Health care organizations are increasingly developing consumer-focused brand identities. While there is a solid business case for this shift, it’s simply not enough to develop a positioning that evokes high-level emotional themes. Your positioning must be a promise. Defining a promise that is distinct from competitors is challenging enough, but the bigger challenge is to consistently deliver on it. Aligning promise and delivery in health care is a complex and delicate exercise because when a health care company fails to keep its promise—nearly always related to a consumer’s well-being—the consumer tends to take it very personally.

Consider the recent case of a large, national insurance provider, whose promise is articulated through a symbolic service mark that dramatically illustrated a link to wellness and a caring organizational approach. The company declined a request by a 17-year-old leukemia patient for a liver transplant, because the procedure was deemed experimental. The attending physicians disagreed, which led the family to believe that the insurance company wanted to sidestep responsibility in an effort to control costs. Not surprisingly, this action was interpreted to be the antithesis of the brand’s promise, and this incensed consumers and stimulated unwanted media attention. While it is likely that the incident was based on valid business decision systems, the viability of the brand was compromised by the disconnect in promise and practice. It’s possible that the controversy could have been averted if those who were empowered to make these decisions had the proper tools and information to behave and communicate in a "branded" way.

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There is a new catch phrase emerging in the corporate world: "How can we change the tires while the car is moving?"

We seldom heard this question until recently, but now our clients in the C-suite are asking it frequently. The question brings to life the difficulty of executing change in a demanding business environment where performance and results cannot be compromised. Brand strategy once lived in the realm of the long-term investment: Developing and implementing brand programs might cost a lot of time and money in the short-term, but would yield long-term gains. But in more challenging economic times, the focus must be on short-term results—the car HAS to keep moving, now more than ever.

The problem with the dilemma posed by the "changing the tires while the car is moving" metaphor is that it is based on an outdated notion of the change management process, which has been described as "Unfreezing, Changing, and Refreezing." (Fred Nickols, Change Management 101: A Primer.) The common conception of change management is that a company starts in a stable place, loosens up to prepare for change, implements change, and then stabilizes within a new paradigm.

A more contemporary view of change management suggests that change must occur constantly and in smaller increments for organizations to survive and thrive. Seth Godin suggests that organizations should consider an evolutionary model of change. "Evolution— defined as inheritable modifications over many generations—is the most powerful tool we have for dealing with change." (Fast Company, December 19, 2007) "It is our fear of changing a winning strategy and our reliance on command-and-control tactics that make us miserable—not change. Change doesn’t have to be the enemy. We start bypassing our fear of change by constantly training people to make small changes."

If your brand is not delivering real business value to the organization, you should not be afraid that change will require you to sacrifice business performance in the short-term. Whether you need to develop and deliver on a new brand promise and identity that is more relevant to customers, or whether you simply need to optimize your brand throughout the customer experience, taking a pit stop approach to change will yield results now and in the future.

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Analyzing campaign speeches of three presidential candidates, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John McCain, reveals interesting stylistic differences and some commonalities.

Clinton uses the greatest number of "humanizing" words in her speeches. References to "heart" and "voice" recur throughout her speeches in passages, such as "I come tonight with a very, very full heart," "I found my own voice," and "…we all spoke from our hearts." The "voice" metaphor morphs into "people who whisper to me" and "I will bring the voices of the American people back to the White House." At one point, she even says, "It’s enough to make you want to burst out in song."

McCain also injects a human element with frequent references to "eight years among friends" and "…never just fair-weather friends." Obama refers to people themselves, frequently mentioning his extended family, including his father, mother, wife, daughters, and even grandfather in one speech.

The notion of duty comes through clearly in McCain’s word selection. Phrases such as "an obligation…which I will faithfully discharge" is in the speech he gave after winning the South Carolina primary along with "…sublime honor that has been the treasure of my life." McCain’s speeches invoke the twin notions of responsibility and public service.

Obama is inclined to use the pronoun, "we" rather than "I." Clinton and McCain use "I" quite regularly, imparting a sense of the president as an individual rather than an office.

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