It’s been over 10-years since BP launched its ‘Beyond Petroleum’ positioning and the recent accident in the gulf poses some important questions for business leaders:

• What is happening in the BP culture that such an accident could occur? Despite a huge push for safety under Tony Hayward, BP’s safety record remains worrying. With this new accident, BP is in danger of replacing Exxon/Esso as the black hat of the oil world.
• If the beyond petroleum positioning was supported better, would BP have built up enough equity to help better the reaction that people are having over this latest accident?

One cannot help feeling that the board was not really behind Lord John Browne and the shift to non-petroleum products. To quote Kenny Bruno at Corporate Watch: “When a company spends more on advertising its environmental friendliness than on environmental actions, that’s greenwash.”

Tony Hayward, the (relatively) new chief executive has been public about steering BP away from alternative energies and creating a company more focused on shareholder value, safety and meeting tough engineering needs that difficult-to-reach oil demands.

Hayward: Start watching at 11.30 minutes for the change in strategy

Naturally, a shift in culture has occurred since Haywad took control. However, I wonder if the shift has been so large as to shake the culture and the belief of employees in the vision to unacceptable limits. It’s fair to assume that a degree of cynicism would creep into a culture when leadership direction changes from an aspirational promise that transforms society back to predicable aims like financial performance and putting cash into shareholders bank accounts.

The most depressing six words in the English language for any employee to hear from the leadership are: ‘Our brand is about delivering shareholder value’. As a geologist, Hayward may delight in this challenge as it means coming up with new, more efficient solutions for getting at deep oil. But employees will not feel connected to any greater purpose directed at shareholder wealth.

Where there is smoke there is fire (sorry). Serious accidents like this one and the near miss that BP had with it’s football-stadium-sized rig in the same area point to real hurdles in the culture and around leadership’s ability to drive a new vision for the company.

Changing the direction of the company is critical for BPs survival. In order to do so, the leadership must create a direction that is about more than shareholder value and goes well beyond marketing. If not ‘Beyond Petroleum’, a new story needs to be forged with employee’s and society’s concerns at heart.

Without a new vision, BP’s license to operate will dry up. Governor Swartzenager was the first to react by withdrawing his support for offshore exploration on the Tea Ridge project in California. The fallout from this incident will be severe on BPs ability to win bids and compete. It’s all too easy for governments to look like the good guys by not awarding BP a contract.

+ Wikipedia list of BP accidents
+ Leaking Oil Well Lacked Safeguard Device – WSJ.com
+ CEO strategy summary – BP Website
+ Warnings on Backup Systems for Oil Rigs Sounded 10 Years Ago – NYT

BP and the difficulty of a shifting brand vision

Like Nestle for infant formula in Africa, Exxon for the Valdez and Union Carbide for Bhopal India, Nike may always be a symbol for sweatshops. However, as with any global brand, the picture is more complex and the stories are more varied.

In our whitepaper, we cite Nike and the problems with promoting a win-at-all-costs story. To be sure, this kind of over-achiever message can raise levels of anxiety in society and contribute to feelings of inadequacy that characterises much of the developed world’s alienated populations.

As CFAR explains:

Phil Knight, the founder and CEO of Nike, suffused his company with the idea of the intense, inwardly focused competitor. Ads rarely focused on the product itself, but on the person wearing the product. Heroes and hero worship abound on the Nike campus in Beaverton, Oregon.

Many consider Nike imagery aggressive, like the ads for football featuring Wayne Rooney (even the Daily Mail attacked it). Using sport as a metaphor for violence and war is something people are generally aware of, but English (and other) hooliganism shows what promoting this idea can lead to.

Continuing on the war and WOMD theme:

Nike being bad-ass

Yet, Nike also promotes many stories focused around equality and social rights for women, ethnic minorities and the aged.

When we compare Nike to it’s competitors, we find more benevolent narratives being promoted to the market. Adidas consistently tells a story about participation versus winning. If we look at brands like Nike tha

Wonderful project - Livestrong

Good versus evil (good wins)

Still doing it: Continually telling us to get off our lazy butts, which, let’s face it is probably an excellent thing to do:

Dove-like positioning:

Fighting racism:

So what does this dichotomy mean to us as marketers and as consumers? Nike has done a lot of work on several social responsibility fronts, including brave and interesting work on sustainability.

We can also say that Nike is a ‘true’ brand since it carries on the intensely competitive values of its founders. These competitive values explain its success and these same values explain the trouble that the company has experienced when it comes to answering critics over sweat shops and hyper-capitalistic behaviours.

An intense competitive culture resits openness and slows down the machinery needed to solve problems when they arise. Despite this competitive culture, Nike moves with the times with proactive CR policies, sustainability efforts and brand promotion that raises important issues.

Despite moving with the times, Nike carries on with its legacy succeeding and suffering with its public image. For me anyway, this cultural characteristic promoting a dog-eat-dog attitude explains the dichotomy.

Can Nike become more reflexive and built for the 21st century if it instills a less competitive culture inside? Will its business fail to become viable if it tinkers too much with its founding principles? The shift away from hyper-capitalism may require further shifts at Nike. Many interesting questions remain for how this highly successful company will shape its internal culture and how this will affect its public image over the next decade.

Further reading:

+ Social Responsibility: The Nike Story
+ The truth will set you free
+ From Inspiration to Innovation
+ Muji’s enough message

The ying and yang of Nike