Right before the holidays, a colleague gave me a copy of Paul Arden’s “It’s Not How Good You Are, Its How Good You Want to Be.”  Even though the book is a quick read, it is packed with thought-provoking points.  In particular, I was inspired by three essays that talked about how a Senior Agency Manager, Junior Ad Account Handler and Media Buyer “can make a big difference” in the world of agency work (pages 98 – 101 in the book).  In fact, I thought the points were so powerful that I wanted to do my own riff on:

How a Brand Manager can make a big difference

The responsibility for a brand’s success or failure often falls on the shoulders of the Brand Manager.  But the Brand Manager isn’t the sole driver of success.  In fact, I would say that they probably can’t even take credit for the majority of the things that really make a brand work.

But the responsibility for the success or failure does fall squarely on the shoulders of the Brand Manager.  The company has given the Brand Manager not only ownership of the marketing budget, but often the entire brand’s P&L.

However, the most important thing that has been placed in the hands of the Brand Manger though is the responsibility to inspire.

They need to inspire their direct reports (ie Assistant Brand Managers) to deliver work that is above and beyond what is asked of them.

They need to inspire their agency partners to bring them ideas that will deeply connect with people.

They need to inspire their management to support these ideas, even if it makes them uncomfortable.

And they need to inspire consumers to buy their brand…again and again.

This inspiration is going to take different shapes depending on the company and the person.  But in every case, the inspiration is going to be about

…making your brand something that people want to work on

…something people take ownership of

…where delivering great work is the only option.

A Brand Manager can make a big difference by inspiring people.  It is that simple.