“If you do not stand for something you will fall for anything (paraphrased).”  Peter Marshall, U.S. Senate Chaplain, 1947

We often refer to a company’s vision to understand how they define or imagine the future.  We ask them about their mission to help us describe why the company exists; what drives and motivates their actions.  Sometimes we pull apart their brand, logo, or tagline in an effort to gain a greater appreciation of how they define their identity — the company’s personality.

As a marketer, I understand the importance, effort, and energy an organization puts into creating and developing that insight and direction.  The question is … will that insight enable an organization to answer what I believe is an equally important question – “What do you stand for?”

This may sound like an easy question.  On a day when all is going well, it’s not difficult to point to decisions you’ve made and actions you’ve taken which clearly support the alignment of an individual’s or organization’s  actions with what each might say they “stand for”.  Pause and ask that question when something goes wrong or times are difficult.   Will your actions reflect the truth of what you stand for?

Are you willing to:

• make the unpopular decision?
• stand against the crowd?
• take the road less traveled?
• give someone else the credit?
• take responsibility for a failure?
• rip apart something that’s not working …and start over from scratch?
• support a dream…yours or someone else’s?

Your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to:

1. Select three words that best reflect what you stand for
2. Review your actions over the last week, month, 3 months, year

If your actions and what you say you stand for are not aligned, 2013 is your year to create that alignment.

Ask a friend, family member, your boss, the CEO of your company –“what do you stand for?”

Remember …“If you do not stand for something you will fall for anything (paraphrased).”  Peter Marshall, U.S. Senate Chaplain, 1947