Creating an effective team brand

" A complex system can only be managed through alignment with its purpose."

Edgard Morin

How to strengthen your team’s brand? In a time when marketing is king, showcasing your team, its talents and successes, is key! It’s a powerful way to boost engagement, loyalty, and performance.

What’s the purpose of Team Branding?

Team branding is about building and promoting a strong brand identity for your team by identifying its core values, unique talents, and signature traits—and communicating these strategically. It’s also an excellent way to attract and retain top talent, enhance employee satisfaction, and boost productivity.
In short, team branding is a powerful tool for fostering a positive work culture, building an attractive employer brand, and encouraging team pride.

Step 1: identify strengths

The first step in creating your team’s brand is to formally recognize the strengths of each member and of the team as a whole.

You can start by drawing a collective Tree of Life (see below), or—if you use Gallup CliftonStrengths—integrate it to assess your team’s raw talents across 34 strengths, organized into four domains: Execution, Influence, Relationship Building, and Strategic Thinking.

Knowing and sharing each other’s strengths and accepted areas of weakness strengthens trust, engagement, and collective performance.

Step 2: define your values and purpose

Identify what matters most to your team. Is collaboration important? Trust? Diversity? Responsibility?

Look back at your team’s past achievements and ask: What made these successes possible?

Then, define your team’s “Why”—what drives you, gives meaning to your work, and allows each person to thrive. You can even write a team mission statement or slogan to express it.

Don’t forget to align with your company’s purpose, and then personalize it at your team level.

Also, take time to write down your team dreams and ambitions—what future are you working toward?

All of this will strengthen your team’s image and reputation—which, in turn, can boost or hinder the careers of its members and leader alike.

The tree of life: a powerful team branding tool

The tree of life is a powerful and playful metaphorical tool that helps visualize individuals’ stories, either personally or collectively. Each person contributes what they’ve experienced, what matters to them, and what they aspire to.

Used for team branding, it helps deepen mutual understanding by exploring what’s important to know about one another to collaborate effectively. The Tree reflects your professional identity—or the shared identity of the team.

Each team member draws their own tree, with:

• Roots: past achievements

• Soil: what we need from our environment to thrive

• Trunk: what we know how to do and enjoy doing

• Branches: key projects and dreams

Then, the group shares their trees and creates a collective team tree.

At Be&Lead, this is an exercise we’re currently doing to reflect on our successes, align our ambitions, and take stock of the journey we’ve shared.

Storytelling: make your team’s story matter

Storytelling is inseparable from team branding. A strong team has a unique story to tell! Sharing that story—highlighting achievements and collective experiences—strengthens the team’s identity and builds a connection among team members and across the wider organization.

Having a consistent tone and vocabulary aligned with your values and goals strengthens the team’s cohesion and sense of belonging.

You can also stand out by adopting a distinctive way of working that reflects your identity—be known for your collaborative, agile, or innovative approach, for example.

Designate brand ambassadors

Choose team brand ambassadors whose behavior, ethics, and interactions reflect the team’s identity. Their role is crucial in ensuring your team brand is perceived as authentic and credible across the organization.

Also, when your team actively contributes beyond its own department, it reinforces its identity by demonstrating commitment to broader company goals and causes.

Now it’s your turn!

Be creative, develop your own communication style, language, or symbols that reflect your team spirit!

“Everything is possible for those who dare, work hard, and never give up.”

This quote from filmmaker Xavier Dolan is a favorite of mine for its optimism and infectious energy.

Are you ready to start? And what, or who, do you need to make it happen quickly?

#teambranding #leadership #coaching #branding #cohesion