Jon Wilson

The Intersection BetweenTransformational Leadership, Corporate Communications

And Cultural Branding – Closing The Delta

j.a.j.wilson@gre.ac.uk

Background Research

Expert Delphi study of international brand managers and academics over 16 months. An iterative process - where over several rounds of questioning, participants were guided towards arriving at a consensus.

• Nearly 400 years of collective experience• 185 brands worked on• Multi lingual, ethnic and cultural

Over the past 30 years or so the term has emergedas a concept: moving thinking away from transactions, towards transforming.

Here: Leadership is judged by influence,with the aim of elevating morale & motivation.

Transformational Leadership

Still debates continue around whetherLeaders are born or made?

But, beyond these lofty ideas: how can Transformational Leadership be

engineered?

The Corporate Brand Universe

The Delta: Space, Time & Context

Leading to:Culture-centrism (Global and local duality) &

Surrogacy

Emergent influencing Phenomena

What is Surrogacy ?Literally:It is the adoption process where a mother and/or father takes

ownership and responsibility of a child – like their own bloodOr the grafting of two plants together

And that the concept:

• Applies to brands• Applies to their consumers & staff• Is the consumption of culture, which creates social

networks & communities• Offers a means to generate social capital• Seeks the humanisation of brands, and• Is a ratification of authentic and credible cultural-centric

brand successes

So what I am advocating today is for Culture-centric Leadership: we should either adopt, or allow ourselves to be adopted – and use branding to achieve this

• Not a linear progression• Concentric cultural cycles balancing:• Orthodoxy & Heterodoxy• Heritage & Modernity 

• Governed by Control linked with diffused Power & Reciprocity

• Friendly Humanoid communicating objects – as: Anchors, Nodes and Artefacts

Key Findings suggest that the phenomenon is

full of patterns,open to interpretation,

which are:

Branding, Culture & LeadershipThe Crossroads:

Step 1: Create

Step 2: Map

Step 3: Position

The Journey…New methods of:

Stakeholder & Transactional

Analysis

Avatars,Artefacts

& Humanoids

Thank You (^_^)b

j.a.j.wilson@gre.ac.uk