The erosion of loyalty in the workplace is pervasive, especially among millennials. This is the result of organizations not providing ways for employees to see meaning and purpose in their role and in what they do. If properly addressed, the over-arching “brand” can become the galvanizing idea to express an underlying inter-connection of Vision, Mission and Values, and provide a focal point for developing pride and greater loyalty. This new lens is about understanding the importance of congruence and how to use it.

As far back as 1968, various studies¹ have concluded that the congruence between self-image and brand-image eventually plays an important role in improving brand loyalty. Today, the thinking about congruence and incongruence comes from Carl Rogers’ humanistic approach to psychology that suggests that humans want to experience and behave in ways that are consistent with their self-image and what they would like to be.

When examining what motivates us, it’s clear we are driven by intrinsic factors far more than extrinsic ones. Thus congruence, and how to shape it, is an under-lying key to engendering loyalty, which becomes a significant competitive advantage.

Shift in loyalty

What we know from research is that 71% of millennials² say they are not emotionally and behaviorally connected to their job or company. The days of organization and corporate loyalty have shifted dramatically, and continue to do so.  66% of millennials³ already say they plan to leave their jobs by 2020. In other words, they are already thinking about moving on and not staying to build a long-term career. This puts an enormous burden on organizations to figure out the underlying needs and re-frame themselves so that they can align and engage. There are many companies trying many different activities to retain and build loyalty, but many of these programs are simply band-aids and not fundamental cures.

What is causing the shift?

There are many factors that collectively impact why employees do not feel congruent with the organization they work for. Here are some of the main reasons:

• Acceleration of industry disruption. The rate of change is increasing. Technology has disrupted virtually every industry. Thomas Friedman writes eloquently about this in “Thank You for Being Late”, a text describing the tectonic shift in attitudes resulting from technology evolution.
• Mergers creating mixed cultures with little rationalization or explanation of “why”. As markets consolidate, mergers have created larger and larger organizations, where different cultures may not share a common view of the future, and the role they can play in it.
• Mixed messages are everywhere. Think about how the world is filled with mixed and often untrue messages creating high levels of skepticism:
  • Political messages are often untruths and shake our confidence in believing
  • Religious leaders have been misleading us about pedophilia and other issues within the church
  • Advertisers mislead us. Consumers know that we can find almost any product at a lower price than advertised
  • Corporate communications from the top are often suspect. Employees are sensitized to reading between the lines
• Employees often feel unheard and unmanaged. Because of the rate of change, it is hard for companies to keep up with acknowledging individual needs. This dynamic can further distance employees at a time when they need more communication, not less.
• Corporate visions and missions are often generic and uninspiring. There are relatively few corporate visions and missions that are specific and unique to a company. Much of the time they use generic words instead of language that guides employees to feeling like they are part of something special.
• Corporate values can sound nice on paper, but are often not differentiating and compelling. When values start sounding generic, employees tune out as they do not feel any deep connection to the DNA of the company they have selected to work for. It’s about the specific values as well as the actions that support them such as compensation, incentives, training, advancement, etc.

Meaning and purpose are what employees want

At the core of millennials’ concerns (and we believe a much broader swath of employees) is the need to have meaning and purpose. They want to be part of something that aligns with their beliefs, and has a culture that validates what they are doing. 87% of millennials⁴ seek something greater than themselves, such as participating in cause work. This is a dramatic shift from prior generations.

The result is that to build and sustain a loyal workforce, organizations must establish congruence in the work place. The new mandate is that employees must truly believe what they do is viewed as part of what they would like to be. It is not enough to strive to be an organization that is the “best” at something, unless this is attached to a belief that reinforces purpose.

Congruence comes from the inter-connection of Vision, Mission, Values and Brand

In building a powerful brand, organizations need to think broadly about the narrative of Vision, Mission and Values. This is what, in total, creates congruence. Each element plays an important role in not only shaping the future, but building a community that employees want to be part of. Over the years, we have spent a lot of time guiding organizations to clarify and understand what each element is and the role it serves. We have found that stepping back and re-evaluating each element offers the opportunity for an organization to ask the hard questions about whether each is appropriate for the future the organization is facing. A tougher question is whether there is a consistent narrative that defines the organization, guides behaviors, and resonates with the changing needs of the emerging workforce.

• Vision describes what the organization aspires to be. It is, ideally, expressed to communicate the better world an organization hopes to bring about. It must be inspirational and speak to all stakeholders. A powerful vision becomes an aspirational north star.
• Mission is what the organization must do to achieve its vision. It is the guidance of what it must dedicate itself to achieve, to move ever closer to achieving the vision.
• Values are the non-negotiable beliefs an organization holds to deliver its mission. Each value should be backed up with explicit policies that are embedded in the way it does business.
• Brand is the promise of value represented by the sum of the vision, mission, values and expertise. It is conveyed through communications and behaviors.

Together, these elements form the narrative that creates meaningful congruence by embodying an idea or ideas that employees can attach to. What has changed is the need to look at all four elements as part of a whole so employees can experience congruence

Congruence Narrative

The most successful brands today shape a unique narrative. One that it is honest and true, and expresses a belief system that resonates with employees. Importantly, they reject generic corporate language and develop a unique story that could only be from that organization and none other.

Amazon really gets it… no wonder they are successful. Their Vision is:

To be earth’s most customer-centric company, where customers can find and discover anything they might want to buy online.

Knitted together with their Mission:

We strive to offer our customers the lowest possible prices, the best available selection, and the utmost convenience.

You can see how these core tenets might be attractive to employees.

Amazon Values (or what they call “Leadership Principles”) are very powerful. Notice how they focus on being the leader, and help shape the Amazon way of doing things:

• Customer Obsession.
• Ownership.
• Invent and Simplify.
• Are Right, A Lot.
• Learn and Be Curious. 
• Hire and Develop the Best. 
• Insist on the Highest Standards.
• Think Big.
• Bias for Action.
• Frugality.
• Earn Trust.
• Dive Deep.
• Have Backbone; Disagree and Commit.
• Deliver Results.

When Vision, Mission and Values are part of one fabric or narrative, they shape a brand that connects with current and prospective employees.

The internal brand language at Amazon is “Work Hard. Have Fun. Make History.” The words “make history” point to the opportunity to do something big and important. It means more than money… it signals that customers can derive extraordinary value because Amazon exists.

Successful brands that are driven by powerful ideas enable congruence

The truly great brands, large and small, spend a great deal of time focusing on their brands as the expression of the narrative.

IBM has brilliantly picked up on the need for congruence. They focus more today on “creating a world that is fairer, more diverse, more tolerant, more just.” Think about that… their over-arching philosophy does not reference products and services, but summarizes what they believe.

From a brand communications perspective, IBM links this idea to employees by speaking about “…a world we want to live in. The world you’re building…”. They make the connection for the employees so that they can see purpose in what they do every day. This is congruence at work.

Here are some corporate visions that communicate, in short form, a better world that employees can see themselves part of:

To the extent that a vision sets the stage for what millennials want to associate with, the company will attract the right people and develop greater levels of loyalty than their competitors.

The challenge is to determine whether each element provides enough guidance to shape a congruent experience so that employees stay loyal and enthusiastic. As meaning and purpose evolve as the primary driver of attracting and retaining talent, the “Congruence Narrative” becomes the epicenter of the connections.

If an organization creates a “Congruence Narrative” that resonates, just imagine how much easier many processes will become; from attracting the right talent, on-boarding, training, through internal communications, etc.

How to approach developing a “Congruence Narrative”

There is an organizing framework that can simplify developing a “Congruence Narrative”. It is based on acknowledging the role of specific groups in shaping the future. There are three distinct groups:

CEO & C-Suite. This should be the core group responsible for the Vision. They should be focused on the future and where the organization needs to go. By understanding their key task, this will simplify the number of people and speed of the process. Often, involving more people tends to complicate the process, not help.

Senior Leadership. This must be the wider team to articulate two things: 1) the Mission of the organization to achieve the Vision, and 2) the Values that drive behaviors. Involving the broader group not only develops these elements, but also generates critical alignment.

Associates. Once a draft of the Vision, Mission and Values are developed, it is imperative to involve associates to validate that these elements resonate. Critical listening to feedback will inform and help modify to result in a narrative that truly engages the workforce of the future and develops high levels of loyalty.

Organizations that take the time to truly step back and look at the inter-connectedness of Vision, Mission and Values, build much stronger levels of congruence. Think of the benefits:

• Employees will stay longer
• Turn-over costs will be significantly reduced
• Deeper corporate knowledge and intellectual capital can be transferred to each generation
• Employees will become advocates palpably socializing Vision, Mission and Values
• Internal and external communications will have an anchor to create consistency

When done, you should have a brand that signals an organizations core reason for being, and clearly telegraphs the purpose and meaning employees are seeking.

For deeper insights, contact:
John K. Grace
President & Managing Partner
E: jgrace@brandtaxi.com
T: 203-618-1100

1 Birdwell 1968; Bellenger, Steinberg, and Stanton 1976; Dolich 1968; Hughes and Guerrero 1971; Munson 1973; Sirgy 1980; Stern, Bush, and Hair 1977.
2 Gallup Reports (How Millennials Work)
3 Gallup Reports (How Millennials Work)
4 Case Foundation (Millennial Impact Report)

The New York Times featured an interesting article by Adam Grant, a contributing Op-Ed writer entitled “Unless you are Oprah, ‘be yourself’ is terrible advice.” It sheds some new light on what individuals need to focus on to “erase the gap between what you firmly believe inside and what you reveal to the outside world”.

But doing this, being totally authentic and completely open and honest, has a downside and often a negative effect on advancing in the business world. Said another way, we really don’t want to know everything about the authentic you. There is much truth here for organizations, as well.

In the corporate branding world, professionals have been trying to mine the authentic “self” of an organization… that inner essence which needs to be brought forward to present a brand that is true and honest. While this is a strong starting point, as Mr. Grant points out for individuals, perhaps organizations don’t need to focus on all the warts and truths of their inner self, but define themselves to what they can credibly claim. “Rather than changing from the inside out, you bring the outside in”.

Corporations do need to understand the foundation of where they have come from, but build their brands based on reasonable aspirations of what they want to be. It is a fine line between aspiration and over-promise…and this task has to be very carefully approached. But in the end, if that seam can be found, great brands can be crafted.

The magic is in the synthesis. Understanding the reality of the past blended into a vision of the future.

To quote Grant… “they just want you to live up to what comes out of your mouth.” So spend meaningful time thinking about what that is, and then live it. Amen.

Brand experts everywhere are scratching their heads about how the candidates (“brands”) in the current primary system are challenging beliefs and apparently re-writing the rules. The candidates in both political parties are exhibiting unpredictable, and in some cases abhorrent, behavior. We have looked beyond the immediate to remind ourselves that there are very true and proven principles about short and long-term brand development. Lest we forget, great, powerful, sustainable brands do share important characteristics. They are:

Clear and focused. Powerful brands know what they stand for and stay focused on their core positioning. Rather than bounce around with multiple promises, they understand the need to be almost singular in purpose. At this stage of the run up to the primaries, some of the candidates have demonstrated clarity and focus, and they are being rewarded for this.

Authentic and true. Great brands are authentic. Authentic brands understand what they are and do what they say. Their behavior is consistent with their promises. That means that the organization making the brand promise must be congruent. So “brand” goes way beyond communications or image. It is a mandate for behaviors. Love a candidate or not, those that rise to the top are true to what they are and do not get distracted.

Truthful and honest. Brands that win, over the long haul, are ones that are true and honest. They don’t duck and weave between claims they make, but say things that they can back up. The gap between truth and fabrication will be a key determinate over the longer run.

 Transparent. Strong brands develop a level of transparency so their key audiences understand that they are telling the truth, and not hiding or shielding key information. They understand that this transparency is the basis of the bond they have with their advocates. It would be fair to say that all the candidates, in both parties, are not transparent enough. Some believe that shouting louder masks the need to be transparent. In the long term, this strategy rarely works.

 Consistent. Brands that last understand the need to be consistent over time. Brands that fail flip-flop from one position to another to satisfy immediate needs usually fail. That is because, in the long term, consumers and voters scratch their heads being unable to attach clarity and purpose to a constantly shifting target.

Delivery focused. Many brands can induce trial by making compelling claims and promises but only brands that actually deliver on promises will endure and develop loyalty. Consumers don’t tolerate bait and switch, and what may push a short-term victory could actually develop long-term detractors.

Shouting the loudest is not an enduring platform for a brand. It certainly gets media coverage and awareness. But in the end, it is the guiding principles above that will shape the outcome and the future.

We believe that the degree to which a candidate embraces these principles will determine their long-term viability. Not just in their electability, but also in terms of their effectiveness. So while the American electorate is attempting to select one “brand” over another, those that survive over the long-term will have met the test better than others.

Brands are ultimately about meaning. Stories are the building blocks of meaning. And stories that connect your brand with a fundamental human need can help you build a powerful bond with your clients.

In our experience, this is as true for management consultants, accountants, law firms and architects as it is for carmakers, technology manufacturers, fashion designers and food brands. The difference is that while we have long accepted that emotional connection can drive consumer purchases, we like to think that business-to-business purchases are driven entirely by cold reason. They are not.

We have spent many years interviewing C-suite executives who purchase professional services. Sometimes one firm has a “silver bullet”, a tool or insight or method that nobody else has, so the choice is obvious. It happens, but it’s vanishingly rare (and quickly copied).

More often, clients have to choose between firms that have very similar offerings, people and approaches. So how do they pick? We have found that they make choices based on the story the brand tells them… the story that the brand allows them to tell about themselves.

Certain narrative patterns or storylines tend to recur within particular categories of professional services firms. The table below illustrates a few of the story patterns we often see in our work with these firms.

Credit: Archetypal story patterns based on Joseph Campbell’s The Hero With A Thousand Faces, and Carol Pearson’s The Hero And The Outlaw

Each of these narrative patterns enables a brand to evoke and address a deep human need, even when offering an abstraction such as professional advice. And each of these stories can be told in a multitude of different ways.

By understanding these patterns, a professional service firm can drive differentiation and preference.

So how do you discover and then develop your authentic brand story? There are strong clues in your firm’s origin story and in the recurring iconic stories about the firm that your professionals tell themselves. The stories that clients tell about you (and the language they use to tell them) are also powerful sources. In both cases, it takes skilled questioning and astute listening to draw out the truth in the tale.

Once you have discovered the fundamental brand story that reflects the truth of your organization, it can then be developed into compelling market-facing messages, woven through all your communications and crucially, embedded in the culture of the firm and the behavior of your people.

Mean Something If You Want To Matter

Any brand that endures and stands out from the pack does so by connecting with a fundamental human need.

Professional services firms, which deal with abstractions and intangibles, can begin to build and leverage this deep human connection by first understanding what they stand for – what they intend to mean to their clients and employees.

A powerful, authentic brand captures and signals the underlying human meaning in your business – the thing that sets you apart and makes you matter to your marketplace of potential clients and recruits.

Your brand is therefore a strategic business issue, way more profound than issues like name, logo, tagline, or visual style. Those are symbolic expressions of the brand, shortcuts to the meaning in the business: they are not the brand itself.

One of the key challenges for a professional services firm is how to encourage clients to have a committed relationship to the organization, not just to the individual consultant. Brand offers a way to do this, by building a shared sense of the meaning in the business, while at the same time enabling individual professionals to express that meaning in a way that is authentic to them.

Our experience helping professional services firms to differentiate and market themselves effectively has helped us identify three key factors that set professional services brands apart:

• Relationship is the envelope that wraps the client work. Professional services firms need to understand and leverage the emotional value of the client relationship as a key differentiator

• Attracting and developing talent is as important as attracting and developing clients. Aligning the internal and external brand is crucial
• Vision, values and beliefs drive the behaviors that convey the brand. Understanding and clarifying these areas is essential to building a meaningful professional services brand.

Take McKinsey and The Boston Consulting Group (BCG), the top two global strategy consulting firms. They each recruit similar people from the same set of elite schools, and they each address similar business challenges with similar intellectual tools. And yet clients see real differences and make choices between the two. How and why?

The answer lies in the meaning that both firms have built as they have developed their respective brands. McKinsey has come to mean power and control – the stability and order that enables prosperity. BCG on the other hand, has built its brand meaning around understanding and transformation – the insight that empowers you to change your circumstances for the better. Both are compelling meanings that speak to fundamental human needs, but each appeals to a different client mindset.

These two iconic consulting brands have used narrative and story to create meaning and differentiation as they compete for clients and talent. Our next post will explore how to use story as a tool to differentiate your firm, and to create meaning that attracts the right clients and the right recruits.

Wherever you look these days, mainstream brands are engaging in initiatives or taking a stand on issues that were once considered “social or environmental causes of fringe groups”. Social media has given activists a voice and platform to reach the masses like never before. And whether or not there is enough hard data or scientific evidence to categorically support their causes, there are most certainly enough unanswered questions around issues such as the safety of GMO’s, artificial ingredients such as aspartame, red dye 40, and the prolific use of pesticides and herbicides like glyphosate, to name a few. Consumers are no longer in the dark and are asking questions, reluctant to blindly believe the safety claims of corporations. As such, many iconic brands like McDonalds and Pepsi find themselves directly impacted by this growing sentiment. And more than ever before, it is a case of “adapt or die”. There are many examples of brands that have been proactive, or at the very least, quick to respond. Yesterday Chipotle announced that 100% of their ingredients are now non-GMO. On the same day, Pepsi announced that they will no longer use aspartame in Diet Pepsi. And in January 2014, General Mills announced that Cheerios will be GMO free.

[Read more →]

This blog was originally featured on the Shared Services and Outsourcing Network’s website on October 10th, 2013.

One of the great challenges of a shared services division is to attract the best talent and keep them motivated. This is understandable. Because the concept of “shared services” has built into it a negative stereotype from the start, creating and managing a strong internal “brand” can accomplish a number of important things:

• It can signal the true value the shared services team provides and define value in a new way
• It can be a beacon to attract the best talent
• It can keep the team not only motivated, but also excited to continually elevate the value of what the team can deliver.

[Read more →]

Generation Y Should I Trust You? The Challenge for Brands

Brands are symbols of trust – we use them as navigation beacons in a landscape of uncertain options. But the next generation of consumers is re-defining what it takes to be trusted.  At the core of this re-definition are two attributes: sustainability and authenticity. Brands that lack those qualities will struggle increasingly to attract either consumers or recruits.

According to research by The Intelligence Group, this next generation of consumers, described as Generation Y or ‘Millenials’, want to make the world a better place, and they’re demonstrating this intent in the brands and products they choose, ‘… products that follow ethical practices and are aligned with social causes’. (adweek: responsible youth)

For these digital natives, sharing is a normal part of life. Everyday they share photos, ideas, technology and information about themselves.  Defined by The Cloud, a key facilitator of this ‘open source‘ lifestyle is mutual trust and the brands that can demonstrate the qualities that drive trust, like honesty and authenticity, will benefit from Generation Y’s loyalty.

[Read more →]

What can the difference between a straight line and a circle teach us about building a sustainable economic system that fuels growth without destroying our planet? And what do brands have to do with it?

The answers are “lots” and “lots”, respectively.

This is the first in a series of posts in which we will explore the relationship between brands and sustainability. So we thought we should start by questioning whether consumerism itself is sustainable. Is it reaching the end of its useful life? And if it is, what can replace it as an engine for economic growth?

The law of unintended consequences has meant that the existing model of consumption makes many of us sick, unhappy, stressed, and time-starved; it fails to produce affordable food that sustains healthy life; it fails to offer work that gives us a healthy sense of meaning and purpose; it gradually renders the planet itself unviable; and it makes only 1% of us wealthier.

For most of us, this is not a good deal. For our children, it’s disastrous.

In his book ‘Cradle to Cradle’, William McDonough recognized that in nature’s cyclical design, resources are infinite.  Yet human industry is driven by a traditional linear economic model: Take (resources) – Make (stuff) – Dispose (dump when the new version comes out).

So which is the better (more sustainable) option? That’s where the circle comes in.

[Read more →]

To ensure a seamless image, smart brands take responsibility for both the content of their ads, as well as the environment in which their ads appear.

Vigilance is especially necessary online, where intelligent software and e-marketing technologies allow brands to target the user, not the environment. The old adage of ‘fish where the big fish are’ has never been more true. With varying degrees of success.

A friend of mine recently joked on Facebook: ‘If the ads that Facebook so cleverly targets at me are correct, I need to: a. Lose 9kg. b. Buy a motorbike and c. Attend the classic rock concert at Willowbridge Barnyard Theatre. Now that’s artificial unintelligence if ever I saw it.’

She’s a fit, slim, married, mother of two in her 40s, who lives in the suburbs and drives a family-friendly 5-seater VW.

But getting it wrong can have more sinister results. What happens when a brand finds itself in an online environment that potentially undermines its image? [Read more →]