A few years ago, when I took my first big leap into working for myself, my family rallied around to make sure I knew how capable I was for this journey. I doubt they realize that I still look at their words each and every time I need a reminder of that.
Obviously your genius comes from your kind heart, sweet nature and spontaneity. Having said that, you are hard working, inventive and very artistic. Your genius comes from your ability to both recognize and invent beauty.
Uncle Ray
I will absolutely never forget this one. My uncle Ray was able to explain a piece of my personal mission that I have never been able to put into words – to both recognize and invent beauty.
Those six simple words do so much justice to explain what I do and how I feel about my role in the world. Driving down the street, I see signs and logos and reimagine how they’d look in different designs. When I meet new businesses, I interpret how they want to be experienced versus how they are actually experienced within an instant.
This unique ability shapes a unique space within any company – and that’s been my most curious challenge. In the intersection of marketing and experience – the fundamental impact of your role touches every piece of the business. It’s a difficult position to justify and even more difficult to establish. But consider the benefits of this vision…
Communication and information flows seamlessly
Turn off everything you know about your business. Now, think of it as a living and breathing organism. If it were alive, imagine its movements. Those movements are driven by the nervous system – your teams and the electrical pulses that surge through them. If that current or message can’t move through the system, movement ceases.
Many organizations put up their own road blocks in this communication flow without realizing that they’ve done more to hinder their company’s momentum than foster it. An experience catalyst examines these communication hurdles and breaks them down – allowing information to fluidly move through your company and feed all departments toward their next action.
The customer leads
With a number of stakeholders and influences impacting business decisions – many lose sight of what established their business in the first place: the customer. To establish and continue success – the needs, concerns and evolution of the customer must continue to be a guiding light in the organization. Your teams cannot make assumptions about the customer based on outdated awareness. Research, listening and a clear pulse of how your customer base evolves is required for your business to proactively plan and execute in the most efficient and valuable ways possible.
Strategy is paramount
When approaching any hurdle within the business, the strategic tackling of that hurdle is of massive importance. Tactical solutions are grand and will get you from point A to point B much more quickly – but when the hurdle arises again with vengeance, it behooves you to know the strategy surrounding how it should be handled.
A holistic perspective on the full experience effort helps to establish and evolve this strategy indefinitely. Without it, tactical solutions become duct tape for ever-amplifying issues. When the fundamental core of an effort is missing – we’re left with delicate plates spinning on thin sticks – and that just won’t do.
Industries love the “disruption” conversation at the moment – but if you want to find true disruption, let the plates crash. Go back to your foundation and build it with strength and intention – brick by brick. The resulting stability, confidence and direction of your business will shock you. Bonus points: knowing what you’ve learned from the past, I guarantee you can do this faster than ever before expected.
Isn’t that beautiful?