Brand Impact: Redefining Success When There’s No Finish Line
Defining and measuring success is no easy feat.
Yet, we know defining success is a prerequisite to leading an organization. Without success clearly defined, your teams are left to their own interpretation of what success looks like and how it’s measured – leading to an abundance of challenges in decision-making.
When we talk with leaders about what success looks like, we’re often met with ‘X dollars in profit’ or ‘X dollars in revenue.’ And while these finite numbers (what we call: viability metrics or company goals) are critical to ensure a business is viable, it’s too easy to fall into the trap of reaching that goal and pushing the goal post further the next year, and the next year, and again the next year. And at some point, you start to ask yourself, “What’s all this hard work for anyway?”
If you’re in this position now, we feel you. And when we say ‘we feel you,’ we mean it.
Redefining Success
Historically, success has been defined and measured primarily by how profitable or large your company is relative to your competitors.
This hyper-focus on beating competition and the prioritization of profit over everything else has led to a slippery slope where the well-being of a team is sacrificed to hit financial numbers – resulting in a copious amount of toxic work cultures.
We understand the appeal of simply defining success as a finite number. For starters, it’s easy to both define and measure. And it’s pretty black and white, leaving little room for misunderstanding. But on the flip side, without any other defined factors to weigh in the decision-making process, leaders and teams are likely to make short-sighted moves that can have real consequences.
Today, we’re entering a new era where employees are demanding to be treated as human beings at work – experiencing feelings and finding joy. People are no longer tolerating being a pawn whose purpose is to serve shareholders. It’s time to give teams a new purpose that leaves them engaged and energized to serve a greater vision. One that goes beyond profits.
In the HBR article, “Finding Success Starts with Finding Your Purpose,” John Coleman shares how we often begin our pursuit of success without pausing and asking why. In the article, he urges us to reflect on how we can pursue success with a deeper purpose so we can experience more joy along the way.
When we apply this idea (starting the path to success with purpose) to organizations, we see a shift in the mindset of leaders and teams. We move from playing the short game to playing the long game. And in the game of business, where there’s no finish line, playing the short game is like trying to win a game that never ends – leaving you and your team burnt out and unfulfilled.
While the long-game path requires hard, deep work, the reward is tenfold: Work has a purpose, teams experience joy, creativity, and innovation thrive, and your company finds success in both fulfillment and profits.
“So what do I need to play the long-game?”
To play the long game, we’ve identified four key components:
A viable business model
A purpose beyond realizing profits
A vision beyond realizing profits
And values to guide the behavior of your team
At Hoot Design Company, we’re on a mission to create resilient brands that have a long-term impact. In our Brand Heart process, we partner with formally trained psychologists and management consultants to identify these core components so your brand has the necessary foundation to embark on the long game.
Measuring Success
When you move beyond focusing solely on profits and competition, measuring success isn’t as black and white as it once was. And we’re here to say that’s okay. We’re here to help.
With the shift from the short game to the long game, you stop focusing solely on profits and competition and start to focus on brand impact, where profits become a byproduct of the brand.
We define brand impact as on-brand results. It’s conducting business in a way that’s aligned with your purpose, values, and vision. When a brand is aligned with its Brand Heart – employee engagement, customer engagement, ROI, connection, trust, innovation, and more become consistent occurrences. But when you only focus on the short game, these outcomes are lessened.
“So how do I live out my Brand Heart?”
With Brand Heart completed, the real work begins – embedding your purpose, values, and vision into your company culture. We do this through our Brand Culture process, where we take your Brand Heart and put it into action so leaders and teams have clear behavior expectations. To name values is one thing. Understanding what they look like in day-to-day practice is another thing. Both are necessary to play the long game.
Once we’ve outlined what behaviors lead to success, your team must make a daily commitment to practicing those behaviors because it is the sum of the actions of all members in the organization that determines the depth of your brand’s impact.
In the long game, we focus on and take the time to normalize the right behaviors. We do this through both leadership and active feedback by creating checks and balances so that teams feel empowered and accountable to contribute to the brand in a meaningful way – ultimately moving the organization closer to success.
By concentrating on the behaviors within the organization, leaders take responsibility for facilitating a culture that invites all members to become active participants in achieving success. And when done well, teams are reinspired, and engagement spikes.
Today, people are looking for organizations that do more than solely serve shareholders. They want to advance a cause and experience purpose at work. As leaders, let’s answer that call by designing cultures where we all experience greater success in both profits and fulfillment.
Ready to have greater brand impact?
