Shifting gears

We start this week with great news.

And this truly is amazing news.

For Cicero has become a pin-up and a cult to the audit and risk profession. It is difficult to understand why this profession has now jumped onto a bandwagon whose benefits you recognised early on. One can only assume that these people, who are not all as dull as you might like to think, can see how these words of wit and wisdom can make them better informed people.

Ave, unum et omnes.

You will recall that a few weeks back we discussed London buses and their relevance to career planning. If you would like a refresher see ‘The man on the Clapham omnibus’ in the sidebar for March. An excellent read, you surely will agree.

Following this Cicero was approached by a Marketing Petit Fromage seeking more enlightenment and wisdom to help on the journey to becoming a Marketing Grand Fromage. Cicero advised that now is the time to shift gears to make that particular journey. Allow Cicero to explain.

In the past, and in many organisations still, the role of marketing was to provide sales support and delivered marketing communications. The balloons and brochure type of marketing function. In this business the Marketing Grand Fromage was the expert on the precise shade of blue, red or green for the annual report.

These days are now becoming history and winning businesses are starting to seek competitive advantage through marketing becoming a strategic growth driver. This requires a different kind of Marketing Grand Fromage and to succeed in this environment Marketing Grand Fromages and those aspiring to reach these dizzy heights must learn to adapt. When Marketing Grand Fromages go through the gears like this they move from tactical player to leader to visionary.

With eyes open wide and panting breathlessly with excitement, Cicero’s young pupil was hooked by the vision of marketing excellence that had been painted. He wanted to know more. Cicero was urged on with restless curiosity to tell more. For the apprentice wanted to know how Petit Marketing Fromages should go through the gears; the skills needed; the behaviours practiced.

And Cicero’s advice was to focus on 5 key things to get things going.

Firstly use customer insights as your secret weapon. When you understand your customer better than anyone else in the organisation you are better able to use this insight and understanding to inform key strategy and business planning discussions. If you and your team are the best informed about what your customers are thinking, how they are behaving and the drivers of this behaviour and can synthesise the data with precision and brevity you are one step ahead.

In second gear you demonstrate a profit and loss mindset at all times. You understand how your revenues are generated, how the cost base is shaped and the levers to pull to influence both. How can you collaborate with your colleagues and with your Chief Bean Counter without this understanding? This shows you understand the business intimately.

Now we are really beginning to motor and armed with our knowledge of our customers and of our business it is now time to shift into third gear. In this gear the Marketing Grand Fromage will tie their ideas to specific growth objectives of the business. It is no longer enough for Marketing Grand Fromages just to ask for more advertising or bigger budgets or whatever. We must participate in business conversations using a strategic point of view. Marketing must be seen to earn its keep. Marketing must not wait to be informed by ‘the business’. Marketing is the business. Marketing must connect with the Board level agenda.

In fourth gear the Marketing Grand Fromage will inspire and lead to cultivate an innovative mindset. With a deep level of customer and industry knowledge and a keen awareness of macro trends and the competitive landscape, we are well placed to drive the growth agenda by creating an organisational mindset focussed on constant innovation. Marketing Grand Fromages in fourth gear are the customer zealot within the business and must motivate the business through their networks and partnerships to engage in constant innovation and growth.

And in fifth gear we reach cruising speed. In this gear Marketing Grand Fromages lead their people to deliver marketing excellence with a mindset that incorporates the growth agenda and accountability for delivering that agenda. Marketing excellence at this level is based on demonstrating how marketing activities are linked to growing revenues and profit margins as well as leading to increased market share and stronger brands. At the heart of marketing excellence is business acumen.

And there you have it. 5 gears to help drive you to become a Marketing Grand Fromage and 5 gears to give your business significant competitive advantage. And if you too, like Cicero’s young apprentice, are excited by this prospect and are willing to work hard to make the shift through the gears as recommended by Cicero, then you too can become a Marketing Grand Fromage. It might sound cheesy but this is the way the world is going. Trust Cicero.

Is it only me………..but does this not indicate a sensible way to cycle?
It is illegal to fit indicators to a bike. Putting to one side the practicalities and feasibility of fitting indicators to a bike, does this not strike you as plain daft? What is the problem with using indicators while cycling to let the artics, white vans and bendy buses know that the cyclist in front is about to turn to the right or left?

Certainly Mirror-Signal-Manoeuvre might be a wee bit tricky but surely using an indicator rather than sticking your paw out and thereby disturbing the cyclists’ carefully calibrated balance is a much better way to go round corners. Surely Yorkie Man and his mates would prefer to see a blinking light rather than having someone with arm outstretched wibble wobble in front of them before being spread-eagled across the radiator grille.

No doubt some Health and Safety Gauleiter has decreed that that such attachments when fitted to a bicycle pose an unnecessary risk to the health and safety of the bicyclist. Nonsense. How do they know? Has it ever been tried? What was the outcome?

Is it only me but this is surely a totally stupid edict and if anyone from the Health and Safety Gestapo is reading this and can explain and justify such stupidity, please do share.

And to make matters worse while it is illegal to fit indicators, and brake lights too might be helpful, it is mandatory that those riding their wee bikes must now have a bell fitted. How stupid is that? Do you really think that Yorkie Man in his 32 ton artic or the matadors driving the bendy buses or White Van Essex Boy is going to hear and, even if he does, pay any attention to a wee bell? Only the kind of hooting horn that Casey Jones had fitted to his train is going to provide you with any protection whatsoever on the daily joust with the traffic on our roads.

Surely these are yet more examples of the blatant stupidity and impractical counsel that spews from our Health and Safety Gauleiters. If you are one of these, please feel free to defend yourselves and explain to a fascinated audience how important a job you all do and why you feel it necessary to eliminate all personal responsibility for our own safety. We’re all waiting.

Have a great week.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.