be a culture maker

​Have Purpose. Make Culture .
Brands have great power, potential and resources to be a culture maker. To not merely react to what’s happening around them – but to respond with a POV & action that makes the right dent in culture. There are two parts to this equation. 
One, requires understanding the culture & the issues therein. 
Two, requires operating from the brand’s purpose. Brands that have got it right are those that have stayed true to their Brand’s purpose, and used that as their guiding force.  

Understanding Culture (and the issues) + Understanding Brand = Where to Play 

Always needed a way to appeal to a next generation of consumers in the face of growing competition. Their award-winning response was the #LikeAGirl campaign that turned a phrase that was used as an insult to an empowering message, a rallying cry uniting all girls, in celebrating & giving meaning to the word ‘confidence’ in ways that mattered most to them. The purpose of the brand was the cornerstone of the idea. The purpose of the brand guided the path to take, the cause to espouse. 
Lifebuoy’s ‘Help a Child reach 5’ aims to change the hygiene behavior of consumers globally thereby helping to reduce rising causes of child mortality. A match between the cultural habits and practices around the lack of personal hygiene and the brand’s that has always  been an active proponent of hand washing with soap and instilling a hygienic hand washing behavior . As a part of expressing the brand purpose in the service of a relevant cause, Lifebuoy adopted villages with one of the highest rates of diarrhea to spread the message of hygienic hand washing – an initiative that saw both Lifebuoy Business and the infants grow in health. 
AirBnB is making diversity & inclusiveness a priority. It is using its brand values in responding to a big cultural tension of people feeling alienated, isolated, and discriminated against. “We do believe in an inside-out culture,” said Gebbia, Airbnb co-founder and chief product officer “If we hold our hosts and guests to an expectation of acceptance and belonging, it has to start within our company. Otherwise, how on earth do we have the credibility to hold them accountable, if we’re not doing it to ourselves? Airbnb has published its own diversity numbers, with 42.88% of its workforce being female in 2016. Meanwhile, 56.6% of the company’s employees were white in 2016, compared to 30.41% Asian, 6.47% Latino, and only 2.92% black.

When picking a cause to champion

1. Be sure that it is an expression of your core equity & and that you have a right to play in that space. 
2. Let the focus of your efforts be a genuine act of change for the better
3. Walk the talk. The cause you pick is one that you should live and action every day through your organization, employees, policy. It should be able to stand up to scrutiny.