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2nd Head
Friday, 29 January 2010
Thursday, 21 January 2010
Consultants - why we're not all bad
While furiously networking at an event the other day, it occurred to me that I do feel slightly embarrassed to admit that I’m a consultant. There’s something in that vaguely innocuous three syllable word that I’m sure sends shivers down many a spine.
Is it me, or can I see something in people’s eyes, which says: “Uh oh, prepare to be bored...”? Now I may be paranoid, but there is some truth in the rather unflattering reputation that precedes us consultants. We can be horribly officious and condescending in our manner and tediously dry in our approach to business.
I base this on my own experiences of the many consultants, who have tried to harangue me at exhibitions in the past. In one particularly chilling incident, an HR consultant attempted to prove his superior intellect with the opening gambit: “I’m going to ask you a question that you won’t know the answer to. But give it a go anyway.” And then proceeded to bear bait me for half an hour until I finally had to admit that yes, indeed, he was cleverer than I and no, I had not a fair clue what I was talking about. If I had been an onlooker, surely I would have rushed over with a zoo sized net and thrown it over this man shouting “No, no, no, no. That is NOT how you do business!”
Why did no-one save me from his patronage?
The greatest error that you can make as a consultant is to be a know-it-all - to sweep into an organisation/conversation/room, with all the tact and sensitivity of Katie Price. Surely we are better than that? A good consultant will recognise that yes, they do know their stuff. Indeed they should know a lot about business and their particular area of expertise. But they do not know everything and are certainly no better than the people or businesses they’re trying to assist.
A good consultant should recognise that they are an enabler and by quashing a person’s confidence they will never help that person or their business succeed.
What I hope is that 2nd Head will practise exactly what we preach, that we will provide the support and objectivity that businesses need to plan for growth. But we will do so sensitively and with empathy.
We enjoy working in businesses and the challenges they present. So I hope you don’t mind, but we intend to have fun too.
Is it me, or can I see something in people’s eyes, which says: “Uh oh, prepare to be bored...”? Now I may be paranoid, but there is some truth in the rather unflattering reputation that precedes us consultants. We can be horribly officious and condescending in our manner and tediously dry in our approach to business.
I base this on my own experiences of the many consultants, who have tried to harangue me at exhibitions in the past. In one particularly chilling incident, an HR consultant attempted to prove his superior intellect with the opening gambit: “I’m going to ask you a question that you won’t know the answer to. But give it a go anyway.” And then proceeded to bear bait me for half an hour until I finally had to admit that yes, indeed, he was cleverer than I and no, I had not a fair clue what I was talking about. If I had been an onlooker, surely I would have rushed over with a zoo sized net and thrown it over this man shouting “No, no, no, no. That is NOT how you do business!”
Why did no-one save me from his patronage?
The greatest error that you can make as a consultant is to be a know-it-all - to sweep into an organisation/conversation/room, with all the tact and sensitivity of Katie Price. Surely we are better than that? A good consultant will recognise that yes, they do know their stuff. Indeed they should know a lot about business and their particular area of expertise. But they do not know everything and are certainly no better than the people or businesses they’re trying to assist.
A good consultant should recognise that they are an enabler and by quashing a person’s confidence they will never help that person or their business succeed.
What I hope is that 2nd Head will practise exactly what we preach, that we will provide the support and objectivity that businesses need to plan for growth. But we will do so sensitively and with empathy.
We enjoy working in businesses and the challenges they present. So I hope you don’t mind, but we intend to have fun too.
Friday, 15 January 2010
2nd Head website now live
We’re pleased to announce that the 2nd Head website is now live! After just a few months of brand development and the hard work of a few faithful suppliers we finally managed to get there.
Having a website is the absolute basic requirement of any business as many of will know, so in some ways it’s quite ironic that it’s also one of the trickiest things to get right. Especially when you consider that it’s usually developed within a hot pot of other marketing activity that demands equal attention and tender loving care.
After all the effort that’s been poured into developing the 2nd Head brand, I thought I’d impart a few (hopefully) wise nuggets of information on ways to develop and nurture a fledgling brand and within a reasonable timeframe.
In the beginning
Right back in the beginning all we had were good intentions and some great ideas. We knew roughly what services we wanted to deliver and why, but we needed to articulate this.
Before we did anything else we met up as a team to talk about our aspirations for the business and what we stood for. What were our values? What was going to make us different to other consultancies and most importantly, why would businesses want to work with us? From this we were able to draw up not only our ethos, but everything that constituted the 2nd Head brand.
We formalised our brand model using a tried and tested structure that roughly included: vision statement, brand essence, positioning (our strapline!), key messages, personality and principles. Once we had all of these in place we were able to develop them into two key brand areas: tone of voice and visual identity.
Of course there were times during this process went it felt as if it would have been easier to just get on with the ‘important things’ like writing the brochure or putting together web copy, or even making some sales calls. We agonised for weeks over our strapline: we disagreed on what sounded good; we came up with embarrassing suggestions and we spent several meetings trying to tactfully appraise each other’s ideas. Never an easy job!
But it was worth it. Spending the time on the basics was essential in galvanising our thoughts and helping each of us to understand what we were aiming for. Without these conversations the next stages of the process could have been both unnecessarily time-consuming and incredibly painful. Every word we threw out, every time we had to explain ‘why’ we liked something, was integral to the moment when we could finally declare: ‘This is our brand.’
I found this process most useful when explaining our brand values as part of the brief for our graphic designer. It was an excellent means of providing direction and clarity to our visual identity.
Consistency is key
There are two types of approach to producing corporate literature. You can either create specific materials based on an idea of how the brand should look, or you can take the time to create a corporate colour palette and other imagery to be used both for current and future design work.
The former approach allows for a ‘quick and dirty’ solution and arguably enables those that are working against the clock to meet deadlines more easily. Yet if you use the latter and admittedly, more expensive approach, then you lay the foundations for a clear visual identity that can be picked up by any designer in the future. It may take more time now, but it will save time later.
As with the development of brand values, the conversations we had around the aesthetics of the brand were essential in ensuring consistency and meant that very little of our design was arbitrary. Naturally there were certain elements that simply appealed to us for no fathomable reason, but in the main if we agreed on a colour or design element, it was because it seemed to say the right things about our brand. Therefore it was consistent with our tone of voice and brand values.
Working with people you trust
Identifying the right people to work with is one of the hardest things to do when you’re starting a business. Anyone you contract work to, hire as a freelancer, or even employ, is an investment for your business. So you need to know that you can trust them to deliver the goods.
Think about any old contacts from previous organisations, who may be interested in working with you. And if your network of contacts doesn’t include the skills that you’re looking for, consider asking others if they may have the right contacts for you.
There are never any guarantees, but recommended contacts often save you time in searching for what you need and are more likely to meet your expectations.
The devil’s in the detail
Spending time on reading and re-reading copy, gauging the opinions of others and continual testing, is all essential in preparing for ‘Go live’. Even if it’s for just half an hour each day.
I prefer to allocate testing time to either first or last thing – the times in the day when other things are less likely to demand my attention. This works differently for everyone, but it’s important to know when you’ll have the time and stick to it. This way you’re far less likely to discover unpleasant errors and mistakes later on and ones that others may well have noticed before you. All of which could compromise the professionalism of your brand.
Have a plan
The detail of brand development is all well and good, but you need to know that once you have the materials in place, you’re ready to get moving with them. Think about your PR and marketing strategy so that you’re prepared to get going almost immediately.
That’s not to say that you won’t change your mind about certain activities or events during the course of the brand development process. But do be aware of what needs to be done and when. This should prevent any nasty shocks later on.
Be firm but flexible
Once you’ve made decisions about the brand, do try to honour them. For example, once you’ve chosen a strapline, or produced final brochure copy, try not to change it unnecessarily. Last minute changes can sometimes lead to inconsistencies and often draw out a process longer than is healthy for the brand. If you spend too much time over-thinking and re-working then you can lose the freshness and clarity of your original work. Make this clear to your colleagues so that they are aware of the implications of doing so.
Having said this, alterations will always be needed. Don’t be so rigid as to allow glaring anomalies to pass through the net. Know that sometimes the right word only occurs to you at the end of a process and typos will somehow have evaded you despite constant re-reads.
It’s all about balance.
Finally
My experiences this time around, as before, tell me that pride is everything. Care about what you do and make sure that when it’s completed you’re proud to shout about it.
You can only ever do your best, but make sure that it is and you’ve given your all.
If you're reading this from our external blog, please access the website at:
www.2ndhead.co.uk
Having a website is the absolute basic requirement of any business as many of will know, so in some ways it’s quite ironic that it’s also one of the trickiest things to get right. Especially when you consider that it’s usually developed within a hot pot of other marketing activity that demands equal attention and tender loving care.
After all the effort that’s been poured into developing the 2nd Head brand, I thought I’d impart a few (hopefully) wise nuggets of information on ways to develop and nurture a fledgling brand and within a reasonable timeframe.
In the beginning
Right back in the beginning all we had were good intentions and some great ideas. We knew roughly what services we wanted to deliver and why, but we needed to articulate this.
Before we did anything else we met up as a team to talk about our aspirations for the business and what we stood for. What were our values? What was going to make us different to other consultancies and most importantly, why would businesses want to work with us? From this we were able to draw up not only our ethos, but everything that constituted the 2nd Head brand.
We formalised our brand model using a tried and tested structure that roughly included: vision statement, brand essence, positioning (our strapline!), key messages, personality and principles. Once we had all of these in place we were able to develop them into two key brand areas: tone of voice and visual identity.
Of course there were times during this process went it felt as if it would have been easier to just get on with the ‘important things’ like writing the brochure or putting together web copy, or even making some sales calls. We agonised for weeks over our strapline: we disagreed on what sounded good; we came up with embarrassing suggestions and we spent several meetings trying to tactfully appraise each other’s ideas. Never an easy job!
But it was worth it. Spending the time on the basics was essential in galvanising our thoughts and helping each of us to understand what we were aiming for. Without these conversations the next stages of the process could have been both unnecessarily time-consuming and incredibly painful. Every word we threw out, every time we had to explain ‘why’ we liked something, was integral to the moment when we could finally declare: ‘This is our brand.’
I found this process most useful when explaining our brand values as part of the brief for our graphic designer. It was an excellent means of providing direction and clarity to our visual identity.
Consistency is key
There are two types of approach to producing corporate literature. You can either create specific materials based on an idea of how the brand should look, or you can take the time to create a corporate colour palette and other imagery to be used both for current and future design work.
The former approach allows for a ‘quick and dirty’ solution and arguably enables those that are working against the clock to meet deadlines more easily. Yet if you use the latter and admittedly, more expensive approach, then you lay the foundations for a clear visual identity that can be picked up by any designer in the future. It may take more time now, but it will save time later.
As with the development of brand values, the conversations we had around the aesthetics of the brand were essential in ensuring consistency and meant that very little of our design was arbitrary. Naturally there were certain elements that simply appealed to us for no fathomable reason, but in the main if we agreed on a colour or design element, it was because it seemed to say the right things about our brand. Therefore it was consistent with our tone of voice and brand values.
Working with people you trust
Identifying the right people to work with is one of the hardest things to do when you’re starting a business. Anyone you contract work to, hire as a freelancer, or even employ, is an investment for your business. So you need to know that you can trust them to deliver the goods.
Think about any old contacts from previous organisations, who may be interested in working with you. And if your network of contacts doesn’t include the skills that you’re looking for, consider asking others if they may have the right contacts for you.
There are never any guarantees, but recommended contacts often save you time in searching for what you need and are more likely to meet your expectations.
The devil’s in the detail
Spending time on reading and re-reading copy, gauging the opinions of others and continual testing, is all essential in preparing for ‘Go live’. Even if it’s for just half an hour each day.
I prefer to allocate testing time to either first or last thing – the times in the day when other things are less likely to demand my attention. This works differently for everyone, but it’s important to know when you’ll have the time and stick to it. This way you’re far less likely to discover unpleasant errors and mistakes later on and ones that others may well have noticed before you. All of which could compromise the professionalism of your brand.
Have a plan
The detail of brand development is all well and good, but you need to know that once you have the materials in place, you’re ready to get moving with them. Think about your PR and marketing strategy so that you’re prepared to get going almost immediately.
That’s not to say that you won’t change your mind about certain activities or events during the course of the brand development process. But do be aware of what needs to be done and when. This should prevent any nasty shocks later on.
Be firm but flexible
Once you’ve made decisions about the brand, do try to honour them. For example, once you’ve chosen a strapline, or produced final brochure copy, try not to change it unnecessarily. Last minute changes can sometimes lead to inconsistencies and often draw out a process longer than is healthy for the brand. If you spend too much time over-thinking and re-working then you can lose the freshness and clarity of your original work. Make this clear to your colleagues so that they are aware of the implications of doing so.
Having said this, alterations will always be needed. Don’t be so rigid as to allow glaring anomalies to pass through the net. Know that sometimes the right word only occurs to you at the end of a process and typos will somehow have evaded you despite constant re-reads.
It’s all about balance.
Finally
My experiences this time around, as before, tell me that pride is everything. Care about what you do and make sure that when it’s completed you’re proud to shout about it.
You can only ever do your best, but make sure that it is and you’ve given your all.
If you're reading this from our external blog, please access the website at:
www.2ndhead.co.uk
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