"The ethical brand Identity® is probably the most inclusive and authentic symbol of social, economic and environmental integrity. Licenses to use the ethical brand Identity® are not sold, but granted and not on the basis of what a brand says, but what it actually does or doesn't do."

Brands reflect the diversity of enterprise. We typically associate brands with the products and services sourced, produced and distributed by commercial entities, but the concept of branding is actually far more pervasive and profound. It is the context in which our perceptions of value are abstracted. The concept of branding touches every conceiveable type of organisation as well as people and places. Importantly, brands have also evolved from labels for these things to experiences we associate with their identities.

Our early work on the ethical brand initiative identified peculiarities that clearly distinguish all ethical brands from all others. We eventually concluded that no matter what ethical brands actually do, how large or small they are, or which geographic or cultural environments they operate in, authentic ethical brands are qualified by their respect for the needs, interests and concerns of the stakeholder communities, economies and environments they touch. We then architected a world class approach based on this inescapable truth, as well as the fact that - in the broadest sense - authentic ethical brands are genuinely committed to 'doing the right thing', whilst retaining their fiercely competitive nature and strong commercial instincts.

• The 3C Brand Experience
  
  
  
  

  • Commitment

    Even the most well-intended top-down initiatives can be overwhelmed and undermined by the efforts of the organisation itself to create the appearance of 'doing the right thing'. If obstacles such as poorly aligned incentives and inconsistent policy enforcement (to name a few) are allowed to persist then those responsible for execution are most likely to eventually conclude that the only way forward is to engineer the appearance of doing so. That may deliver short term satisfaction, but the real cost of allowing this scenario to unfold is actually substantially greater than the cost of effectively enabling and supporting an authentic commitment, which delivers far more value over the long term.

  • Capability

    An organisation that is genuinely committed to 'doing the right thing' not only needs to clarify and articulate its commitment in policy and procedural terms, but to activate its ability to do so in a very deliberate and visible manner so that everyone engaged in the fulfilment of the brand promise, or experience not only feels authorised, but encouraged and supported to make consistently accurate interpretations about what 'doing the right thing' actually means. Enabling people operating in different departments and locations, dealing with different situations to exercise that capability in a manner that serves consistent outcomes can be challenging to even the most committed brands.

  • Communication

    If the commercial promise is to be fulfilled, then current and future stakeholders need to be fully aware that the organisation is genuinely committed to 'doing the right thing'. These communications need to be particularly succinct and effective at the point of sale where the integrity of the brand needs to be asserted as part of the overall value proposition of the products or services under consideration. However, today this claim almost certainly needs to be independently verified, or authenticated, because the wide-spread practice of greenwashing has severely undermined the ability of brands to make convincing assertions about their own integrity.

• Leadership Challenge

  Leaders of ethical brands:

  • Are genuinely attentive to the interests, needs and concerns of all of their stakeholder communities, which they strive to balance;

  • Want their organisations to diminish their reliance on linear systems by leading, if not participating in initiatives that promote sustainable practices; preserve fragile eco-systems and uplift communities.

  • Are not fixated with managing perceptions, but realities and the one they all recognise is the clock ticking faster as yesterday's innovation becomes tomorrow's status quo.

  • Respect what the scientists might be saying, but are motivated by their recognition of the fact that the demand for more responsible brand experiences is rising sharply in those markets they depend on for talent, capital and customers.

  • Recognising that this groundswell demand is not for the latest must have gizmo but for fundamental change and this is presenting opportunities that nimble organisations - particularly the smaller ones - find relatively easy to address.

  • Enabling the Capability

    The characteristic qualities exhibited by authentic ethical brands do not occur naturally, or emerge merely as a consequence of any particular cultural influence, structure or even maturity - no matter how well intentioned a directive to 'do the right thing' might be. Genuine ethical brands have strong leadership that instil these qualities.

    Of course, some of these naturally occuring influences may be responsible for some of the more unique, brand specific qualities, or rather the individual character of an authentic ethical brand, but the common denominators associated with the ethical brand Process™ are the consequence of deliberate leadership.

    This begins with a clear mandate and commitment to 'doing the right thing'. However, this alone still is not enough. The organisation must also be provided with the practical ability to make more frequently accurate interpretations about what 'doing the right thing' actually means and that needs to be clarified, enabled, stimulated, nurtured and supported.

    
    
  • Commercially Inspired

    The essential nature of the challenge for any entity that aims to service this demand for change involves constantly visualising, refocusing and re-engineering the brand experience to incorporate right responses, without undermining the commercial clarity or ability of the organisation to compete. After all, what use to the world is an ethical brand if it is unable to deliver a reasonable return on investment or worse, if it is going out of business? So, authentic ethical branding is not about altruism, charity or philanthropy, but fundamentally about bottom line performance and advancing competitiveness to an entirely new level.

    
    
  • The Socrates Effect

    The ethical brand business case has always been inspired by a simple, but solid case for enabling organisations that are de facto 'ethical' to express this fact in the market - as a means to securing competitive advantage. All of the most reliable research on the subject of commercial ethics consistently confirms that the vast majority of individuals are strongly inclined to 'do the right thing'. So much so that when they are able to overcome the very real challenge of identifying what is right, more than 90% generally do so. Surprised? When we first uncovered this research in 1997 we certainly were, but then we realised that it merely confirms a simple truth that has been standing for more than 1,600 years.

    Socrates, the ancient Greek and founding father of modern philosophy - said in the 4th century: "People will naturally do what is good, if they know what is right." This certainly helps to explain why the ethical brand Identity® resonates with the vast majority of individuals. Of course, there are a number of important considerations taken into account when decision-makers encounter choice, but the presence of the ethical brand Identity® invites everyone who encounters it within their range of options, to seriously consider the prospect of 'doing the right thing' against alternatives where the evidence of right is likely to be absent. Clearly, the right to display and use the ethical brand Identity® represents a compelling commercial advantage.

    
    
  • Are Making a Difference

    The responsibilities and challenges associated with 'doing the right thing' clearly extend to everyone in the value chain - including all stakeholders themselves. The ethical brand Identity® engages stakeholders with this proposition and in so doing attracts confidence, trust and loyalty to the host brand.

    The opportunity to inspire, motivate and engage all stakeholders in the overall challenge of 'doing the right thing', making a difference and 'changing the world... one experience at a time' inspires problem-solving, innovation, quality, teamwork and sets a solid foundation for personal accountability. The over-arching objective is to impact commercial performance in all the right ways and for all of the right reasons.

    Each public expression of the ethical brand Identity® is, in effect, an invitation to make a difference. This not only enhances loyalty among existing stakeholders, but also resonates with prospective new customers, employees, investors and partners - and not just marginally so, because as the Socrates Effect illustrates, buyers prefer the ethical option on an overwhelming scale.

    In a world where commercial trust is merely continuing a sustained period of decline; where the most predictable feature of so many brand experiences is more likely to be their pedestrian or insipid and sometimes downright inhuman nature, the ethical brand Identity® promises an altogether different experience that is rational, explicable, refreshing and inspiring as well as rewarding, honest and respectful on so many levels, and above all communicable.

    
    
• Recognise Process
  

  • The 'eb' Process

    The ethical brand Process™ is the short-hand we use to refer to a sequence of activities that combine: Listening, Learning and Responding, which we identified as the quintessential enabler of the ethical brand. This process is employed by all de facto ethical brands who organise, manage and use it - formally, or informally, knowlingly or otherwise - to facilitate their commitments to 'do the right thing'.

  • The Status Quo

    Many organisations claim to be doing all of these things and in most cases they probably are. However, many organisations are - generally speaking of course - notoriously poor listeners and in any event seldom connect these interdependent activities to one another in any meaningful way. Smaller entities find it relatively easy to do all of these things well and to 'join the dots'. However, in larger environments, for example Listening may be assigned to Marketing; Learning to Human Resources while Responding is quite likely to be a rather more ad-hoc responsibility, which anyone may be expected to deal with on demand. Worse yet, it may be fielded by a call centre that is so disconnected from the core business that learning is denied. See the problem? Authentic ethical brands recognise the inescapable ubiquity of this process, as well as the need for a more conscientious approach to using it and greater recognition of the skills required.

  • Key is Listening

    Listening is the area where the process of 'doing the right thing' typically starts to go wrong and where the intrinsic lack of process integrity often creates, or at least fosters conditions that simply allow bad situations to get worse. Often, much worse. Again, generally speaking, the problem is not hearing as such, but the unwillingness, or more often the inability of the organisation to effectively recognise and synthesise information that is both important and clearly audible to it. In other words, it is the ability to filter, distill, learn important lessons and formulate appropriate responses to external input that is problematic for most.

    Deficiencies in the area of Listening effectively deny Learning. However, couple this with the typically short attention span of an organisation that is accustomed to Responding to situations and events in ways designed to serve the lowest common denominator - commonly its legal obligations - as opposed to an authentic ethical brand experience and this is an enterprise that is very likely to be haemorrhaging costly goodwill as it lurches through day to day decisions that are poorly informed, tasteless substitutes for 'doing the right thing'.

• Manage Integrity

  Reputation management is a term we hear quite a lot. However, we believe that efforts to manage reputation are misguided if they are not accompanied by any dedication to the business of managing integrity. To do otherwise is rather like treating symptoms instead of causes. Any reputation based on perceptions of integrity which are not strongly aligned with a corresponding set of realities is essentially unmanageable and unsustainable. The sum of the differences between these corresponding perceptions and realities is a measure of integrity.

  • Integrity is a Capability

    The word integrity is defined by two key words: 'wholeness' (functional, or operational capability) and 'principles' (moral and professional standards). Wholeness may be demonstrated without principles, but principles cannot be demonstrated without the corresponding wholeness.

    So, the actual integrity of a brand - any brand - cannot be reliably assessed on the basis of an examination of principles (i.e.: policies, etc.) alone, but must also consider its wholeness, that is its functional or operational capabilities, or at least its intrinsic capacity or propensity for 'doing the right thing'.

    No matter how committed the leadership is to 'doing the right thing' every organisation needs the right resources - tools, materials, data, information, intelligence, policies, procedures, incentives, etc. - in place to enable and support frontline decision-makers to make consistently accurate interpretations about what 'doing the right thing' actually means.
  • The Brand Experience Showcase

    Evidence of the actual integrity of a brand permeates every facet of the brand experience and is most vividly illustrated by the gaps between what stakeholders expect from the brand and their actual experiences of it. These gaps afflict every organisation from time to time - without exception - and contrary to what many are inclined to believe, these mismatches are rarely the product of any sinister, or malevolent intention. More often than not they are the consequence of unchecked human errors of judgement, as well as the poor translation or execution of policies or strategies, which can be commonly attributed to a failure to equip the organisation with the capabilities it requires to service the intention.

  • Insight into the Unfolding Experience

    The ability to identify, analyse and monitor the life-cycles of these gaps in real-time deliver exceptionally valuable insight at a relatively low cost. It gives leaders unparalleled insight into the brand experience as it unfolds. This intelligence can be used in very practical ways to motivate, inspire and enable the organisation to adapt and respond quickly to unfolding events and opportunities - as well as to institute corrections and improvements and promptly mitigate unintended outcomes. It also produces the most compelling evidence of functional, or operational integrity of the brand, which in turn essentially underwrites, validates and authenticates its credentials as an ethical brand.

• Monitored & Authenticated

  The credentials of an ethical brand can not be reliably assessed on the basis of any evidence of altruism, philanthropy or indeed outcomes. These things alone do not assure the holistic integrity associated with an ethical brand. Quantifying the gaps between stakeholder expectations and the reality of the brand experience provides a far more reliable indication of this and our monitoring program is entirely focused generating this insight and sharing it with Sponsors. This means both our approach and that of each authentic ethical brand are focused on the quantifiable, measureable and actionable insight into the way things are actually being done versus the way things are expected to be done. No other perspective provides more insight into the true heart of a brand.

  We ruled out approaches with subjective dependencies such as check-box management declaration, or self-assessment and rejected any that required us to make routine judgements about what particular activities, arrangements, behaviours or practices might qualify, or disqualify an ethical brand. Not because we're uncomfortable making judgements of this nature, but because our philosophy recognises de facto stakeholders as the ultimate owners of this responsibility. Providing management with insight into bodies of stakeholder opinion is an important pillar of the ethical brand value proposition.

• Fully Supported

  Our Service Plans deploy all of the elements needed to authenticate an ethical brand, but in so doing they also deliver exceptional value to each enterprise - irrespective of licensing considerations. We provide each registered ethical brand with the practical insights, tools and capability support that it needs to enable, authenticate and communicate its credentials so that it can begin to secure the combination of competitive advantages, opportunities and benefits that only genuine and authentic ethical brands are able to access. We are here to do everything we reasonably can to support each authentic ethical brand to realise its fullest potential.

  We look forward to being of service to you.Θ