraging to celebrate your successes, even the small ones, together.

Keep your eyes on the prize. Recognizing and remembering the potential payback to you and your business of making these changes is key-the What’s in it for me? factor. Focusing on these benefits often provides the motivation and self-discipline we need to make the effort and stick with our new habits. I encourage you to take your time, your business and your life seriously-take responsibility for your own success by making necessary changes.

Victoria K. Munro is co-founder (along with husband Dave Block) of Make-it-Fly® LLC, a company dedicated to creating success for small business owners through creatively designed programs and tools. Victoria has started and run nine different businesses. To receive FREE business success articles with tips to help you with your business, sign up for their award-winning ezine, “In-Flight Refueling,” at: http://www.Make-it-Fly.com, and receive a free copy of the eBook, Get More Done in Less Time: 101 Quick and Easy Time Tactics & Tips.

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