As I'm looking ahead to an upcoming SLA Toronto event focusing on determining the type of professional role and work that is most suited to our innate abilities and preferences, material dealing with professional niches and "brands" for information professionals naturally gets my attention. Here are two samples: Stephen Abram's "We are a Profession that Makes a Difference" in the January 2009 issue of Information Today and Tracey Caldwell's "Professional associations stand up for librarians" in the March 9, 2009 issue of Information World Review. Stephen recounts the successes of colleagues who had a significant impact on their constituents by innovating and reaching way beyond their formal roles; Tracey has several professional association leaders comment on the evolving roles of and challenges for today's specialist librarians.
In those and similar articles, the underlying question is "who are we - and who do we want and need to be in future - to our direct clients and employers, to those who may be impacted indirectly by what we do, and to our peers?" In preparation for another upcoming event, I took the liberty of asking a couple of colleagues for a reality check: What is the "brand" that comes to mind when you think of my work as an information professional? (Much to my relief, the answers corresponded to what I had hoped - or half expected, as in the case of the "whirling dervish" part.)
Before we communicate about our services to various stakeholder groups, we may want to establish what perceptions already exist about the function and role we have. We are likely to find a wide range of impressions depending on the interaction we may have had with any respondent or on the experience he or she may have had with other information professionals - and it would be surprising if some of those impressions didn't differ from what we ourselves thought. Brands are powerful carriers of connotation for products, services, and organizations - in building ours, we want to make sure it's the "right one". Are we seen as steadfast partners in success, last-minute miracle workers pulling the impossible out of a hat - or something or everything in between? Or are we respected but not really relevant? Yes, the exercise may at first appear to have some tinge of the "how much on a scale from 1 to 10" I always recommend against - but that is handled by focusing on the role, not on ourselves as persons.
Crafting the work related brand we want to have vis a vis our various stakeholder groups is a challenge for many reasons familiar to information professionals. One of them is the relatively short time frame we have at our disposal - the luxury of nurturing our brands over decades is not available the way it has been, say, for some iconic manufacturers. For us, it's imperative to work effectively with our clients in ways they find directly beneficial in strategic ways (and yes, it's true we may never have the opportunity to share how much effort was involved in the enabling work we perform in order to deliver stunning results very quickly from time to time).
The catchy theme song in the TV series Crime Scene Investigation is named "Who are you?". I "hear" it every time I think about how our professional roles are perceived. We could all benefit from a bit of investigative digging now and then: We know who we are ... but what brand do we really have - in the eyes of those we strive to serve?
Your posting reminded me of the one and only experience I have ever had with the inside of the branding process. A few years ago I was working for a fairly large not-for-profit that began the process of branding. A significant number of those volunteering for the organization were appalled that the organization should betray its values by stooping the the level of Nike and Walmart. I must admit that I too was not entirely impressed with the decision. My perspective changed, however, after a management workshop where the organization's approach to the whole thing was explained.
Part of branding is about building a recognizable logo or product that the public automatically associates with your organization. It is about advertising and about similar-look-and-feel that makes customers feel comfortable walking into any of your stores--the surroundings are familiar, they know the drill. This is the part the customer is keyed into. But there's another very important aspect to branding that is what drew our CEO into the process in the first place.
Branding makes a statement--about the organization, about the product, about the service. That statement is also a target for organizational development. "This is what we do, and this is why and how we do it." It should guide the choices that management and employees make with respect to what the organization becomes involved in and how members of the organization approach their jobs--"is what I am about to do in keeping with what our brand stands for?" It also provides a measuring stick against which the performance of the organization and its members can be evaluated. Branding done well means that when people think about your product, they think about your name. DO YOU PROVIDE THE SERVICE THAT YOUR BRAND CLAIMS YOU DO? Successful branding means that you have effectively rallied your organization behind what that brand claims to stand for and are effectively making it stand for exactly that. A catchy logo is not good enough. That logo must come to mean something positive and reliable over time. This is the inside face of branding.
With respect to Information/Knowledge Management, the question is, "What do we do, and why and how do we do it?" It is the answer to this question that should guide the way we present ourselves to our stakeholders, the choices we make, and the way we train up those who will follow us. In an organization, adherence to the principles of the brand is enforced by management. In a field like IM/KM there is no management to enforce brand obedience. This is part of where it is so important to have professional organizations that support and enforce the principles of the IM/KM brand.
And then, there's patience. Building brand-loyalty takes time. People have to come to the point where they believe (and for good reason) and start telling their friends that when this company says "[insert brand tagline here]" they mean it.
Anyway, just some thoughts ...
Posted by: Shelly Jordan | August 14, 2009 at 10:25 AM