Alumni Spotlight: Brandon Waselnuk
Posted on Wednesday, January 16th, 2013
Brandon is a graduate of the two-year Business – Marketing program. He is currently working as a User Experience Manager at IBM. Sounds cool right? His job involves:
- Development and management of a User Research program across the world
- Business and Marketing strategy and implementation of a User Experience training program
- Evangelism of User Experience and Design as drivers for today’s buying agenda
Brandon is also an accomplished blogger and business and marketing strategy speaker. He also manages to find time to volunteer for United Way Ottawa on the NextGen Cabinet and work as a teaching assistant for the School of Business.
Below is one of Brandon’s recent blogs: Strategy is not a one person show. You can view more of Brandon’s work or book him for a speaking engagement at BrandonWaselnuk.com.
Strategy is not a one person show by Brandon Waselnuk
When we’re in the weeds working toward a timeline, or trying to ship on a deliverable, we sometimes forget that there’s a whole team around us. Those of us who have the pleasure of working on strategy, either marketing or business, know how crazy it can be sometimes. It’s not a simple “put in 4 hours of work, get out 10 pages”. In fact, strategy and business planning of any kind more closely resembles the creative process to me.
Here is my best advice for all you strategists out there.
Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson
Get out of the tower!
As strategists, we are sometimes accused of sitting in our ‘ivory tower’ and dictating strategy to our company, basically acting like bullies who tell people what to do simply because it’s “the strategy”. But guess what? If your employees don’t believe in it, your strategy sucks
Yes, I said it. It freaking sucks.
It’s true that certain people have a gift for thinking strategically, just like in creative pursuits. These people should be working on the first draft and getting the work started, but like all good business you have to experiment, test and re-test.
Ship your strategy out to your staff, colleagues, advisors, and mentors.
Make sure everyone gets the chance to see it before you slap that FINAL sticker on it. Take the advice you’ll ask for and inevitably receive. Some of you will think “Well, what if it’s crap advice? What if they just don’t know enough about the big picture?”
You have the right to choose what advice you keep, but just ensure that you recognize everyone’s input, thank them for it, and then choose the best path for your company. Besides, most employees get the big picture, so don’t inflate your ego.
Overall, when invited to participate, your team will have a greater chance of buying into the final strategy and it will lead to greater success for you and your company.
So, will you get your team involved?