Oberland Aims to Inspire Brands to Do the Right Thing With Its Purpose Guide

Many companies still don’t know the ins and outs of being purpose-driven. To guide them, full-service agency Oberland has mapped out a plan with its 2021 Purpose Forecast. Oberland has been purpose-driven since its inception in 2014, but this is the first year they decided to put out a definitive guide that lays out how others can benefit from the practice. After an intense year full of Black Lives Matter protests, a seemingly never-ending global pandemic, climate disasters and a turbulent election, the team at Oberland decided to take action. “This is really the culmination of what we call: ‘There is no normal, only new,’” Davianne Harris, partner and head of strategy at Oberland, told Adweek. "2021 is going to be the year of accountability,” added Drew Train, co-founder and president of Oberland. "This is the year where people realize the system was broken. Brands are a part of the system, and the whole system and its inequities need to be fixed, and brands can't avoid that conversation anymore." The agency did a series of webinars, conducted research and observed what brands were doing right and wrong when addressing purpose to come up with its forecast. It divided it into the following categories: racial and systematic inequities, climate action and sustainability, and democracy and truth. The forecast cites facts such as 67% of Americans supported Black Lives Matter during 2020, up from 43% in 2016, and 42% of people are doing something to combat systemic racism for the first time. The report also highlights companies doing the right thing, like Netflix adding a Black Lives Matter genre and Chipotle launching virtual hangout sessions to keep people social while isolating. But what may help brands the most are the do's and don’ts offered at the end of each section. For racial inequities, for instance, it reads: “Do highlight and center the Black experience," while democracy and truth says: "Do not blur the line between truth and misinformation." While some of these tips may seem obvious for those companies already doing the right thing, Train said many companies don’t know how to hold commitments to causes. Oberland saw many brands taking stances during the Black Lives Matter protests, for instance, but not all stuck with their commitments. To truly make purpose stick, Train said companies need to operationalize their commitments and take them out of the marketing department. “Ultimately, being a more inclusive organization is not actually the problem of your CMO. Making a company more inclusive, friendlier to people of color, [is the] the COO’s job,” Train said. He noted that the responsibility needs to be shared between the COO, CMO and, ultimately, by the CEO. If the CEO believes it, then everyone lines up. Purpose doesn’t have to be an all or nothing proposition, however. Train suggests that to operationalize purpose, he would do it one thing at a time. In the long run, Harris said, it's not about getting it perfect but being frank and acknowledging that there is work that needs to be done on whatever purpose a brand chooses. “It's not about knowing all the right things to do. But staying silent, that's never the right answer,” she continued. Oberland hopes its guide will prompt people to look at the role they play in a broken system and then ask themselves what they're going to do to fix it. “The bigger the brand is, the bigger part of the system they are, and the bigger their responsibility to be part of the solution,” said Train.