7 Tips for Reputation Management
Featuring Hotdog mobiles, Britney Spears, and ‘Magic’ Johnson
Our guest speaker turned up to our ‘virtual’ class in a Batman mask. In a swift Zoom hour he taught us more about reputation management, disruptive innovation, success, and life than all the management books of my life — combined. Doug Melville, Chief Diversity Officer, TBWA spoke to the students of Reputation Management at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business earlier this week. In an engaging session sprinkled with deeply personal (and wildly hilarious) anecdotes, Doug shared with us his thoughts on diversity, personal branding and reputation management.
TBWA is the agency most famous for all the Apple ads we adore — from the latest slo-fies to the iconic 1984. TBWA is amongst the Top 50 most creative companies in the world. It is only right that our Professor looked to Doug to talk about personal branding and reputation.
I am not half as funny as Melville but will faithfully attempt to outline his 7 watertight tips for reputation management — plus a bonus thrown in. Through a myriad of jobs, mentors and life experience, this inspiring CDO has accumulated a lot of wisdom. Following a short introduction to his firm TBWA, known as ‘The Disruption Company’ (he insists they were disrupting before disruption became cool), Doug guided us through a framework that is widely used across the advertising firm.
The Disruption Roadmap
In the huge COVID-19 chaos, The Disruption Roadmap is a welcome lens through which we could examine our career and professional choices. From the bland starting point that is the Square, the map takes us through a disruptive ‘key’ to an exciting Vision — where we need to be.
- Convention — everything typical. It is that yawn inducing CV of that person who studied the one thing, then worked in that one thing, never trying anything new. Taking a ‘gapyah’ out to go to the same traditional package destination does not count! Think of those friends who had their lives planned out in a bullet journal in a nauseating, linear way. That is the picture of Convention. A box.
- Vision — The vision is the circle. The center of the lens. This is where you want to be in 5, 10 or 50 years. Mock those new age vibrant Vision Board makers but do be intentional about what is it that you want to achieve and when. Be deliberate about where you are heading.
- Disruption — this is the behaviour or key to get you from the starting point to your vision. Doug urges us to look at our careers and identify the disruptions that will propel us to the vision. This is also how and where reputations are truly built.
The 7 Reputation Tips
- Tip #1 — prove trust and consistency. What can you show or tell people that assures them that you can be trusted when they don’t know anything else about you? Some practical things to try are — blogging consistently. Grab your iPad to meetings and investor pitches to showcase your work.
- Tip #2 — Your reputation precedes you when you walk into a room. Do yourselves a favour and launch a private browser and run a search for yourself and see what shows up. Is it flattering? Would your grandma be proud? No? Change it.
- Tip #3 — Be comfortable with the uncomfortable. Melville’s assortment of jobs included driving an Oscar Mayer wienermobile/hot dog truck. He lived in this monstrosity straight up for 400 days driving across 48 continental United States. Painful and embarrassing as it was — this experience indirectly led him to opportunities including being an assistant manager for Britney’s “Hit me one more time” tour.
- Tip #4 — Know the people you are with every day. Knowing who you are around every day is a superpower. Melville made an effort to get to know people deeply. To the point that at the end of the Britney tour, he landed meetings with renowned retail brands based on the brand he had built. People on the tour were asked who was the one person who had hustled the most and Doug’s name emerged consistently.
- Tip #5 — You pay for what you don’t know. Just be interesting! Know what’s happening around. In business we will meet a variety of people. Ask yourself if you are able to speak around multiple subjects in a quick-fire way.
- Tip #6 — Focus on your strengths, NOT your weaknesses. Melville landed a job with ‘Magic’ Johnson’s marketing company at age 27 by drawing focus to his incredible resourcefulness, grit and creativity — not for feeling embarrassed about the wienermobile.
- Tip #7 — Know how to tell your story. We are terrible at telling our own story. Practice your elevator pitch. Finetune your narrative.
- Bonus tip — Don’t waste a second putting these in action. Start Today!
Consider also —
Reputational Calamities
Reputation mishaps in Advertising and PR tell us a lot about the cracks between intent and optics. If the execution is in poor taste and the optics are not received well, no amount of noble intention can save a brand. Who can forget the unbelievable cases from the advertising hall of shame: the unfortunate images from that H&M shoot to the reality defying $890 Gucci ‘blackface’ sweater.
