Marketing :
Agent of Change
By: Kim Bayer @ Augustavo International
Think about change in your life for a moment. Start small – your favorite lunch spot, the place you go once a week is closing, forcing you to find a new haunt. Now think a bit bigger. Switching from an iPhone to an Android, and what a hassle that would be.
Now keep going.
A new company. A new position. A new house. A new city.
How does each one make you feel? Excited? Apprehensive? Terrified?
Now consider that each of those scenarios affects only you or the people in your immediate circle, and change the setting to a corporate boardroom. You walk into an executive meeting with a plan to change your company’s strategy. You’ve considered every outcome backward and forward and have contingencies and options.
Except as you’re progressing, you can see the faces around the room drop. The finance team is concerned about how it will affect Q3 earnings. The sales people have their current pitch down cold and don’t want to learn a new one. The marketing team doesn't know how this new strategy aligns with what’s been done before.
At one time or another, you’ve probably faced this problem. Unless your company is in a freefall, enacting change can feel like an insurmountable task. Because even if things could be better, as long as they’re ok, people will be resistant. After all, change can sometimes be scary. It can be risky without confidence or clarity in the new direction.
As much as you hear about entrepreneurs looking for the next disruptive service or product, staying status quo can be the path of choice for many organizations. I know this because I’ve seen it and lived it. I spent years working in the corporate world and ran into every kind of barrier to change. Fear, complacency, ego, doubt – I’ve seen it all.
And I’ve broken through.
Everywhere I’ve been, I’ve been an agent of change, and I've been able to broker buy-in despite initial reluctance, including my career as a senior marketing executive at McDonald's, a Fortune 500 company with one of the most famous brands in the world.
If you've started your day with a delicious cup of coffee from McDonald's in the last two decades, I was part of the catalyst making that possible. Based in the coffee hotspot of the Pacific Northwest, I watched as people avoided McDonald's coffee as the premium coffee industry exploded. Those winds of change hadn't yet reached the rest of the country, so top management wasn't inclined to look at things differently.
But seeing where the trends were going, I sprang into action. I created a partnership with Seattle's Best Coffee in the Northwest region, and we saw immediate results, so much so that corporate couldn't ignore it any longer.
We took a setback when Starbucks purchased Seattle's Best Coffee and ended the partnership, but our executives had seen the potential. That led to a greater investment in premium coffee and the creation of McCafe, which has grown to become a growth catalyst to their business.
To get there, my team and I had to win over our regional management, then our national management and then our franchisees across the country. There was pushback and there was doubt, but the results quickly removed barriers and led to company growth, which is the ultimate goal.
It isn't easy getting to that point – to get past complacency you need an abundance of perseverance and tenacity, attributes I'm certainly not short on. I like to use the analogy of climbing a mountain – you can get to a plateau, but there's no helicopter coming in to take you to the summit. You must keep challenging yourself and with me at your side, I will help elevate you and your team to reach the peak.
If your business has reached a crossroads where change is necessary, I will guide your company in the right direction to help you execute your growth goals. Enacting change in a Fortune 500 corporation with a worldwide presence is no easy feat. I encountered just about every barrier imaginable and overcame them.
Sometimes, it takes a set of fresh eyes to find new ways forward, and that's where I come in.
Contact me today to schedule a complimentary Leadership Assessment and see how Augustavo International can help your company’s strategy and execution systems change to improve profitability. If you're ready to climb the mountain, let me be your guide.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kim Bayer has been in the Advertising/Marketing industry for 30 years. She began her career as an account executive with Seattle media, eventually becoming the Marketing Manager for Seattle Lighting, managing all in-house Advertising/PR efforts. In 1994, Kim joined McDonald’s Corporation where she was responsible for the Marketing efforts in the five Northwest states as she climbed the ladder to Regional Marketing Director. Kim has recently retired from McDonald’s and is pursuing a new career chapter as an executive marketing consultant and coach.
