Sometimes in our training work with clients, we make the important distinction between "blind obedience" and "true obedience." As the term suggests, the former is a kind of rote, without-second-thought obedience or agreement - that usually results in a bad end. For example, if your boss, becoming alarmed at a fire in your offices, screamed out "Jump from the window" (on the 15th floor), to do so without thinking would be blind obedience. And you can imagine the outcome. On the other hand, if you stop and think that, what the boss is really seeking your obedience on is "vacate the building, save yourself." Then, by thinking through some other, safer options for getting out of the building and choosing one, you would be engaging in true obedience. We sometimes find ourselves running the risk of bad outcomes from blind obedience in our brand-building lives: for example, when our global or franchise brand team screams out, "Implement this global brand positioning strategy exactly as you see it," and we do so without thinking at all about the total fit of that positioning with our local market, well, read on.

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