Becoming AUTHENTIC

When I returned to consulting and strategizing full-time, I took a long look at what I wanted to do and an even longer look at what I didn't want to do. As we gain experience and expertise in life, this task seems easier to do.

​I knew that I didn't want to be merely known for logos and end product design. I knew my talents lay in analyzing my clients' needs and sifting through the noise to identify the heart and soul of their brand. Initially, I cast a wide net in order to be open to new ideas and concepts. It is incredibly difficult for creative entrepreneurs to hone in and specialize because we love variety and waking up to new jobs and learning opportunities every day. So, the hard work for me was to take my years of experience and the vast variety of careers and meld those into one brand position that truly identified the type of work that A: I'm very good at and that B:  I really enjoy doing.

One thing I know I'm really good at is recognizing patterns. This trait is something that I knew I had a unique ability to do. If you’re thinking that would make me a better fashion designer than brand strategist, let me explain. Creative people tend to be obsessed with taking a collection, (whether that be data points, imagery, or problems) and identifying patterns, commonalities and outliers and then envisioning solutions to problems based off of that insight. This is where inspiration and innovation comes from. 

Another thing I knew I wanted my new venture to be identified by was my sincere commitment to effectively evolving my clients' brands. I was tired of simply providing logos without doing the thinking, research, and diagnosis that goes behind truly developing a useful brand. I wanted to help my clients peel back the layers of noise, to reach inward and identify what makes them tick, what drives them, and what the soul of their business is, just as I was doing in developing my own firm’s brand position.

From my brainstorming, I realized that another thing I'm pretty good at is identifying core values and stories that resonate with all of us, and helping my clients tell those stories in a way that truly connects them with their customers or community members. In my brainstorming about what shape I want this new firm to take, the word "authentic" kept coming up. If I were to create a word cloud based on the most often referred-to words defining my vision and my goals for this new firm, authenticity would be large in front and center.

As I started looking into the depth of my knowledge and where I wanted to focus primarily my work in downtown development and helping towns tell their stories that unite their community and engage investment is something I'm most proud of and enjoy thoroughly. The overlap between branding and marketing strategies and downtown development strategies is something that fascinates me, and I love analyzing it and coming up with new ways that it can be applied and cross-pollinated. The fact that the word "authenticity" ends in "city" just made it even more inevitable that it needs to be used in the naming of our firm.

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July 2023