You Brand

'Know thyself' comes from the Greek expression 'Gnothi Seauton'. There are various sources and interpretations, including Plato. According to Platonism, self-awareness, i.e. knowing ourselves, is the necessary point of departure for development potentials.

In today's world, we find ourselves more and more preoccupied with rapid technological progress and we neglect the slow evolution of human behavior. We forget that Moore's law does not apply to the human brain and prefer to see technology as the silver bullet to solve our problems. But technology won't save humanity. Only we could do that – supported by technology, but not driven and 'enslaved' by it.

In the present technological model, the inventor comes first and is followed by the businessman, the 'thinker' comes last. As much as I admire geeks, I don't believe in leaving the prerogative of interpretation of humanity – the ongoing discussion on what is 'social' according to Facebook is a good example – entirely to them. The 'thinkers' must become proactive and involve themselves earlier.

This requires an admittedly difficult change of individual attitude and behavior. We must think new, social, lateral and multidimensional. Even more important, we must stop selling ourselves short. We have been led to believe that the individual wields no power and influence. This is not true. Everybody can make a difference, but only if he or she really wants to. Change is not necessarily a joyride, which is probably why so many of us love progress but hate change.

Via this blog I'm looking for other 'thinkers without borders' that believe in the necessity to rediscover our human side and put people first.

Thank you.

Posted via email from Gnothi Seauton

Leaders know that ultimately every business is a people’s business.

Their reputation as leaders puts them in an enviable position, as everybody will want to work with them, giving them the agony of choice. Having the canny ability to recognize and promote individual talent alleviates this situation. Once they hire a new employee, they will mentor, support and coach them. They know that there is no such thing as a bad employee, but just employees doing the wrong job.

But above all, leaders put together great teams, of which they themselves are active members. They know that people, who don’t get along or won’t accept a common goal, will ultimately add less value than they cost. Hence the best teams are not necessarily composed of a bunch of geniuses.

Teams are democratic, every team member has a voice. Leaders don’t surround themselves with yes-men (or -women). A CEO once told me “If I surrounded myself with yes-men, I might as well do everything myself”.

People, whose abilities have been recognized and esteemed, identify with their job, i.e. their team position. They are intellectually and emotionally engaged. When they give their very best, it increases the performance and reputation of the entire team including the leader.

You remember what it felt like preparing strategy presentations for your boss? Often changing charts until the last second because of vague briefings? Of course you couldn't come along for the presentation. After all senior executives, sometimes even board members, were present. The boss wanted all the glory for himself.

Leaders are different, they empower their experts and take them along to the high-ranking meetings. Not only that, they also let them present their own work!

Leaders don't claim to know and do everything themselves. They are smart enough to know that nobody would believe that anyway. Great leaders make sure that they have the best people working with them and they open doors for them. Taking them along to high-ranking meetings and letting them perform live is one expression of their confidence in their employees abilities. During the meeting, they will make sure that the presenting employee can focus on doing his thing and doesn't get caught in any of the common political battles. What I found to be especially useful is that they also share great recipes against stage fright

At the end, everybody profits:

• The company, because it gets a great strategy and highly motivated employees.
• The leader, because the best people will want to work with him, further adding to his reputation.
• The employees, because they gain the exposure necessary to advance.

By the way: I have never met a board member, who had an issue with experts presenting great work.

I look forward to your comments.

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

Everybody expects employees to be loyal to their company and to their bosses. Of course I don't mean 'blind loyalty', which is a concept of the past. Today loyalty means conditional as opposed to unconditional, questioning as opposed to unquestioning and thinking as opposed to unthinking.

This loyalty is a two-way street. Leaders know that and are therefore loyal to their employees as well!

What do I mean by that?

Smart leaders will challenge you, they will push you and at times they will criticize you. But they will always do that internally. A leader will never leave you out in the cold. As opposed to many managers, for whom staff is just cannon fodder in the unavoidable political battles, leaders will always do their very best to protect their employees in these battles and you find them at the front line all the time. Employees are obviously part of the battle in one way or another. After all, leaders rely on their know how. Loyal employees will provide them with the necessary facts and arguments, i.e. the ammunition, to win the battle. But they are not cannon fodder!

Two-way loyalty must be earned and it is an important element in building trust. And as we all know, trust is one of the most powerful emotions.

Last but not least, we should never forget that it is also important to be loyal to ….. ourselves!

I look forward to your comments.

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

Imagine the following situation: You need to talk to your boss and call his office to get an appointment as soon as possible. His assistant tells you that you can come by on the 1st of December, i.e. in 3 weeks from now, at 3:00 p.m.sharp and that you have 15 minutes. She also tells you that this will only work, if his prior meeting ends on time. If not, a new appointment has to be fixed. At the end she asks you why you want to see him. Actually this situation is not hard to imagine, as it's reality in many companies. Big fail!

That boss is definitely not a leader. Not only that, he also squanders two of the companies most valuable resources: People and time.

I once had a boss, who made sure to answer every email from his employees within 24 hours. He often went out of his way and answered late at night or early in the morning. He had realized that this was time well spent and you know what? It made us feel important and valuable, we were extremely motivated. We didn't moan about extra projects, tough deadlines and occasional Saturday brainstorming sessions.

He also found time to look up his people in their offices from time to time. Not like many, who only come by once a year to wish everybody 'Happy New Year' – 15 seconds per employee for 'greeting plus handshake'.

Of course, we didn't have to wait 3 weeks for an appointment either

Amongst other things, leadership means to valuate highly your time AND that of your employees. After all, it is a very scarce resource and nobody's day has more than 24 hours.

I look forward to your comments.

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

Over the years, I have met myriads of managers. I have also been very fortunate to meet and work with a few fantastic leaders. Leadership is in short supply these days.

We are often deceived by gifted orators, who wind up not walking their talk. Companies are full of managers focused on managing their personal careers, procrastinating innovative decisions and trying to maintain the status quo. Peter Drucker quotes can be found almost everywhere, yet not many adhere to his advice. He must be spinning in his grave.

Few will doubt the messy state of affairs on our planet today. In this situation, great leaders are imperative.
 
Over the next few weeks, I would like to share with you some of the attributes that I consider to be relevant in describing and defining a leader. I look forward to an inspiring exchange of ideas.

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

No, she isn’t! The customer is queen. Let me therefore use the term ‘monarch’, which applies to both king and queen, instead.

Is the customer the monarch? A monarch is by definition an individual, who rules and controls a country for life or until abdication. Does the customer rule and control a brand for life or until abdication?

In my opinion, the metaphor is flawed. There are hundreds, thousands, even millions of customers, i.e. would-be monarchs. Presumably all of them each have one voice with all voices being equal and, being would-be monarchs, they would all want to rule and control. Knowing the human race, I am inclined to say ‘what a mess’. On the other hand, the larger crowds of people become, the more important it becomes to ‘organize’ them. Fortunately in today’s world that often means in a democratic way. This applies to football teams, voters, consumers and others. 

As any politician will tell you, the grassroots democracy is a great principle, but it does have its limits. You can’t have a plebiscite each and every time you have to decide something. The parliamentary democracy aims to solve this problem with elected representatives of the people voting and the principle of the majority vote applying (depending on the topic, a simple majority or an absolute majority or a two-thirds majority are necessary and on rare occasions even plebiscites are possible). The problem is of course that the elected representatives of the people are organized in political parties with different agendas. Walking the party line and voting for something that’s in the public interest is unfortunately not always one and the same thing. Looking at the political systems around the world, we quickly realize that none of them are flawless. But in my opinion the parliamentary democracy is the best system we have come up with so far. What is often neglected however, is the fact that the democratic value of this participatory system depends on the continuous engagement of each and every individual. Voting once every few years is not enough.   

What’s true for politics is also true for brands. Brands have to develop and implement a system of democratic representation with rights and duties. It is imperative to esteem the ‘customer’ as a member of the brand family and to integrate her and him into the process of value creation, may be via a ‘brand parliament’.

Declaring every customer a monarch is not the answer. Just try to imagine thousands, if not millions of monarchs, trying to wield one scepter

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

The other day I discovered this street sign in Munich and immediately liked the double meaning:

König Marke refers to a main character in the legend of Tristan and Iseult, in English he's called King Mark of Cornwall. The street sign obviously refers to him. Furthermore, 'Marke' in German means 'brand', hence 'King Brand'.

Both are characters of the yesteryear. King Mark of Cornwall for obvious reasons and 'King Brand' because in today's world, brands can not survive as monarchies

Posted via email from laid-back

There are thousands of languages spoken on our planet. Estimates range from 5.000 to 10.000 living languages and there are many dead ones as well.

In my opinion, there is one language missing and that's the one that everybody speaks and understands. Unfortunately that language does not exist.

In 1887, Ludwig Zamenhof invented Esperanto, a constructed language designed for international communication. Zamenhof hoped that Esperanto would have the added benefit of promoting the peaceful coexistence of different people and cultures. According to educators, Esperanto can be learned in 1/4 to 1/20 the amount of time needed for other languages. Still it never got off the ground. There are only about 1.000 native speakers worldwide, the most famous one probably being the businessman George Soros.

In today's globalized world, communication is more important than ever. To date, I have been able to visit many countries and meet many people. With some of them I could communicate directly, either in their native language or in mine or in a third one we both understood. At times communication was only possible with an interpreter and sometimes I had to rely on hand gestures and facial expressions. The direct verbal communication is by far the most rewarding experience, as the relationship is more personal. It has more meaning and openness.

I definitely support Zamenhof's argument that a common language can promote peaceful coexistence of different people and cultures. 'Speaking the same language' not only means communicating in the same language. Figuratively it also means sharing values and ideas. And that is exactly what we need to solve the global problems we're facing.

Choosing an existing language used by a relative minority of the world population as their native language won't work. Selecting a few 'official' languages, like the United Nations did, hasn't and won't work either. We need a language with equal requirements and benefits for everybody. This could be Esperanto or a new language. The latter would incidentally be a fantastic global crowdsourcing project. This global language would of course not aim to replace existing native languages. It would be taught as the second language worldwide.

Just think about the benefits, if we or the next generation could communicate globally in one language. Imagine sharing values globally to make this planet a better place for all of its inhabitants.

Do you speak my language?

Posted via email from Achim Muellers

In 1439 Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press, which revolutionized the 'making' of books and the dissemination of knowledge. Before Gutenberg and his invention, knowledge was generally a monopoly of the Catholic Church. Books were handwritten and copied by hand by monks in Catholic Monasteries. Gutenberg's technology was instrumental in breaking up that monopoly.

But what about content, i.e. new ideas, that would change the world? This is where Luther comes in.

Martin Luther initiated the Protestant revolution, when he published his 95 theses in 1517. Thanks to Gutenberg's printing press his theses were quickly printed, copied and distributed throughout Germany and Europe. Luther's excommunication by the pope in 1521 could not stop the movement. The 95 theses and Luther's translation of the Bible into German not only had an incredible impact on German culture, the development of a 'new' church effectively broke the monopoly of the Catholic Church.

Gutenberg's invention allowed Luther's vision to develop into an international movement very quickly. Could Luther have succeeded without Gutenberg? What would have happened, if the Catholic Church would have taken over Gutenberg's invention?

We need great thinkers and their visions to light the fire and we need technologies to spread that fire. That was true yesterday, it is true today and it will be true tomorrow.

Posted via email from Achim Muellers