I’m not the greatest parent in the world. I’m not even the greatest parent among the parents that I know. And I’m saddened by the fact that I know people who would be better parents than me, if only they were able to have children of their own.

But I do make sure that I LIVE every moment, every hour and every day that I am privileged to spend with my children. By living, I mean full, undivided attention, on their terms and in a way that we can ALL grow and benefit from, regardless of how ordinary or exciting the time is.

This is sometimes challenging and tiring but never boring or frustrating because I go into this time naturally, without any preconceptions, barriers or thoughts about how I SHOULD behave or what other people might think. Sometimes it gets me (and them) into trouble. Being told off in Sainsbury’s for trolley racing springs to mind.

The reason for sharing this is to say that because I live and breathe the time with my kids, loads of good things happen.

1)   There is real, deep mutual trust that allows all of us to be open with our thoughts and feelings. This makes dealing with some of the more tricky issues of parenting much, much simpler and with correspondingly better results.

2)   All of us are content, happy and rewarded. We value the time, understand the boundaries but naturally and without fear, explore new things and experiences – we all get more out of the moments.

3)   By always reminding myself that I am privileged, I recognise and respect what I have and am more committed and passionate about preserving and developing it. The more I put in, the more I get back because the kids sense the effort and the rewards too.

4)   We are each, and collectively, setting up a very strong long-term future relationship – hopefully, sustained for life.

The point behind wearing my heart on my sleeve is to say that brands are like children (without the nappies). They are born, sometimes with difficulty, and after the initial celebratory euphoria, brand owners have to knuckle down to the business of nurturing (and responsibly growing) their charges in all the many and varied ways necessary for them to successfully reach maturity and positively contribute to the world.

Brands, like children, need to be LIVED with not DEALT with or tolerated. They need the same deep levels of commitment, passion, care, respect and understanding. They need protecting from harmful influences, but they also need help to find their own path. They benefit from a devotion of time and consistency of thought and input from everyone around them.

For MTD, the role of brand custodian, developer and champion is as rewarding in our professional world as parenthood is in our personal ones. We approach each in very similar ways and LIVE every moment spent with the brands that we are responsible for.

We do this because we know that we are privileged to have such wonderful and responsible jobs – ones that many people would wish to have for themselves. We also understand that the role of brand custodian can be very challenging and tiring, but that if the attitude is right, it should never be boring or frustrating.

Ultimately, if brand owners, custodians and managers live their brands constantly, believe in them passionately and engage with them naturally, everything else becomes easy. The work stops being hard work, starts to become fun and everyone who contributes begins to grow and benefit.

Finally, there are tons of books on parenting, loads of people keen to offer advice, anecdotes, evidence, rules, ‘best practice’, watch outs, horror stories and ways of achieving certain success. Parents are analysed, observed, bench marked, criticised but rarely praised. Some parents get so concerned about how to be a good parent that they stop being a good parent. They over complicate, compensate and even allow inertia to set in. In other words, lose their ability to be natural, keep things simple, enjoy themselves and reap the rewards.

It’s exactly the same for brands and brand custodians.

If mobile is the future of marketing, then the future is now. Consumers are buying shiny smartphones in their droves, which is driving a revolution in the way we engage with them. The mobile internet on smartphones and other mobile devices has set the web free from the desktop and it won’t be long until it overtakes.

When we develop for the web today, we need to consider how best to serve all devices and understand what users want from each experience. Those shiny smartphones in the pockets and handbags of consumers are gateways to new types of interaction and we’re only scratching the surface of what can be achieved.

Brands large and small need to think hard about how to use the opportunities mobile offers to engage in innovative ways.

QR Codes and Tags offer simple and seemless links between the physical and digital world, but unless we give users compelling reasons and positive experiences, they’ll be dismissed as another marketing fad.

Retail is being shaken-up by mobile marketing, but not enough retailers are really taking advantage of mobile coupons, location and payment services. How long will it be until savvy consumers start voting with their feet (and their fingers)?

Check out the infographic below. Although it’s produced by Microsoft to plug their Tag system, it does give an insight into the growing world of mobile marketing:

I’ve recently returned from 4 months embedded in a private sector client business. They have become the leading player in their markets, have a truly global operation and multiple businesses serving a very broad range of audiences. A $5bn turnover is testimony to their success. So why was I there?

Well, like many corporate entities they are a big machine – growth and success does that to you. As a consequence, they are slow to think, make decisions and act. Their infrastructure, whilst capable of servicing the machine is not so great at creating or dealing with change – deciding if the machine is still fit for purpose and if not, how they change it and with what.

T’was a time when organisations of this size either chose to not think about change (if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it) or could devote huge resources, budgets and time to defining how to evolve and then enacting evolution. Leaders and decision makers could wait for ‘the plan’, be given all sorts of indications, research and evidence that would insulate them and have teams define implementation plans that could last for years.

Not now – try and operate in today’s world in this way and the world has changed again before you’ve evolved to meet the previous changes. The result? Small, lean and fast organisations start eroding your position, demanding members/customers can’t be bothered with you and you become a tired old dinosaur trying to survive on past glories and stories.

The complexities of inter-dependent teams, workstreams, logs, programme meetings, ‘brown paper’ meetings and meetings about meetings all seem to conspire against really dynamic forward motion. Sure things get done. In some cases there have even been real ‘outcomes’ but everything runs at a pace that erodes the ability for keen minds to resolve, create, plan and deliver in a diligent, inspiring and efficient way – barriers are built not removed.

Some organisations have tried to address the inevitable inertia that gets created within cultural and operational systems that are essentially bureaucratic. Meetings without chairs, brainstorm/blue sky sessions etc. Others create brand values designed to motivate lean thinking and action (to a greater or lesser degree successful – usually lesser) but the real answer is to create environments where the people that want to speak up, move forward, create and inspire – even if this means rubbing the status quo up the wrong way – can flourish rather than becoming suppressed.

Somebody said to me recently that the trick in meetings is to avoid asking questions that require debate and answers. Better to keep quiet, let the agenda run its course and then everyone can leave on time and go about their business. This is the priority over defining purposeful direction and action or resolving issues. We at MTD agree with the age old but still relevant quote - “This is no way to run a railroad”.

Everyone understands the world is going through a period of change. The changes are profound and fundamental. They are also irreversible. The economic downturn has been a catalyst – the straw that broke the back of doing things the way they have always been done, but the writing has been on the wall for ages. People’s access to knowledge and increasing comfort with online technology has combined with dissatisfaction with their lot, their choices and their leaders. People are questioning more, contributing opinion more and creating powerful movements for change themselves rather than waiting for leaders to create change for them. They are now increasingly impervious to traditional communications, marketing and spin.

Some managers and marketers view the changes as things to be suffered or tolerated where survival is the priority, where shrinking or adapting accepted practices is the only option. Others see opportunity and need to change but are unable to do so because the accepted status quo creates insurmountable barriers. A few see opportunity to change themselves and their organisations, to address new challenges in new ways and are finding ways to achieve this.

Have a guess who the winners will be?

Where are your leaders?

Organisations need to change in order to be successful in the brave new world. Leaders create change – they are the mavericks, the purveyors of uncomfortable truths. They have the passion and conviction to drive change and to bring others along with them. Leaders invite opinion and ideas because they recognize that they can’t do it by themselves.

Many organizations are populated by managers rather than leaders. Managers maintain the accepted practices and processes. They keep the machinery well oiled. They may question whether the machinery is still relevant. They may question whether the organization needs the machinery at all any more. But many are not encouraged to voice change related opinions or believe that to do so would upset the accepted way of doing things. So they carry on managing rather than leading.

So in many organizations today there is a gap between the need to create change in order to engage with staff, customers and other stakeholders and the capability to do so. Which is a shame because we think that creating change, although demanding, is ultimately much more beneficial, rewarding, exciting and fun than just struggling through.

Yes, the Queen is on Facebook. It was inevitable and we should have seen it coming ever since she addressed the world on Youtube. If only I had been smart enough to snatch up www.facebook.com/thebritishmonarchy I could have made a small sum, or even owned an unofficial monarchy page.

Engagement you ask? Not the Prince William type (and we actually did write this just before Prince William announced his engagement to Kate Middleton today), the other kind of engagement. The British Monarchy engaging their audiences who spend their time in Facebook, and whom are getting a very warm welcome.

It’s been about two weeks and at a last count there have been hundreds of thousands of followers that have “liked” them. Depending on how Prince William and Kate use this new medium to communicate with Royal fans, the potential for followers is exponential.

Although expected, I was caught by surprise by a small, tiny comment on the homepage in the haiku-like “about me” box. “Please note that any offensive comments will be deleted”.

A question asked by many companies and organisations when setting up a Facebook page, is whether or not to delete negative comments. Now interestingly enough, the posting to wall functionality has been disabled, however what the general public can do, is comment on a royal post.

Perhaps in one of the most engaging mediums of all time, the general public has a desire to comment on these pictures, most likely posted by someone in a position of relatively high responsibility at an advertising agency or a digital media agency.

As you can see from the posting, these fans are engaging in a genuine and utmost authentic way. “What a thrill” to see my favorite actresses receiving MBE’s as noted by Stuart Parkinson for the world to see.

“I wonder what the joke was” asks Sean Schilke. Is the ability to comment on pictures and activities of the Royal family strengthening people’s brand association with the Monarchy?

At least the new Royal wind farm developments can fund the room full of people who will spend every waking hour reviewing each and every last comment, deleting the offensive comments. It will be very interesting to see the how many people will grow to “like” the royal family, and whether or not it will contribute to national and international “liking” of the Monarchy.

While taking a mental break from the Apprentice over the weekend, I read that Hugh Hefner is re-opening London’s Playboy Club. In case the Playboy-merchandised store on Oxford Street wasn’t enough to fulfill your Playboy needs, the revival of the London establishment will be located in Mayfair and is scheduled to open in 2011.

My primary experience with the Playboy brand stems from the popular reality show “Girls Next Door”. The show first became popular in 2005 and launched the celebrity careers of Holly, Bridget and Kendra, Hef’s girlfriend’s. The reality show offered a glimpse into both the celebrity filled lives of the bunnies, Hefner himself, and also a glimpse into their curfews, schedules and professional development. Bridget for example, hosted a radio show while Holly was trained in editorial and post-production work. Now that the girls have grown up, Kendra is married with a child and now has her own reality show and Hef has moved on to new girlfriends including the Shannon twins plus blond bombshell Crystal Harris.

Although Hef and the Playboy brand doesn’t offer the same appeal it once did, it still has amassed incredible awareness, and is undoubtedly a topic of household discussion at certain dinner tables.

The opening of the London restaurant, casino, and lounge extravaganza comes at a time when the company must need to diversify. Increasing levels of free online porn, and the appeal of a busty lady no longer racks in the cash it once did. The success of the club will be heavily dependent on the celebrity intake, and we certainly know some ex-bunnies who will guaranteed red carpet places.

There were certainly be a plethora of tourists to fill the seats, but we will have to wait and see how many stars show up on opening night. The opening of the venue certainly comes at a time when people are taking fewer vacations and there will be ample unemployed curvy ladies from all parts of the world vying to dress up as a bunny.

I wonder if the event organisers will let Hugh glide across the red carpet on a mobility scooter?

Have you heard of the recent Gap logo saga? The original navy boxed Gap imagery had been pulled from the website in place of a newer more modern logo when the company was hit with a backlash. Whether you agree or not, Gap have rescinded their rebrand plans and are going back to their old Gap imagery.

I would like to think that the decision makers at Gap are smart enough to only move forward with a change in imagery after some careful consideration and with the help of supporting research, but who can tell? The reversal did provide the company with a great deal of publicity this week that they wouldn’t have received otherwise and it demonstrated that many of their customers are still passionate about their brand.

Whether you agree or not with their change in direction, the company is being very quick to respond to criticisms and as the Twitter account shows, (I can’t tell if it’s an official Twitter response or the clever and quick workings of a fan) they are certainly laughing at themselves.

The press release issued by Gap Inc. acknowledges that the company neglected to consult their passionate online community and says that moving forward it will engage with the audience before making future rebranding decisions.

Based on the MTD approach, whether the new logo was created internally or externally, the decision did not consider customer relationships and customer perception, some of the very important branding considerations. How has this move alienated or supported their brand champions?

The decision by Gap to revert back to their old logo also demonstrates that internally the company must not have been fully committed to this change. When companies and organisations rebrand there will always be bloggers that respond negatively but rarely do such large companies like Gap release new imagery only to then revoke it due to customer feedback.

The release and revoke of the new imagery have sparked some entertaining Twitter conversation, although it is difficult to tell whether it is coming officially from Gap or from clever and interested fans.

Here’s a snapshot of the humour:

I wonder why Gap decided to change the imagery in the first place?

In addition to being humorous, Gap’s (potential) use of the light-hearted Twitter as a PR tool is very clever, if they in fact came up with it. Perhaps they should move some people from communications into research!

Teams Apollo and Synergy were sent to Heathrow’s Terminal 5 in the beginning of episode 2, not to go on vacation but to design an original beach accessory that holidaymakers would want to take on a beach vacation. The goal of the challenge is to create this original beach accessory and then sell the product to large chains.

Although pressed for time, it seems that the teams didn’t consider strategy much at all throughout their latest challenge. Instead of considering the various markets, or even the target audiences of the high street chains, it seems as though the teams considered the audience only after a product idea was suggested.

Although the challenge was business oriented, the teams used little strategy, forethought or even common sense in tackling this challenge. Team Synergy ultimately was able to create a product that could potentially sell, with one buyer placing an order for 100 items while team Apollo’s internal communications completely destroyed any chance of consensus, despite the team leader’s early attempt to control the group discussion.

Some of the weaknesses of the teams identified in this episode were the lack of constructive group communication and the lack of foresight in thinking the product through. In team Apollo, the chosen product was determined by the individual who shouted the loudest, which was ultimately discovered in the boardroom.

This was the first episode that we participated in the live discussion on Twitter. Using the #theapprentice hashtag, we contributed to conversations which every week can be followed by searching #theapprentice on Twitter.

As you can see in this diagram, there were many people tweeting about the episode while watching the show who included a hashtag (used for tracking discussions and trending topics) in their post.

This graph is also useful in determining which hashtag to use moving forward. We chose to use #theapprentice last night in our conversations because that is the hashtag used by the official Twitter account of BBC’s The Apprentice. According to the diagram above however, more of the audience were contributing by using #apprentice rather than #theapprentice, so from now on we’ll have to engage in the larger #apprentice conversation.

Unfortunately we could not give great comparison between the methods and process followed by either Apprentice team, because there simply seemed to be none whatsoever. Instead of choosing a target market, the teams created a product that could potentially serve a wide range of audiences and in the end had no interest from the buyers at all.

Team MTD at the very least would have given more thought and consideration to the target market and commerciality of the products rather than moving forward with the loudest idea. Hopefully the teams of the Apprentice will show more consideration to strategy moving forward, so then we could have more to write about!

In an effort to sustain sales levels, Harley Davidson are now officially targeting women specifically. Of course they have always had loyal female followers, but they are now targeting the thirty-to-fifty something female demographic who have high levels of disposable income.

After hearing last week that the Milwaukee family home of the brand will be staying open after unions voted to accept a seven year pay freeze and move from full time to more part time and seasonal employment, Harley Davidson are being frugal and are saving money through user generated promotional content.

In contrast to one of the brand’s recent extremely edgy, masculine commercials appropriately called “The Cheater”, here is the winning video from one of Harley Davidson’s newest targeted demographic.

Harley Davidson are being extremely smart in harnessing the devotion and cult culture that the brand have already established, and getting those same customers to create content for them in their spare time. The user generated content may not have high production value, is admittedly slightly on the cheesy side and may not appeal to the wider older woman demographic. It does however belong to a collection of content that increases top of mind awareness and fuels increased customer passion for the brand as they and their troupe of supporters vote for their favorite video.

I read in a blog that the brand have started to send out rings specially designed by one of the founders’ grand daughters to new and loyal female customers, but I couldn’t find any official word on that. The cost of a ring is a small price to pay for user-generated content and the development of long term brand champions.

As I lay in bed last Monday morning listening to the radio, there was someone on BBC One talking to Chris Moyles about going camping with the Beckhams. I asked aloud “Who goes camping with the Beckhams? (I also meant, the Beckhams go camping?). I then heard someone say “It’s Gordon Ramsay” from the other room, and I replied that I didn’t recognise his voice because he’s not swearing.

I have had limited exposure to Gordon Ramsay outside of his “Kitchen Nightmares” franchise, where his favourite language of choice is profanity and where he displays an unwavering passion for food and cooking. On the radio, Ramsay was plugging his new book, as well as the new grill at the Savoy, where radio host Chris Moyles was very upset at the fact that they wouldn’t be serving chips. Ramsay also spent a very long time talking about his £110 truffle pizza at Maze.

After being hurt fairly badly in the recession, and even before the recession, he seems to be continuously beating his drum like the energiser bunny, who keeps going and going and going. He has been selling off restaurants and rights to telly programs to remain profitable.

What is he up to now, and how are these new ventures going to save him?

What is Ramsay’s competitive advantage? Well he’s not leading a food revolution like Jamie Oliver, no in fact he is trudging forward in the fine dining market. Even www.gordonramsay.com is pointed in the right direction, with the title reading “Fine Dining in London”. You don’t get more specific or clearly defined than that.

If the webpage is called “Fine Dining in London”, how do Ramsay’s new initiatives support that direction? Interestingly enough they do not in fact support that direction. The new Ramsay direction is in search of Ramsay’s best restaurant in England. The series on Channel 4 will follow Ramsay around the country as he tests restaurants nominated by the public, to ultimately crown the winner as Ramsay’s Best Restaurant.

I think the series is a lovely idea, and will get to showcase restaurants all over England. Is it a smart move for Ramsay? I still can’t wrap my head around how Ramsay is going to swear and pull horrible emotions out of the restaurant owners and workers in a best-of series. Where’s the conflict that Ramsay is best known for? Maybe this is all a part of his new image. Oh wait… there’s also a new book.

Ramsay’s Best Menus cookery book features 52 recipes from varied countries and is displayed in a cut-out style, where each course is in a section, so at any given time you can have a starter, a main course and a dessert open, all on one page. The webpage says that the recipe book allows for 140,000 different menu choices, but if you do buy the book, you’ll probably make 3 dishes from it and add it to your shelf of other Gordon Ramsay cookbooks.

I’m not even sure if Gordon Ramsay has a competitive advantage anymore. He obviously can’t compete with the Emmy winning, Ryan Seacrest backed Food Revolution, but it doesn’t seem like his new TV show and book are really anything new, anything different, or even anything remotely Ramsay.

Putting my cynical side away for the moment, I do hope that Ramsay does well and I do hope England embraces the new show…. but I don’t think it’s going to be the winning combination that he’s looking for.

Best Wishes Ramsay!