The Musings Of An Opinionated Sod [Help Me Grow!]

Or should I say the hijacking of purpose by marketing departments and agencies.

Far too often, we see companies where their ‘purpose’ has no day-to-day impact on the operations or decisions they make beyond pushing their marketing messages and promotions. For these orgs, purpose is positioned simply as ‘something we hope might change’ rather than actively doing stuff that actively pushes it.

As they say in the UK, “the truth of the pudding is in the eating”, and a lot of corporate brand purpose tastes like bullshit.

That doesn’t mean the concept of purpose is entirely wrong.

Oh no.

However the reality is true brand purpose is born rather than manufactured – especially by a marketing department – so for every Patagonia, there’s a Unilever … which is why I find the easiest way to see who is talking truth versus shite is simply by exploring how much inconvenience they’ll accept and embrace.

Recently I saw an interesting example of a brand who not just embraced inconvenience, but demanded it.

An example which I imagine caused all manner of friction and tension throughout the company.

And yet, when you think about who the company were and – more importantly – who they wanted to become, you see it as absolute commitment to their beliefs and ambitions.

Take a look at this …

Now I appreciate some would read that and only see the problems … the costs … the disruptions … the impact on productivity … the C-Suite ‘bullying’. But they’re probably the same people who think purpose is about ‘wrapping paper’ rather than beliefs and actions … which is why I kinda-love this.

I love how much they were pushing it and how they pushed it.

It was important to them.

Not for virtue signaling, not for corporate complicity – though I accept there’s a bit of that – but mainly because a company can’t talk about technology, creativity and the future while asking your very own colleagues to embrace the cheap, the convenient and the conformist.

Just to be clear, this is VERY different to companies who mandate processes.

That’s about control and adherence.

A desire to keep things as they are rather than what they could be.

And to me, that’s the difference between those who ‘talk’ purpose and those whose actions are a byproduct of it.

Every day in every way.

Because as the old trope goes, it’s only a principal if it costs you something and the reality is – like strategy – too many talk a good game but will flip the moment they think they could make/save a bit more cash.