Heritage

Its evening in ancient city of Ur in Mesopotamia, they sat across the bonfire admiring the ancient Ziggurat, the legend holds that it’s as old as time. The city of ‘Ur’ came into existence nearly 3800 B.C. and the city was abandoned about 500 B.C. “That’s Heritage” said Shams of Tabrizi, “imagine a city which was inhabited for more than 3300 years, what all they must have accomplished in terms of Humanity, ?Art, Science, literature”, and recited the opening of world’s oldest known ?Love Poem ‘The love song for Shu-Sin’, was written? 4000 years ago and immortalized on clay tablet in cuneiform and then lost in perpetuity , till rediscovered ?and meticulously translated by erudite Samuel? Noah Karmer, below is the opening passage.

“Bridegroom, dear to my heart,

Goodly is your beauty, honeysweet,

Lion, dear to my heart,

Goodly is your beauty, honeysweet.”

Shams, Rambo, Shephard & blue camel walked over the ground which once was fertile with irrigation channels, orchids, fowls and now it’s a desert, ‘Heritage ’ said Shams, ?is when we see beauty and romance in past and find a connection however distant, whether monuments, heroes or glory, look around everyone is trying to reclaim their heritage, be it ?Nations or Brands and most ever so the world of luxury brands. We all have this deep desire to being a part of a very close circle, a privileged one, and addressed the Shepherd, “look at the purple tunic you are wearing, in antiquity, purple color was reserved exclusively for affluent families of ancient Greece.” Shepherd smiled and said, “I’m just a wandering shepherd.”

How do you create a brand differentiation, that competition becomes secondary, yes, its ‘Heritage,’ and it talks about value creation, lineage, only to strengthen the gap in this chaotic competitive landscape. Shams dug out an antique water pot from sand and turned over the back exposing its base, the name of seller was written in cuneiform, “the elders set the foundation of branding for us.” In ancient Mesopotamia, the sellers would brand their goods as protection from being copied by competitors.

Look at the term ‘Benchmarking ‘which could not preserve the cloak of invisibility on either Xerox or General Electricity, nowadays change management talk persistently about ‘benchmarking’. ?Walk into a shopping mall and all stores look same, even the client experience has become hard to distinguish, and you wonder what ‘benchmarking Uber and Airbnb used or was it purely ‘Blue Ocean Strategy’ meaning “a market for a product where there is no competition or very little competition”. ?Benchmarking is good in measured quantity, to understand the landscape for adoption and improvement, but just as a reference point, the DNA of each organization is different from others. “A company can outperform rivals only if can establish a difference that it can preserve” wrote Porter in the seminal essay “What is Strategy “.

??In antiquity the cities which prospered, progressed, and produced new results were setting up higher standard for themselves but the ones who only relied on benchmarking, were soon overtaken by rival city, annihilated, and abandoned, their name erased from history and no song of glory, nor poems of love were immortalized by its future youth. Unless you have the willingness to build solutions from the ground up and position yourself within a niche, it’s only going to get tougher.

“What about brands that don’t have Heritage, asked Rambo, Shams smiled and said, “then built one, and deliver on promise of the product and improvise persistently. The brand houses you know today and admire so much, once too had no history but they tried, innovated and had GRIT.” ?

Rambo stared at his wrist looking at Sub ref 5513, year 1962 in gilt dial, ‘that’s my heritage’ and gave out the famous Rambo smile.

The sun was setting on horizon, trying to find its home, its solace for one more night, its time of day when light meets dark, its time of ‘Nanna,’ Moon God of ancient Mesopotamia.