The essential role of employees as brand advocates in companies

South Africa is an amalgam or melting pot of cultures, which if not carefully tackled could lead to polarisation and dissatisfaction in the workplace. A high percentage of South African managers have to a large degree an individualistic cultural dimension.

This means that due to South Africa's mainly Eurocentric corporate culture, many managers do encourage competition between employees, award incentives on individual basis, tolerate individuality, and encourage employees to work independent of each other.

These values are at the opposing side of the belief system of the majority, who are mainly lower level and collective in nature. Being collective implies looking at the interests of the majority instead of the individual, shunning upon competition within team members, and awarding incentives cooperatively.

Also, collaboration and interdependence are highly acknowledged and appreciated in collective cultures. These arguments are reflected in the current unions' demands for reduction of executive salaries and the increase in lower employees' remuneration.

Now put the two cultures in the same company and observe as misunderstandings soar and blood pressures shoot up! Then how could companies achieve best market orientation if the top is radically different from the bottom?

Enter the Brand Council

One way besides a host of other management interventions is the introduction of a brand council, a group of employees from all levels of the company and diverse cultural backgrounds that has the capability and intent to bridge the chasm between the two cultures and groupings and instil a positive outlook of the company. There needs to be a right environment and conditions in place for this to happen:

Management buy-in and commitment

Showing commitment and living the brand at all times would instil in others a sense of pride and commitment. What you do and say will always be scrutinised and if it's not seen as acceptable, the chances are high that your employees will not buy into it.

Subscription to market orientation principles

Market orientation is generally regarded as the commitment to understanding both the customers needs and competitors positioning and the ability to effectively interact internally. Since market orientation is both behavioural and cultural in nature, it involves the gathering and dissemination of market intelligence across the company. Committed employees can share critical information such as customer and competitor insights with colleagues if they are satisfied with their employment conditions. They also tend to be more customer-oriented when conditions improve.

Subscribing to and encouraging jointly agreed values

Corporate values should not only be left to hang on the company walls. Values such as honesty, ubuntu, collaboration, etc. are essential in uniting everyone, but living the values everyday without compromising is important.

Involving everyone in key corporate events and launches

Events such as corporate donations, CSR and sponsorships are likely to be seen by the lower echelons of the companies as unnecessary especially in tough times like now. Involving them might sway their perceptions. Also, doing small things like showing them your new ads before they are flighted could increase their support and enjoyment of the brand within their homes and with friends.

There is a legend about employees of a certain FMCG company responsible for producing product X, who would willingly check if the product was well positioned on the shelves at supermarkets when doing their shopping. Legend goes further that if it they found it fallen, they would pick it up and place it back on the shelves, bragging to their better-halves, friends and families about being responsible for producing it. Wow!

The above are amongst a non-exhaustive list of things needed to be done to ensure success with internal marketing initiatives. How companies adopt these depends on their current states and strategic intent.

The proverbial wrangling between HR and marketing regarding the territory that employee well-being should fall into has to be confronted. Marketing is there to ensure that all customer needs, both internal and external, are not only met but exceeded. HR also has the mandate of ensuring that both employee recruitment and retention are sufficiently achieved.