OPERATIONS

hat makes a brand? If your first thought was logo, mission statement or aesthetic, keep reading. In the age of instant access to information, over-zealous customers sharing stories – good and bad – on social media and a growing focus on society, sustainability and impact, the concept of brand has moved from the drawing board to the boardroom. Thom Newton is well versed in this evolution. As Global CEO of design powerhouse Conran Design Group, he has worked with globally recognised businesses and brands for more than a quarter of a century including the likes of Aston Martin, Coca-Cola, Peugeot, McDonald’ s, Nokia and more. He tells Business Chief more about the importance of brand and why good brand management begins in the C-suite.

What does brand mean to businesses in terms of being a strategic or operational lever? It’ s changed hugely in the last five to 10 years. The understanding and leveraging of brand value was minimal even a decade ago, when the perception of brand focused on how you look, your logo or the way that you present yourself. Now, CEO and C-suite-level understanding is more sophisticated. Our interactions with the C-suite show that the most useful lever for brand is actually as a framework to understand the current state of business health, or as a tool to surface challenges and to find common understanding and solutions to them. Brand has evolved from an executional standpoint, where it was very much seen as an aesthetic thing, to a boardroom priority – certainly for larger organisations – to insulate against fluctuations in markets, pricing elasticity and more. It is now a strategically mobilised tool. Five or 10 years ago it would be uncommon to find board representation or ownership. It was very much the purview of the Chief Marketing Officer and comms department before being flashed in front of the CEO for final signoff. That has changed. Now, leaders can use their brand strategically, creating frameworks that allow an understanding of current position and key challenges. It is also a strong, unifying force. The beginning of any branding programme is about insight, understanding discontinuity across the business, gaps between current internal reality and how the business communicates externally, or how employees interpret brand and vision. It encourages leaders to put a ruler over business performance in a way that is often missing.

84 March 2026