The Winstone’s brief
As part of an internal branding product, the CEO of Winstone Aggregates wanted to launch their new values to staff at their annual conference. It’s very easy to get caught in the trap of putting your values into PowerPoint – but with that comes the risk of putting your audience to sleep and not absorbing the message. How do we create a memorable presentation of company values that will inspire staff to live out every day?
Using history to inspire
Rather than redesigning a bunch of boring Powerpoint slides, we decided to use a Back to the Future approach. The CEO had given us a book on the company history and we were blown away when we read the origin story, because the foundations of the values were all right there! When William Winstone came to New Zealand 150 years ago as a 16-year old, he had the grand sum of 13 shillings in his pocket. His love of horses drove him to work in cartage, and within five years he had saved up enough money to buy a horse and cart of his own, and by the 1870s his business had grown so big that stables had to be built for his 200-odd fleet of horses.
We used this wonderfully motivating back story to guide the principles of the company’s values, and put them into book format to inspire Winstone Aggregates staff. It was a huge success at conference because it brought those values to life and emotionalised them, making staff proud to be part of such a visionary company.
