6 Rules for Transforming Your Brand
The Carter Holt Harvey Experience
By Dellwyn Stuart
Australasia's leading forest product company, Carter Holt Harvey
(CHH), transformed itself in under three years from slumbering giant
into a high-performing, innovative business leader based on values
of performance, leadership and innovation - and won an IABC Gold
Quill award in the process. Here's CHH's story in brief and rules
learned along the way.
CHH is New Zealand's second largest public company, with revenues
exceeding NZD$4 billion a year, and over 11,000 employees throughout
New Zealand, Australia and Asia-Pacific. But in the intensely competitive
forestry sector, CHH needed to embrace change, and quickly.
The CEO recognized this need and demanded it. So began enormous
change in which the large, solid and reliable company transformed
itself into an Australasian business leader with a clear vision
based on performance, innovation and leadership.
Running in tandem with a major reorganisation of Carter Holt Harvey
from early 1999 was a massive rebranding programme aimed at reshaping
the company's image and identity as the one large company was split
into 33 different entities. The 33 new businesses each required
new names and new visual identities. There was also the question
of how they would fit together in building the overall brand. Corporate
strategy and branding had to coincide and work together.
These six rules helped transform CHH's branding during the tumultuous
time:
1. Be imaginative. Don't get bogged down in simply maintaining
the present. Dream of what might be, and ideally, get your employer
behind those dreams.
2. Set goals. Clearly understand where you are now, and
then define where you want to be. CHH's initiative was successful
in part because clear, concise, supportive and inspirational leadership
was backed by a comprehensive communications plan and a huge effort
by everyone to see it through.
3. Get good help. Recruit a great project team, and if budget
permits, work with a leading brand research company. In CHH's
case, research confirmed their instincts: CHH was perceived as
solid and dependable, but unexciting, bureaucratic and hierarchical.
New recruits to CHH wanted to work for more than just a major
forest products company.
4. Stay focused and keep it simple. CHH adopted a three
tier approach: first they defined the brand attitude, Revolutionising,
to challenge old perceptions; second, they shortened the brand
name to CHH, which then endorsed the individual new business names;
third, a seven-stage naming process ensured buy-in and enthusiasm
for these new names.
5. Keep it moving. CHH used financial and performance incentives
to encourage each business to action brand implementation in the
shortest possible time. It was critical for the 33 CEOs to lead
the transition and champion the brand both internally and externally.
The CEOs needed constant communication support, thereby always
feeling in the loop, and with their staff feeling informed and
inspired.
Initial communications involved a series of workshops to examine
business plans, points of difference, competitive advantages and
the position of competitors in the marketplace. This was followed
by a comprehensive brand audit during roll out, a secure website
for all CEOs as a guide through re-branding, brand guidebooks,
a weekly email updating progress and responding to FAQs, a company
screensaver for 5,000 desktops, merchandise and an in-house staff
magazine.
6. Learn from experience. Inevitably, not all 33 businesses
did as well as each other in understanding and accepting the transformation
and change that each new brand represented. The CHH communication
team learned some useful lessons. Here are just a few:
- In developing business names, three or four people is the
optimal number to have involved. This ensures multiple points
of view while keeping focus and allowing for full participation.
- Legal checks on possible names have to happen quickly; otherwise
there is the risk that people will get emotionally attached
to a name they ultimately can't use.
- Greater consultation across the whole company makes the
implementation phase smoother, with less time spent later
on explaining why certain decisions are made.
- Tight deadlines create project fatigue, and don't underestimate
differences in brand positioning between audiences.
Awakened giant
CHH's transformation from slumbering giant to the high-performing,
innovative leader it is today took two years. The process is still
continuing.
Much of the success is due to a powerful vision for the company
and awareness of how brands create value.
Employees embody Revolutionising the everyday through identification
with an inspirational brand, and as a result are delivering performance
benefits to customers and suppliers alike. That's the power of brands.
Read the complete
case study
Dellwyn Stuart is Director of Corporate Affairs at Carter Holt
Harvey and has worked for the company since 1998. Working closely
with the company's chief executives and leadership team, Dellwyn's
team manages communication programs with key stakeholders and for
major initiatives across Carter Holt Harvey. She can be contacted
at dellwyn.stuart@chh.com.
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