How does your brand think?
Hello from the education state, the home education state that is.
Victoria is discovering that having the kids round the de-facto boardroom means more colouring in and less concentration. Karen from the accounting team in Brighton tended not to demand another sandwich with the crusts off during a board call, or maybe she did it’s been that long since I was in a non-zoom-based boardroom. I truly can’t recall. Kids, could you please post your questions using the chat function, Dad will answer them at the end of today’s presentation should time allow. Living the dream.
Long on natural laws, short on humans
If life was an investment and I was its broker I would be always long on natural laws, constantly short on human behaviour. Let’s take our current mask wearing for example. Newton’s second law would tell you that the force of a breathe carries it far enough for tiny droplets from your ‘close contact’ to hit your N95 mask; they stop on the surface rather than in your lungs. That’s a natural law. And then there is human behaviour. Only humans would have the creativity to come up with the hashtag #Maskholes but still fail to wear a covering in public. This virus is truly the ultimate advanced western economy kryptonite because it breaks another natural law, the law of motion.
Growth in a modern economy relies on motion, connection and interdependence. Each of us holds a piece of the value puzzle and we need to connect with others to build something bigger than the sum of its parts. As Adam Smith would say this is the invisible hand that guides us to make decisions that are in our own interest but also the interest of others. It is this value creation that drives growth and my observation of working through my first pandemic, is that it is stalling. Try to start something from what was not already there at the minute, chances are you will be staying put. This is a particular challenge for Australia as like most of our Commonwealth cousins, we are highly reliant on trade for our prosperity.
The Empire left us with more than a love of cricket, people called Glen and the Queen. It left us with an orientation and aptitude for trade. Australian relies on trade, in and out. According to the World Bank, close to 22% of our GDP is linked to export. It is not just trade of goods and services outward that maintains our momentum, it is also the attraction of capital of the human kind inward. The Australian economy is also driven by migration. According to the OECD Australia leads the way in the percentage of its population born overseas.
To put it in perspective 27.8% of our population is foreign born while the United States is 13.4%. Our largest ‘export’ is our educational services to international students studying here in Australia. There are around 630,000 international students here each year at a high school and university level. International students also form the basis of our migration policy, which sees people relocating to Australia making up over 5% of our annual GDP. While minerals may still be flying, the lack of free movement of people is one significant drag on our economy. It breaks our natural law of continual population growth maintaining the momentum of unbroken economic growth.
The other drag?
The great pivot away from China also feels like it is on and I am sure our trading future has everything to do with our renewed sense of pluckiness. Rather than solely a sense of morality driving our agenda the timing is, let’s just say, fortuitous. With the signing of ASEAN and the Trans Pac trade agreements, we have access to more markets than ever before. With other bilateral agreements with India, the UK and the EU on the way to completion our trading future is far from hanging in the balance. For those brands who have spent years building an image solely to appeal to China’s view of us as Fresh Air, Green Fields, Beaches and Hopping Animals what do you do? Do you panic or do you realise that these are universal attributes appreciated not just in China but across South East Asia and beyond?
Coincidentally, the one our Federal Government has just signed a free trade agreement with. This was no great surprise and I’m sure our cows and milk will be heading for parts known sooner rather than later. You just need to figure out how and where. Whether that is finding your way through the forest of trade, dealing with the effects of COVID or how to home school, like any other problem you have to think your way through it.
Define the type of problem you face
When the path is unclear where do you turn? I find that the new iso routine doesn’t really allow for new modes of thinking so over the last few months I have been turning back to one place, the world of strategy. I started my career in scenario planning and fell head over heels in professional love with the problem solving that is brand.
I have multiple editions of the tombstone of a book simply called Strategy. It is written by Bo Dewitt and it has a simple premise delivered in the comforting robustness of high-level academia. At the heart of it is the premise that the understanding of a topic can only be gained by exposure to its many opposing perspectives. While this feels very far from our general discourse at the minute and the A/B of social media (I like it/I hate it), the book frames simple ways of viewing problems that help you see them for what they are – deep laws hiding in the woods of human-induced myopia.
Any problem has natural laws. It is either an either/or problem which acts like a puzzle or dilemma with one optimal answer, or a both/and problem which is more a series of trade-offs to manage. If you face an either/or problem it is important to ask, is it a puzzle or a dilemma? A puzzle has one optimal answer (there is one fastest route to get there) whereas a dilemma is a problem with two possible and equally-good solutions (pizza or chicken wings for dinner, yes please).
If you face a both/and problem, you need to ask, is it a paradox or a trade off? A paradox is where two different factors seem to be true at the same time and there is no way to reconcile them (I love having my kids at home 24/7 but home schooling is a killer); or a trade-off where there are different solutions to resolve competing pressures (I think Apple TV has better original content but Netflix the bigger back catalogue and I can only choose one). If the field is muddy ahead and you are not driving one of the new bucking beautiful beasts called a 2020 Ford Bronco, the best course of action is to think; take the time to think through the path you must tread.
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Be better to each other.
