Brand(ing):Inside & Outside

What’s Better Than Branding the Organization with the CEO?

December 9, 2008

Tweet Graeme Martin , Director of the Centre for Reputation Management through People at the University of Glasgow, has written an interesting post on his blog, about the Dangers of Branding Leaders . Writing about the practice of creating an organization’s brand / identity from the celebrity personality of the CEO as a strategy for […]

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B Corporations and Employer Branding

November 27, 2008

Tweet Branding your organization as being "for purpose and for profit" might help you attract just the right kind of talented job applicants. At least that’s what the HR Folks at Reece Computer Systems seem to believe. In their job posting for a Consulting Engineer , Reece Computer Systems not only describes the position and […]

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Musselman’s Applesauce Refocusing on Its Core Identity

November 17, 2008

Tweet Claiming your authentic identity can be good for your organization. Sometimes, getting back to the core of “who you are” can help your organization create a distinctive position relative to competitors. This is the reasoning behind the new ad campaign by Musselman’s (the company photo credit : fauxto_digit that makes applesauce, apple juice, and […]

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Organizational Identity, Employee Branding and Political Contributions: Should you care if The Body Shop leans Republican?

October 27, 2008

Tweet The Body Shop is Republican? Anita Roddick must be rolling over in her grave. Released last week were the results of a study that shows how organizations have supported the Republican and Democratic parties. The data include direct corporate support (through Political Action Committees) and/or the support of these organizations’ employees (through individual donations). […]

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The Lyin’, the Which? , and The Wardrobe: Palin’s new clothes cost her more than $150,000

October 23, 2008

Tweet Sarah , Sarah , Sarah . Just when I’m ready to move on to other topics, you serve up yet another opportunity to understand organizations and authenticity. This time, the lessons are all about image, and the relationship between how we present ourselves and who we really are. If Palin’s wardrobe upgrade had been […]

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Homophobia and (In)Authenticity at Omnicom: What can a leader do?

July 24, 2008

Tweet I am struggling to understand the pattern of reactions to a recent critique of an organization’s authenticity. Bob Garfield, writing in Monday’s (7/21) Advertising Age, has an Open Letter to Omnicom President-CEO John Wren, asking Wren to look at the contradiction between Omnicom’s public Statement on Corporate Responsibility and the homophobia represented in three […]

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Fake Names for Authentic Organizations? Thornberg & Forester

July 3, 2008

Tweet Is this organization being authentic by giving itself a fake name? photofrom digitalcontnentproducer.com There’s a funny little news tidbit in Sunday’s New York Times Business section, right below Tommy Hilfiger’s engagement announcement (as if that’s business news?). It’s a paragraph about a design & communications firm, Thornberg & Forester . Neither Thornberg nor Forester […]

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In the authenticity battle, who wins? Barbie vs Felicity

June 12, 2008

Tweet Does an organization’s authenticity protect it somehow, and make it stronger? S houldn’t it be harder to influence, harder to infiltrate, harder to damage an organization where identity, image and action support each other? Whenever I noticed an organization differ from its industry’s norm, or noticed a subsidiary doing something completely different from its […]

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Suspicious of “Authenticity”, women challenge Dove ads – Again!

May 12, 2008

Tweet The latest controversy over Dove’s "Real Women" ads shows just how suspicious we are of organizations that claim they have become authentic and honest, after showing themselves to be neither. You may already be aware of the two previous controversies related to Unilever Corporation’s Dove "Real Women" ad campaign . [Jump to previous post […]

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Previous Authenticity Controversies re: Dove & Unilever

May 11, 2008

Tweet Can Dove / Unilever be thought of as ‘authentic’? 1. Dove makes and sells products to ‘fix’ women’s beauty problems, and contradicts the messages it intends to send in the "real beauty" campaign. These unreasonable standards of beauty hurt women and girls . CBC’s Street Cents "examines whether Dove wants to turn beauty standards/stereotypes […]

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