MIXTAPE Partners

One of the things I love about my work with P&G Signal360 is the chance to catch up with some of my favorite people - like Deborah Conrad, who joined us as our Signal Conversation this month. Deb and I have known each other for nearly 20 years, and her work as Intel's CMO has already put her in the media, tech, and marketing hall of fame. Now, she shares her new chapter as a co-founder of Mixtape - with a unique approach to thinking about strategy and branding. https://lnkd.in/ek_6TDgc

After dedicating 20 years as a marketing executive at the largest ad networks in the world, I am thrilled to share that I have made the decision to build a company with some of the smartest and most experienced people I know. People I’ve had the privilege of working alongside in a variety of ways. People I am fortunate to call my friends. Deborah Conrad, whom I worked with extensively when she was Intel Corporation's CMO along with my Interbrand colleagues, Andy Bateman and Nirm Shanbhag, who have both had substantial careers as transformational marketing leaders. I couldn’t be more excited to introduce my LinkedIn community to MIXTAPE Partners. A management consulting firm dedicated to marketers. We wanted to leverage our experience and expertise to focus on the biggest issue we’ve seen time and time again – the failure to turn strategy into action. As our world becomes more automated, consolidated and efficient, I have seen one commonality that consistently surfaces as the largest challenge marketing executives are facing today – the immense challenge to drive organizational wide adoption and ownership of a strategic change. MIXTAPE Partners helps marketing leaders successfully create strategies that inspire as much as they compel individuals and teams to action. And, we develop programs to move from big ideas into adoption by enabling your people to see themselves in a shared future. So my ask to my LinkedIn community is threefold.? 1. Please give our MIXTAPE Partners LinkedIn page a follow to stay on top of our latest thinking and news 2. Peruse our website and let me know what stands out to you? 3. Most importantly, give us a call if you’re looking for the link between a brilliant idea and real-world results.

“Wisdom is where experience meets compassion”. I heard this a couple of weeks ago and it’s stuck with me. I love it. It’s about how you apply your knowledge and experience to help others. It suggests too, that wisdom is an action; not the passive accumulation of knowledge and experience. What do you think?

At MIXTAPE Partners, we have a thing for making sure strategy sticks. That means knowing how to quickly figure out if the right pieces are in place to get thinking off the page and turn strategy into action. Our Strategy-to-Action Readiness Scorecard makes that much easier, by laying out the key elements needed to ensure both the strategy and the company are ready. Have a look and let us know what you think! PLUS there's a longer analysis on our blog (link in comments) MIXTAPE Partners Andy Bateman Deborah Conrad #strategy #marketing #innovation #growth #strategyintoaction Starbucks Gap Gap Inc.

Launch Hangovers You know the feeling; the launch was a couple of weeks ago now. The excitement and shine has worn off and now the questions start. What is this new strategy - I'm not sure I really understand it? What is it you want us to do? Why do we think this will work? What do you want me to give up so I can do this? What's in it for me? Worse still is the inertia. Nothing changes at all and the senior leadership is beginning to question why it's not working. The teams are beginning to revolt - at least privately questioning why we needed this change at all. The launch hangover is real It's not unusual. As the reality of post-launch settles in, it becomes clear to everyone that they're going to need to do considerable work to make it real and actionable. And for most teams and organizations, doing something new and different is really hard. Let's face it, most teams are already fully occupied with the current plan of record. So resistance is normal. In fact resistance to change is an entirely human response. We thrive on order. On normalcy. On habit. The issue is for most companies and teams, we're in deep trouble when the market is changing faster than we are. Regenerative Loops - how to recover from the launch hangover Our experience suggests that there isn’t a silver bullet, but a series of well-coordinated actions that are required to make strategy stick. It begins with understanding how people engage with (or react to) any new strategy. Habit loops form easily and we tend to recoil,? and look for data that supports the behavior we know. This leads to justifying existing strategies even if they are becoming less effective. It takes a degree of self observation to our habits in order to break the pattern and consider potential new options. This regenerative loop is essential if we're ever going to learn and take in something new - and even change our behaviors. The unfortunate truth is this is almost never considered in any new launch roll out. We expect teams to pick up the new thing; be instantly great at it having had no prior practice and absorb it into their already stretched workload. It's no wonder 90% of all new initiatives fail. So if you're considering a new launch, start with how to get your team in the right mind-frame to welcome the new directions and create new habits. MIXTAPE Partners Deborah Conrad Nirm Shanbhag #strategy #marketing #innovation #growth

Launch Hangovers You know the feeling; the launch was a couple of weeks ago now. The excitement and shine has worn off and now the questions start. What is this new strategy - I'm not sure I really understand it? What is it you want us to do? Why do we think this will work? What do you want me to give up so I can do this? What's in it for me? Worse still is the inertia. Nothing changes at all and the senior leadership is beginning to question why it's not working. The teams are beginning to revolt - at least privately questioning why we needed this change at all. The launch hangover is real It's not unusual. As the reality of post-launch settles in, it becomes clear to everyone that they're going to need to do considerable work to make it real and actionable. And for most teams and organizations, doing something new and different is really hard. Let's face it, most teams are already fully occupied with the current plan of record. So resistance is normal. In fact resistance to change is an entirely human response. We thrive on order. On normalcy. On habit. The issue is for most companies and teams, we're in deep trouble when the market is changing faster than we are. Regenerative Loops - how to recover from the launch hangover Our experience suggests that there isn’t a silver bullet, but a series of well-coordinated actions that are required to make strategy stick. It begins with understanding how people engage with (or react to) any new strategy. Habit loops form easily and we tend to recoil,? and look for data that supports the behavior we know. This leads to justifying existing strategies even if they are becoming less effective. It takes a degree of self observation to our habits in order to break the pattern and consider potential new options. This regenerative loop is essential if we're ever going to learn and take in something new - and even change our behaviors. The unfortunate truth is this is almost never considered in any new launch roll out. We expect teams to pick up the new thing; be instantly great at it having had no prior practice and absorb it into their already stretched workload. It's no wonder 90% of all new initiatives fail. So if you're considering a new launch, start with how to get your team in the right mind-frame to welcome the new directions and create new habits. MIXTAPE Partners Deborah Conrad Nirm Shanbhag #strategy #marketing #innovation #growth