Client Story
Building a Brand Culture for an Education Think Tank
The Idea
A new CEO came to us with this vision: to position her research facility at the U.S. Department of Education to grow a new revenue stream.
Identifying What Matters Most
To achieve our goal, we needed to transform the culture of this research facility from an academic think tank to an entrepreneurial hive of education thought leaders.
First, to discover the organization’s value proposition, we had to find out what really mattered to its customers and its staff. Using our collaborative facilitation method, the staff worked to define a set of core values that guided their work in education. Next, we interviewed key customers to highlight disconnects between the staff’s values and the customer experience.
Research That Lights the Way
Through a series of in-depth interviews and discussion groups, we found that the values of the client and the values of the customer were in sync, but certain practices made customers feel misunderstood.
To solve this key communication problem we identified words, behaviors, and images that conveyed shared values. Knowing that the words and actions they’d be asked to adopt would be meaningful to prospects, our client’s staff embraced the changes without the anxiety that new business development situations often pose for knowledge workers.
Building a Brand Culture
Once the new positioning was developed, we designed a staff training process to cultivate a brand culture and build the organization’s capacity to communicate clearly once we were out of the picture. Our Brand Ambassador School was customized in collaboration with people recruited from client management, marketing, and support staff. All areas of the organization were represented in this effort, with education researchers, policy strategists, instructors, and administrative assistants working in conjunction with senior consultants and managers.
Together, we plotted a sales road map attending to all touch points of customer experience. The Culture Code Book included a booklet, a YouTube video series, sample sales scenarios, sample scripts, and visualizations of the values set created tools to continually reinforce the “everyone sells” culture. By the end of this process, we had a set of values and goals people could rally around. The positioning rang true with just about everyone we’d spoken to, including prospects.
Impact of Our Work
What was an insular think tank is now a vibrant operation with three new satellite offices. Revenues are up 30 percent from entirely new accounts. What was a cost center for the U. S. Department of Education is now a break-even proposition. The project influenced the organization's brand extensions and ongoing advertising, earning it awards for outstanding communications.
We felt greatly honored to be part of a creative process that makes such a difference on an important issue—public education—and to the people who ultimately benefit, namely, an entire population of teachers, children, and their families.
Building a Brand Culture for an Education Think Tank
The Idea
A new CEO came to us with this vision: to position her research facility at the U.S. Department of Education to grow a new revenue stream.
Identifying What Matters Most
To achieve our goal, we needed to transform the culture of this research facility from an academic think tank to an entrepreneurial hive of education thought leaders.
First, to discover the organization’s value proposition, we had to find out what really mattered to its customers and its staff. Using our collaborative facilitation method, the staff worked to define a set of core values that guided their work in education. Next, we interviewed key customers to highlight disconnects between the staff’s values and the customer experience.
Research That Lights the Way
Through a series of in-depth interviews and discussion groups, we found that the values of the client and the values of the customer were in sync, but certain practices made customers feel misunderstood.
To solve this key communication problem we identified words, behaviors, and images that conveyed shared values. Knowing that the words and actions they’d be asked to adopt would be meaningful to prospects, our client’s staff embraced the changes without the anxiety that new business development situations often pose for knowledge workers.
Building a Brand Culture
Once the new positioning was developed, we designed a staff training process to cultivate a brand culture and build the organization’s capacity to communicate clearly once we were out of the picture. Our Brand Ambassador School was customized in collaboration with people recruited from client management, marketing, and support staff. All areas of the organization were represented in this effort, with education researchers, policy strategists, instructors, and administrative assistants working in conjunction with senior consultants and managers.
Together, we plotted a sales road map attending to all touch points of customer experience. The Culture Code Book included a booklet, a YouTube video series, sample sales scenarios, sample scripts, and visualizations of the values set created tools to continually reinforce the “everyone sells” culture. By the end of this process, we had a set of values and goals people could rally around. The positioning rang true with just about everyone we’d spoken to, including prospects.
Impact of Our Work
What was an insular think tank is now a vibrant operation with three new satellite offices. Revenues are up 30 percent from entirely new accounts. What was a cost center for the U. S. Department of Education is now a break-even proposition. The project influenced the organization's brand extensions and ongoing advertising, earning it awards for outstanding communications.
We felt greatly honored to be part of a creative process that makes such a difference on an important issue—public education—and to the people who ultimately benefit, namely, an entire population of teachers, children, and their families.
