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Sharing the Know-How to Know How

Posted by Constance Ward on June 8, 2013 | Comments Off

When explaining complex topics, thought leaders make a clear distinction between two key terms: ”knowledge of” and ”knowledge how.”

Let’s say, for example, that you want to shape your industry to be more agile and responsive to changing demands of the economy. You shouldn’t only show colleagues what that future will look like so that they have ”knowledge of” that vision. It’s important also to show them the way to reach that goal — to give them ”knowledge how” to get there.

Similarly, if you want to change the culture of your organization, it’s important not only to give them ”knowledge of” what the changes look like and the advantages the new culture will bring. You must impart to them ”knowledge how.” Articulate clearly the steps each employee — no matter where in the organization they sit — will need to take to move toward the defined future.

Cultural change is a journey, not a destination. Employees need ”knowledge of” the destination and ”knowledge how” to navigate the path ahead.

Do you need help defining and articulating the roadmap to change internally or externally? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged change, culture, vision

Are You Loco for Logos?

Posted by Constance Ward on May 31, 2013 | Comments Off

Swimming in a sea of logos: it takes more than guidelines and graphic identity to develop effective brand strategies. Photo credit

My sister and I were enjoying a coffee and a chat about marketing her insurance business when her 5-year-old granddaughter interrupted us to ask what a logo was. I showed her the green logo on our coffee cups and sent her and her brother off on a mission to find other logos in the coffee shop.

They brought back several items with examples of known logos, as well as some random things like a piece of wood being used as a doorstop–things that made me question how clear my explanation actually was.

How do you explain logos and brands to your employees? Do you define these terms and show them examples like you do with a 5-year-old? Do you present the brand guidelines and templates for presentations, letters and email auto-signatures?

These approaches are good ways to start a dialogue about brand, but a memorable way to reinforce the true meaning of brand is to:

Print out a paper copy of the cover of your brand guidelines or some of the rules themselves.
Tear the paper into small pieces and throw it in the trash.

That’s a dramatic way to lead into a meaty discussion of how your brand is not just a set of rules about fonts and colors and sizes of your logo. It’s the total marketing proposal that your company is making to clients, potential clients and non-clients. Business guru Seth Godin defines brand more fully as

the set of expectations, memories, stories and relationships that, taken together, account for a consumer’s decision to choose one product or service over another.”

Do you need to communicate your brand better internally and externally? Ask, assess, then ask. We’re here to help!

Tagged branding, logos

Three Steps to Becoming an e-Commerce Thought Leader

Posted by Constance Ward on May 23, 2013 | Comments Off

Becoming a thought leader in the B2B, B2C or C2C arenas will require focus on improving the overall e-commerce experience in three ways. You must, step-by-step, strive to become:

The best people to shop with
The best people to do business with
The best people to work for

To be successful at the first two steps, you must make sure that your employees truly believe that you have achieved the third step. Companies have permeable walls through which such internal messages seep to the outside world. Any mismatch between your internal and external reputation as an e-commerce thought leader will destroy credibility.

Countless articles on this website address the fact that ”thought leadership begins at home.” If your own team members don’t believe that you and your company are

Your employees are also ”message multipliers” who take your viewpoints into the world.

thought leaders who excel in a given field, then you certainly won’t be able to convince external stakeholders you are.

Your employees are also ”message multipliers” who take your viewpoints into the world…the virtual or the real world. But you’ll need to remember to simplify the messages so that your staff can amplify the e-commerce messages you want to deliver.

Does your e-commerce thought-leadership approach need a refresh? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged e-commerce, internal communications

Resistance and Renaissance: A Metaphor for Managing Change

Posted by Constance Ward on May 13, 2013 | Comments Off

Renaissance or resistance? Diverging views on change may stall or stop important initiatives. Photo: www.westnetz.ch

In the trendy western part of Zurich is the Renaissance building, a tall hotel-apartment complex that has continued since its conception to draw the ire of some vocal Swiss opponents who object to the placement, size and scale of the ”skyscraper” with 15 stories. Local residents have staged a form of permanent protest by attaching a sign to an older, more traditional building in the neighborhood. That sign, in the same font and style as the Renaissance one nearby, declares the owners’ point of view: Resistance.

The juxtaposition of the two buildings presents a metaphor for cultural change in the world of business. How often do you, as a leader, try to regenerate your company and meet with reluctance to change? Are you looking to promote a rebirth or renewal of your firm for the future only to find that some employees are still holding tight to the past?

How can you effectively achieve that Renaissance and mitigate any Resistance you might be facing? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help!

Tagged change, renaissance, resistance, Zurich

5 Actions for Leaders in the Golden Hour of a Crisis

Posted by Constance Ward on May 9, 2013 | Comments Off

fire exit sign A recent article floating around the blogosphere focused on the “golden hours” of crisis communications. Those are the critical hours immediately following an event when information is incomplete but audiences are continuously seeking additional facts.

The article lists five steps as the “Grand Crisis Response Strategy” for covering those first stages of the crisis.

1. Stop the production of victims. Continuous victim production is what drives the media coverage, the public interest, the emotionalization, the commentary and criticism from 1000 sources and the reputation destruction.
2. Manage the victim dimension. This is what leaders and senior managers should be doing rather than hanging around and second-guessing the command center.
3. Communicate directly and frequently with employees, stakeholders, and those directly affected
4. Notify those indirectly affected, those who have a problem now because you have a problem; regulators, licensing authorities, neighbors, partners, those who need to know and who should hear from you very promptly.
5. Manage the self-appointed and the self-anointed; the news media and the new media, those who opt in on their own, the critics, the bellyachers, the backbench bickerers, the bloviators.

Are you prepared to make good use of that valuable time window? Ask, assess then act. We’re here to help!

Photo: Paul Harrison

Tagged crisis communications, media relations

Three Ways to Electrify Your Organization

Posted by Constance Ward on April 27, 2013 | Comments Off

Benjamin Franklin Drawing Electricity from the Air 1816 Painting Benjamin West Philadelphia Museum of Art

Benjamin Franklin Drawing Electricity from the Sky 1816 – Benjamin West (Public domain) via Wikimedia Commons

As a thought leader, you may find it more difficult to build your reputation internally than externally. Think, for example, about the saying that ”Genius is never recognized on its own soil.” Your communications team can and should help you build your professional brand internally while they work on developing your reputation in the industry.

My husband trained as an engineer and uses a great metaphor about electricity when he coaches team leaders. Applied to communications, these message-multiplier teams can help to electrify your organization in three ways. At the least, communications teams are transistors or transformers. At their best, they are transducers of the energy inside their organization.

Transistor teams simply send out messages like radio signals, rather than acting like radar, which also listens for responses. This is the least effective of the three ways to communicate internally.

A transformer communications team takes the same energy inside the organization and

At the least, communications teams are transistors or transformers. At their best, they are transducers of the energy inside their organization.

boosts it up or steps it down as appropriate to the situation. When false rumors are floating around inside an organization, for instance, a transformer team might communicate hard facts to take the energy out of the watercooler discussions. Or when a new sales campaign is launched, the transformer team might energize their employees with an electrifying communications campaign.

The third, most effective way to electrify your organization is by establishing a transducer communications team that will create a different form of energy within your company. Transducers will convert the strategic energy that exists at the top of the organization and the operational energy and dedication of the employees into a new energy source to drive the company.

Do you have transistor, transformer or transducer communications teams to help electrify your organization? Ask, assess then act. We’re here to help!

See related post: Sending the right and wrong signals

Tagged internal, transducer, transformer, transistor

Creating Crowd-ed Sidewalks

Posted by Constance Ward on April 19, 2013 | Comments Off

As a college student decades ago, I learned an important lesson about crowd-sourcing ideas that still applies to the world of business today.

Construction was ongoing at the time throughout the campus of my small university in the U.S. Midwest, Missouri Southern State University in Joplin, Missouri. Joplin is today best known for the unfortunate reason of being the place where the deadliest tornado in America struck on May 22 two years ago.

maps shows sidewalks following students natural paths

Well before concrete sidewalks were installed, students found and developed the natural path between buildings.
(View full map)

The part of the university campus I’m referring to here was not badly damaged in the tornado, so this map shows approximately where two buildings (numbers 14 and 17) were built in the 1970s and how the sidewalk connects them.

What happened when the buildings and sidewalk were built shows an early understanding of the value of crowd-sourcing an idea and channeling the wisdom of the masses.

Both of the buildings were built on a horseshoe-shaped commons area on campus. Rather than pouring concrete sidewalks between the facilities, the university let the students first make a footpath across the commons.

The students naturally found the shortest way to get from one place to another and over time wore a muddy path between the buildings. Then the university paved the sidewalk on top of the route that the students were already using. The unofficial shortcut then became the established direction for foot traffic.

Getting input from the end users of your ideas — by crowd-sourcing or cloud-sourcing the concepts — is an effective way to develop ”sticky” ideas before they are set in hard concrete.

Are you using the wisdom of crowds and clouds and stakeholders to find the best, most effective path forward? Ask, assess, then ask. We’re here to help!

Tagged crowdsourcing, ideas

Call Me–No Maybe!

Posted by Constance Ward on April 15, 2013 | Comments Off

I’m too small–and too wise–to take on Big Tobacco by myself. So I will just comment on one specific, nefarious tactic being used right now as an advertising campaign in Switzerland. Billboards are warning young adults not about the dangers of smoking (except in the small font). Instead they’re encouraging them to smoke with four little words in very large type: ”Don’t Be a Maybe!”

”Maybe” is such a powerful word and now quite a trendy one, it seems. According to a recent New York Times article by Ben Sisario titled The New Rise of a Summer Hit: Tweet It Maybe, Carly Rae Jepsen’s catchy song ”Call Me Maybe” was the longest running hit of the year in 2012 and stayed in the Number 1 spot for nine weeks.

It also spawned a series of viral internet Maybe videos, like the Cookie Monster’s ”Share It Maybe” and the political spoof with excerpts from Obama’s speeches knit together so that he seems to be singing ”Call Me Maybe.” Finally, if you want to see a funny video from a trade organization, look at the American Water Works Association video “AWWA Call Me Maybe.”

Being a Maybe person in business isn’t always a bad thing. Maybe can give you time to think things through more thoroughly so that your final decision is better considered. Maybe can give your organization time to catch up with you and align with your thinking.

But Maybe can also do the opposite and that’s the risk. Too much hesitation or ”analysis paralysis” can allow doors to close behind you and options to be taken off the table.

Do you know whether Maybe is hurting or helping your organization? Ask, assess, then act. We’re here to help so call me — no maybe!

Tagged maybe, memes

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