Our world is now complex and uncertain, visible to all of us through the still lingering pandemic and the incoming recession. The business world shows the duality of both growth and stagnation by continuing to nurture start-ups at one end and questioning revenue and profit models of late-stage companies, even post IPO.
When will uncertain times end?
Let’s say, “never”. Forget about the political end of why our world and lives look more complex than ever. From a financial, social, and economic standpoint, this world is never going to be like our lives were in the pre-covid era. Technology, digital access, and the amalgamation of both has empowered far more voices than before changing the way we function as a society.
How do we cope?
Since none of us can predict the future and the very definition of normal has changed we have to learn how to cope.
“Instead of getting stressed about change, we have to develop a growth mindset, which is ready to accept change, learn quickly and innovate to adapt to the changes we encounter.”
All the uncertainties and access to unlimited knowledge through the web, is the reason why learning mindset, growth mindset et al are becoming buzzwords. In a business context, the same growth mindset has to be imbibed by all employees to emerge as a successful business or brand. Growth mindset can help both businesses and employees to operate at their fullest potential.
How to reach your fullest potential?
For reaching the fullest potential, an individual or business needs to understand their strengths and weaknesses, value system that is being followed, motivations and fears involved. Bestselling author & motivational speaker Simon Sinek’s Golden Circle also talks about businesses and individuals reaching their best version when they start with their why. WHY gives you a perspective to the problem that the business is solving and from there competitive landscape becomes easier to review and find one’s niche. This applies for personal branding as well.
But why care to be a brand?
When humans spend money to buy any commodity or service, they look for value for money and the assurance that the product or service being promised will be delivered.
Brands stand for trust.
This trust comes from:
- Identifying the right problem in a consumer/customer’s life
- Making a clear promise to resolve the problem
- Delivering promises consistently and repeatedly over time.
It’s easier said than done. Setting expectations and meeting them means every department and every employee in an organisation has to work towards a common goal and maintain a certain standard of excellence.
As a personal brand too, an individual has to be cognizant of his behaviour, work, and output to maintain the brand identity he wants to showcase. With the right kind of brand positioning and proof of concept whether you operate as an employee, business owner or entrepreneur, the opportunity to reach your full potential is much higher. When people and organisations trust you, then they also entrust you with bigger possibilities and opportunities.
“Businesses or Individuals become brands when they deliver promises over a long period of time consistently and repeatedly.”
How to withstand the test of time?
Delivering on promise consistently and repeatedly is slightly easy for a personal brand but it becomes a challenge in organisations especially when they start growing. Hence, young organisations need to set the right culture in place so that exponential growth doesn’t dilute their brand authenticity.
Setting the right culture means setting a framework for recruitment, management, and retention of human talent in your organisation. Culture can be designed for new companies and nurtured for existing ones. Brand and culture are like two sides of the same coin. When a business is able to identify the value they bring to the ecosystem, they are able to understand what values the organisation will need to nurture in order to keep delivering as a brand. Aligning these values with employees lead to a strong culture and a strong culture makes it easy to implement processes and policies. The organisations with the best culture also need far less restrictive and autocratic policies because employees are internally motivated to perform and be efficient.
Culture & Brand Mindset can be your biggest MOAT.
While technology and access to information has made it difficult for businesses to create moat or defensibility, the understanding of culture and developing a brand mindset can help resolve this issue. Investing in employees and building a culture of trust and psychological safety can help employees reach their full potential which translates into growth for the company. Founders and management teams need to inculcate the brand mindset in all employees so that they operate towards the same goal, which is also aligned with their personal motivations.
About the Author
Siddhangana Karmakar is the Founder of Definer Brands, a boutique consulting firm which helps small and medium sized companies with their brand and culture strategy.