Culture is the New Company
Wealth Creator

Last week I decided it was time to invest in my future yet again to remain nimble and agile at 77 years of age! I booked into the Tony Robbins two day event in Melbourne. Eight hundred others had the same idea. OK, I left after hearing 20 minutes of the last speaker (Tony Robbins) but every other speaker re ignited my passions to continue to be a gamechanger and company transformation specialist. My ROI was great and I urge everyone to attend an event that re charges your mindset and energies. My favourite quote from the event was “Don’t be pushed by a problem – be pulled by a dream”. The keynote speakers included Ruslan Kogan (Kogan.com), Luke Baylis (Founder Sumo Salad), Radek Sali (CEO Swisse Wellness) and other impressive entrepreneurs, investors and authors.

Radek Sali made the biggest impression. He explained how he survived a $70m hole to sell Swisse for $1.7 billion. He went on to explain how culture was the ultimate disrupter and his policy of ‘People, Principles & Passion for Profit’ was the primary reason Swisse survived and prospered. At Traffic, we have been asking our clients to specifically invest in culture for the past five years. We discovered ‘culture oversight’ was one of the main reasons most company and brand transformations failed. Investing $500,000 in a new logo, website and campaign was not difficult but approving a $50,000 budget for investing in the cultural mindset of the company was difficult to win.

Not, so with CSG Ltd and Teachers Credit Union. Traffic transformed both companies successfully in 2014/5. Teachers Mutual Bank is now Australia’s 8th largest bank thanks to a new logo and a significant repositioning that evolved thanks to an internal campaign changing the prevailing ’mutual’ cultural mindset to compete more aggressively with the big four banks.

At CSG Ltd, we helped triple the share price in six months with a totally new business model that transformed the company into a more agile and dynamic organisation to compete more effectively with Xerox, Canon and other global giants. We created a five minute video to launch the new, reinvented CSG entity to over 100 of their key staff to help them embrace the new CSG mindset. It worked.

So it was great to hear Radek Sali sing the benefits of culture as one of the key driving forces behind the Swisse success and brand wealth creation. At Traffic we practice this every day with every client because we know that culture has always been a significant factor in company and brand successes.

If you would like to know more about how Traffic creates increased ROI and shareholder wealth call Chairman Austin Begg, CEO Andrew Begg or Sam Moore, Creative Director Sydney office to discover the secrets of making culture your most powerful competitive advantage.

Article written by Austin Begg, Chairman Traffic Australia.