Part 2 of 2. In case you missed it, read Part 1 now. For those of you catching this post on a mobile device, don’t forget to check out today’s video. If it doesn’t load properly for you, feel free to go watch it here. Caught up on yesterday’s post? Done with the moving pictures? [...]
Archive for July, 2009
Embracing Obstacles: A Leadership and Project Management Manifesto
Posted in agile creativity, being fearless, being the best, brand you, business thinkers, competitive edge, courage, design thinking, differentiation, excellence, excuses, expectations, experience, flexibility of execution, fresh ideas, hiring, hybrid thinking, innovation, insight, intelligence, leadership, management, tagged brandbuilder, butterfly effect, leadership, murphy's law, obstacles, olivier blanchard, problem solving, program management, program manager, project management, project manager on July 24, 2009 | 14 Comments »
“Making it work” : Lessons from the real world of “do or die.” Sometimes, even the best laid plans just go awry. Call them cliche, but those sayings about finding the silver lining and making lemonade when life hands you lemons, they aren’t just hot air. When I was in the French Fusiliers Marins, the [...]
Either commit or stay home.
Posted in account planning, being fearless, being the best, building value, commitment, competitive edge, courage, expectations, guts, tagged brandbuilder, commit or go home, cycling, goals, olivier blanchard, win, winning on July 20, 2009 | 35 Comments »
I realized a few days ago that every business problem/solution has a cycling analogy. For a guy who rides the line between the business world and the cycling world on a daily basis, that’s the sort of thing that can come in pretty handy. (And since the Tour De France is on right now, the [...]
Welcome to my annual midsummer blog slump
Posted in brandbuilder, tagged brandbuilder, olivier blanchard on July 16, 2009 | 8 Comments »
It happens every single year: Sometime between mid-July and mid-August, my posting rate drops considerably. You can almost set your calendars to it. I struggle with this a bit, as my contributions to this and other blogs are pretty important to me, but year after year, I find myself falling into the same pattern: One [...]
And on the eighth day… (A word-of-mouth primer)
Posted in 2009, account planning, acts of rebellion, adaptation, being the best, brand consciousness, brand culture, brand planning, brand promise, referral, relevance, WOM, WOMM, word of mouth, tagged brandbuilder, olivier blanchard, Seth Godin, WOM, WOMM, word of mouth on July 15, 2009 | 19 Comments »
So as it turns out, WOM (word-of-mouth) is at least twice as effective at influencing purchasing decisions as most forms of marketing (from PR to advertising). (Source: Nielsen) And the beauty of Social(ized) Media platforms like blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Myspace and Seesmic, is that – as connection and conversation engines, they enable, accelarate and amplify [...]
Today is Bastille Day. Vive La France!
Posted in birthday, brandbuilder on July 14, 2009 | 6 Comments »
Today is Bastille Day – which is how the rest of the world calls France’s “Fete Nationale,” or simply “le 14 Juillet.” This day in 1789, the people of Paris stormed the Bastille (Louis XVI’s political prison) and started down a road that eventually led to France becoming a Republic, just a few short years [...]
Don’t let “branding” kill your brand
Posted in account planning, brand consciousness, brand culture, brand insights, brand ownership, brand planning, brand relevance, brand strategy, brand valuation, corporate culture, customer experience on July 12, 2009 | 3 Comments »
Words of genius from Damon Dimmick, over at UX Magazine: “When corporate marketing departments dream of brand design, they only dream as far as they need. The expensive and time consuming process of extending the brand into an interactive concept is usually pushed off until it becomes absolutely necessary.”Unfortunately, by the time some serious rethinking [...]
Hiring Kung-Fu: The difference between hiring leaders and managers
Posted in hiring, HR on July 10, 2009 | 1 Comment »
I had a great conversation with someone about the topic of leaders vs. managers earlier this week, and was reminded of this post from about a year ago: (Note – If you are an HR professional, you may not like what follows.) “Managers make sure that work follows an established process. They don’t like change. [...]
The Danger of Not Doing What You Love, and other wisdom
Posted in acts of rebellion, adaptation, brand culture, brand ownership, brand you, commitment, competition, corporate culture, creativity on July 6, 2009 | 9 Comments »
Call me lazy, but instead of writing something insightful for you guys today, I’m going to share some of my favorite finds from my morning’s croissant-induced online browsing. All quotations courtesy of Pulled Quotes. On finding out what works: “I have no earthly idea what really works. I don’t know if it’s lunch or that [...]
Happy Birthday, America!
Posted in 2009, tagged 4th of july, America, declaration, independence, USA on July 4, 2009 | 4 Comments »
Eloquence, courage and passion: When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a [...]
You are ALWAYS in Beta.
Posted in adaptation, advice, being fearless, being the best, brand culture, brand planning, brand relevance, brand strategy, change, change agent, competitive edge, corporate culture, culture, design thinking, differentiation, discipline, discovery, efficiency, evolution, excellence, fresh ideas, hybrid thinking, ideation, IDEO, innovation, insight, inspiration, kicking ass, leadership, lessons, management lessons, market disruption, market research, Nike, opportunity, passion, perfectionism, performance, product design, product development, progress, relevance, routine, smart business, strategy, success, triathlon, vision, tagged brandbuilder, business, competition, hybrid thinking, improvement, innovation, olivier blanchard, perpetual beta, triathlon on July 2, 2009 | 32 Comments »
You’re always in beta. Always. If you think you aren’t, you’re already falling behind and bleeding relevance. What does being in Beta mean? It means being in perpetual test mode. It means constantly asking “how could I do this better,” even when this worked just fine. How can I listen better? How could I improve [...]
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