Britain does not have a communications problem. It has a coherence problem.
If Britain were a business, would we invest in it? If it were a brand, would we believe it? If it had a board, would we keep any of them?
I invited Andy Burnham for tea. He didn’t come. So I had the conversation anyway.
What follows is a speculative Tea and Brand dialogue inspired by Burnham’s published positions on devolution, regional growth and political reform.
Brand Britain has an identity problem. It says one thing, does another and changes direction whenever the government changes.
Ranson: People hear the word brand and think advertising. Logos. Straplines. A Union Jack attached to something made somewhere else.
Burnham: Cynical.
Ranson: Accurate.
A national brand is not a communications exercise. It is the accumulated effect of what a country says, sells, builds and does.
It connects vision, mission, values, leadership, policy, investment, behaviour, experience and reputation. When those things reinforce one another, the country becomes easier to understand and trust. When they pull in different directions, no campaign can repair the contradiction.
That is where Britain finds itself.
Tourism sells heritage. Trade sells innovation. Universities sell knowledge. Government sells stability. Industry asks for continuity. Entrepreneurs ask for speed. Regions ask for power. The Treasury asks everyone to wait.
Each part may make sense inside the room where it was created. Together, they do not describe a coherent country.
There is also a leadership problem.
You would not appoint a chief marketing officer with no marketing experience. You would not appoint a chief brand officer who had never built a brand. You would not put someone in charge of manufacturing who had never made, scaled or sold anything.
Government does the equivalent routinely.
Then there is the five-year problem. Governments operate within electoral cycles, but countries cannot be rebuilt on the assumption that every important strategy must demonstrate results before the next election.
A Parliament may have a maximum life of five years. A country should have a memory longer than that.
We also confuse outputs with outcomes.
Government counts what it spends, launches and announces. The public measures whether anything gets better.
Do not measure how much money was announced for transport. Measure whether people can get to work reliably and affordably.
Do not measure housing initiatives. Measure whether ordinary people can find a secure home.
An output tells us something happened. An outcome tells us whether it made a difference.
Brand Britain needs more than another campaign. It needs clarity about what the country stands for, an operating structure capable of expressing it, leadership with relevant expertise and a framework that can survive changes of government.
The old version of British greatness was about importance. The next version should be about competence.
Less swagger. More substance.
Less flag-waving. More functioning.
The complete Tea and Brand dialogue examines government structure, Brand Britain, manufacturing, devolution, net zero, national identity and what it might actually take to put the greatness back.
Read the full article:
https://matthewranson.com/tea-and-brand-andy-burnham-brand-britain/
This is a speculative editorial dialogue, not a transcript or record of an interview. Andy Burnham did not participate in or endorse it.
I help businesses, founders and senior professionals become clearer, better positioned and easier to choose.
