Your brand needs a 20 mile march

Choose a march, set your limit and stick to it.

Tolstoy challenges those of us on a thousand-mile walk to forget our ultimate goal and say to ourselves every morning, ‘Today I’m going to cover twenty-five miles and then rest up and sleep.’ Transpose ‘walk’ for work, and it’s an idea worth considering. We can all use some help with the endless overwhelm that accompanies organisational life.

More recently, management author Jim Collins expanded the concept in Great by Choice. He illustrates his version—the 20 Mile March—using the story of Amundsen and Scott’s 1911 race to the South Pole. Each explorer took a different approach to covering the frozen expanse. Amundsen and his team relied on remarkable discipline to reach the pole and return safely by traveling no more than 20 miles a day, regardless of the conditions. Across the ice, Scott and his team swung wildly between no miles and exhausting effort. Spoiler alert, Amundsen and team win, returning safely. Scott and his team perish.

The lesson of both Tolstoy and Collins is metaphorical, not literal. Choose a march, set your limit and stick to it.

In Great by Choice, Collins underlines the necessity, “Financial markets are out of your control. Customers are out of your control. Earthquakes are out of your control. Global competition is out of your control. Technological change is out of your control. Most everything is ultimately out of your control. But when you 20 mile march, you have a tangible point of focus that keeps your team moving forward, despite confusion, uncertainty, and even chaos.” (Chapter 3, p. 62)

Marches can add a dose of discipline to any aspect of the enterprise. For example, Southwest Airlines (almost) unbroken company-wide march to stay profitable every year—it took a global pandemic to halt their run. Over in research and development, 3M’s ’15% time’ gave the world Post-it Notes and set a precedent copied by Google and others.

Once you start looking, it’s easy to see where successful organisations use their marches. And I think the 20 mile idea also makes a welcome antidote to the wild bursts of activity that bedevil how people work on their brand.

Whether you follow the the baked-on, populist definition, or my version where brand is a store of value generated from everyone’s work, a 20 mile march matched to what matters most can contribute consistent value.

A quality march limits less than 1% manufacturing defects. A satisfaction march tracks customer retention. A workplace culture march keeps an eagle eye on staff engagement. And within those might be others with a narrower focus. Say service teams conducting monthly client check-ins. Communication teams sending out a weekly newsletter. Or on a personal front, writing an article every two weeks :)

The point is to commit to something you will do and can do, consistently. As a side-benefit, the focus helps get you out of the spin cycle of shiny objects. Those feel-good distractions that don’t move you closer to what’s most important for your enterprise. Every unheroic 20 miles boosts the brand and helps you thrive over the long term.

I’m not anti-pizazz. If those things show what matters and make promises you can keep, they can add value. But, finding your march requires you go below what everyone else does to understand what matters and how YOU do things. All while contemplating the required effort. So whether times are good or bad. You stick the distance.

Sure, there’ll be some drops and spikes. Some days you’ll struggle to cover the terrain. The point is temperance. So the slog of those harder days can rely on the reserves of value stored during easier periods.

What’s your 20 mile brand march?

Thanks for reading.

P.S. If you’re in Geelong or Melbourne join me in person for my Brand Masterclass on August 11. Learn more and get tickets here.

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