Heading up a brand that has been growing for years? Serving a great Brand you believe in? Think your brand is immune from destruction?
Let’s reset the narrative with some basics. Companies are made up of people. 100% of businesses are made from people. Many large organizations in fact started at their beginning with 1-2 or a small group of individuals with a great idea, cause or purpose driving them. Money is not the driver. It’s the result. It’s always just the result. The driver is the purpose, the cause, the Simon Sinek “why” behind the actions and directions of people creating those brands.
Technology is a river that flows through every aspect of an organization. It provides modern-day advantages never seen in prior decades. It also creates log jams, workflow issues and serious risk to the very heart of organizations that have taken decades to build up: the Brand.
No brand is too big to fail. There are many former Iconic brands who are non-existent today. The examples are countless: Toys R US, Sears, Blockbuster, Kmart, Oldsmobile, Tower Records, Compaq, Borders, F.W. Woolworth etc. All residing today is the graveyard.
Each demise has varied causes with one common theme: failure to adapt to technology advances. The core of a brand is one thing: it’s reputation. The reputation is built on various factors. At it’s fundamental center is Trust.
Reputation is built on Trust. The breach of trust destroys reputation. A large brand that is untrustworthy is doomed. The demise will come. It always does. It may take a few years longer if very large or swiftly when the size or geographical footprint is smaller.
For anyone who wants their brand to survive and thrive 10 years from now, there are warning signs in the US and global economies that need attention paid to. When viewing the risk to your organization through the lens of security, one needs to realize that cybersecurity is everyone’s responsibility. To manage cybersecurity a brand cannot simply look at the CIO. It’s up to leadership far moreso than the CIO to make it a priority. The CIO has provide vision and execute on the vision, but the executive leadership needs to be aligned and drive it into the very fibers of the people in all departments.
When done correctly, the organization is protected, growing, leveraging advances in technology to gain exponential returns. All while risk is mitigated.
The ones that adapt focus on one cause, purpose, or driver: To Challenge the status quo. What do we mean? It’s different for each industry and company so I can speak to mine. In the IT and Cybersecurity industry the firms that thrive challenge the status quo for their clients. That create the awareness that doing things the way they always have been done is bad. Bad for the client, bad for their brand and bad for the economy as a whole. Consequently, it had detrimental effects on the people and their families who serve that brand.
In reality, staying with the status quo actually means you are falling behind. Falling behind your competition, falling behind in your industry and falling behind for your people that serve your brand.
In cybersecurity, the requirement today is to do things today, spend the time & resources on things you haven’t done in the past. The pandemic and reallocation of employees to remote and hybrid work environments created a technology footprint that most large organizations and many mid-tier and smaller ones are only now catching up with and falsely thinking they are safe.
There are many steps to take. Where to start depends on your history and current stance. Literally every organizations has a need to level up, advance this year and move the needle.
Where to start? Assess where you are. To change the status quo, we have to identify exactly where we are at today, in detail. An assessment is that first step. To assess your current state, desired state, the gaps and create a roadmap to get there is fundamental.
David Mauro
Regional Manager Great Plains, Chicago Market
All Covered, Konica Minolta Business Solutions, US
Contact David Mauro and the All Covered Team to learn more.
