Hawaii WBE Feature: iQ 360 & Communication Consulting

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios, it’s time for Women In Motion. Brought to you by WBEC-West. Join forces. Succeed together. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Women In Motion and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, WBEC-West. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. And this month we’re spotlighting WBEs from Hawaii, and we have Lori Teranishi with iQ 360. Welcome.

Lori Teranishi: Hi. Thanks for having me, Lee.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about iQ 360.

Lori Teranishi: We are a sort of a unique entity in our field, where we like to think of ourselves as a mix of a business advisory firm and communications consulting, which is a little unusual in our industry. We’re not a traditional sort of PR firm. We have a number of consultants who have been chief communications officers in corporations, as well as a number of MBAs, attorneys, former product managers. And this is unusual in our field, but it also gives us the experience of track record to manage complex crises, litigation, mergers and acquisitions, labor issues, and large scale sort of organizational transformations. So we find ourselves often advising on strategy and operations as well as communications in these situations because the way we communicate to multiple stakeholders often involves making business decisions.

Lee Kantor: So what usually comes first?

Lori Teranishi: We always start with – we start with the company’s values actually in any situation, especially in a complex crisis, or if you’re embarking on a major change or if you’re getting a threat from an activist or, you know, someone who wants the company to pursue a certain policy. You know, it’s always important that a company have its purpose and values laid out so that that becomes its North Star and its guiding sort of force. And all business decisions sort of emanate from that. And then you can decide how you communicate. But you have to decide on what your actions are and then communicate as opposed to having the communications be the veneer or the window dressing.

Lee Kantor: Now, in the companies you work with, do you find that a lot of people might have a North Star on a mission statement or somewhere, but it isn’t maybe reality anymore? Maybe it was what they thought they should be when they started. And now over the years, they’ve kind of migrated to a different position in some of these kind of true north places.

Lori Teranishi: We – I see that quite a bit, actually. You know, in a prior life, I spent most of my career in communications, but I also spent time as chief of staff to Visa, where that was the company, the payment company I was working at. I was chief of staff to our chief operating officer and managed large parts of corporate strategy. And what we – first of all, strategy is very important. It’s something that needs to be revisited often. And we do see in our consulting practice today a lot of companies that create a mission statement or vision statement and it sits on a shelf. Same with a strategic plan, sits on a shelf.

Lori Teranishi: And, you know, because the world is changing so quickly, I think Accenture put out a report earlier this year that, you know, said the pace of change has accelerated by just orders of magnitude. So because things the world is changing, business is changing, it’s no longer enough to write a strategic plan and just keep it for, you know, five years and not change it or not revisit your mission or vision because companies have to be more adept, more flexible, more agile than they ever, ever have been.

Lori Teranishi: So we do see that. And I always encourage our clients to try to really look at their plans. I have a strategic plan for iQ. I look at it every quarter and we measure – you know, we measure where we are against our goals.

Lee Kantor: Now, is it possible for organizations, big or small, to have a one true north that is kind of like you said, their North Star, that this is how we make decisions, are all going to be based upon this? I remember reading many years ago about Southwest in the early days when somebody would come to them with an idea, they’d go, does this help us be the, you know, the low cost airline? And it was yes or no. If it did, then they would consider it. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t consider it like it was simple.

Lee Kantor: But do – is it possible nowadays, like you mentioned, with the advent of so much technological change, so much market change and all of the chaos that seems to be surrounding businesses of all sizes, is it possible to have that one North Star?

Lori Teranishi: I think it is. I think it’s more important than ever as the world has gotten more complex. I think we need, you know, more simple, more simple purpose or statement of vision. And I understand what you’re saying, Lee, because, you know, within one company there can be many divisions, sometimes with competing interests. But we have – you know, in addition to the complexity of the world, businesses have a complexity of stakeholders that they manage.

Lori Teranishi: It used to be that, for example, publicly traded companies really had an overwhelming focus on investors. But today, you cannot run a high-performing organization without considering employees, regulators, you know, your supply chain, your business partners, you know, even activists that oppose you, as well as investors and, you know, many other stakeholders.

Lori Teranishi: So in that kind of complex environment, where you’re you’re trying to sort of satisfy the needs – oh, I didn’t even mention customers. That’s a big one, too. If you’re trying to balance all of these needs and how do you do that, you have to have this North Star. So you have a litmus test, you know, especially when you’re being asked to do difficult – make difficult decisions where there are trade offs between those different stakeholders. And so company has to go back to what are its values and its purpose or mission to do that. And it seems it is difficult for companies to navigate that today. But if you don’t have that, then you can run the risk of getting pulled in many directions and not being able to have, you know, something that you stand for, that you can give a rationale for why you made that decision.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there any exercises or advice you can give an organization that maybe they can do right now, that maybe a listener to this show about either defining clearly what their North star is, or to get back on track towards it?

Lori Teranishi: Yeah. I mean, I think that it’s important to get all of, you know, get input from many people and including employees, maybe even some external people, your business partners, your customers. And if you feel as a company or organization that you’ve lost your way, you know, you have to start with defining what your mission is and then your values.

Lori Teranishi: And we actually help companies quite a bit do that. They’ll come to us and say, we have a problem. You know, we have a communications problem. People don’t understand what we’re doing in this area, or we’re getting a lot of lawsuits and we’re just, you know, for some reason this is happening and we go back to a lot of times while there are other presenting problems, the problem is that, you know, they don’t have the right strategy. You know, it’s a business problem, not just a communications problem, because the communication – you know, a lot of times people think it’s communications, but it’s a larger problem.

Lori Teranishi: So going back to your question, Lee, I think it is important to get a cross section of stakeholders to help identify and go back – sometimes go back to your roots. Why did you start the company and, you know, what’s changed, and try to determine if the mission or parts of the mission are still valid or not. And ask, you know – your values usually don’t change too much. But as you grow, you know, you might be servicing different parts of the marketplace and some of your values might even need to be adjusted or you become – you started in one region and you become global and your values have to resonate with a larger base of people. So, you know, there are always adjustments that have to be made, a regular.

Lee Kantor: I would imagine that if you poll your people at all levels of your organization and they’re having different definitions of what your purpose and your true north are, that’s probably a good time to call iQ 360 to get everybody on the same page.

Lori Teranishi: I mean, we would be happy to help. Sometimes it is good to have a third party because, you know, well, first of all, we do this kind of work a lot, but also having a third party that is sort of apart from the organization, you can get a more unbiased view of things and also people tend – this is why I see so many corporate strategies or this mission and vision work not being done because there’s – especially as a business owner, I understand every day you get pulled in so many different directions that it’s easy to just put this aside. So, sometimes when you hire an outside firm, right, you’re paying them so there’s a reason to try to prioritize the work and they can push it along.

Lee Kantor: Right. But I would think this is foundational work. Like, this is one of those things that aren’t a nice to have. This is a must have. You have to have everybody on the same page understanding what the mission is and how we do things and what the culture is. And if you don’t and you have, you know, slowly deteriorating different ways or different values get kind of shifted or adjusted based on the personality of that person that’s in charge, that’s where real problems can occur.

Lori Teranishi: You know, Lee, I couldn’t have said it better myself. I agree with you. And I think that this is something that many, many businesses don’t do regularly, or they have a mission, a vision and values, and they have a strategic plan. So it’s almost like the mentality is, well, check that box, it’s done. But if no one is using the strategic plan, if no one is embracing the values and living the values and it’s not front of mind and not being used to guide business decisions, then what good is it really? Right?

Lori Teranishi: So, this is not something that I believe leaders should just treat as a checkbox. I really believe if more leaders, you know, did the hard work – it’s also hard work. And people don’t like to do this because it’s also not numbers driven all the time. And it’s you have to sort of embrace your whole brain, your left brain and your right brain. And so, that exercise is uncomfortable to some people. It’s in a gray area. And not all business people like that. But, you know, it’s critically important if you want to drive your business forward and, you know, to grow your business and to make sure that you keep everyone focused on your goals.

Lori Teranishi: And also that you mentioned culturally that your culture is one that’s a happy, healthy, vibrant culture. If you are not, as a business leader, paying attention to your mission, vision and values and your culture, there’s no way you can be a high-performing company. So that is something that, although it’s hard work, if every business devoted time and energy to it, I think we would see, you know, better workplaces and better society in general.

Lee Kantor: Yeah, I agree 100%. I think this is one of those areas, especially in fast growing organizations, that they don’t prioritize, and it’s to their detriment in the long run because at first if you’re a small growing company and you know everybody and you know every hire, you know, the values and culture kind of gets communicated. But as you grow and especially like you were talking about multinational or global organizations, it gets so diluted that the people that are the boots on the ground sometimes don’t even know what the business really is about. You know, the culture didn’t kind of get disseminated all the way through to the bottom.

Lori Teranishi: Yeah. And it’s something that as business leaders we all have to reinforce every day. We have to train. You know, it’s one thing, as you said, Lee, when you start a company – I’m a founder, I’m the founder of iQ 360. And you’re right, when I first started the firm, I could talk to everyone in the company every day. But as you grow, you have to train your leaders to talk about the culture, to talk about the vision and values. And that’s another area where we see a lot of organizations could do better at.

Lori Teranishi: And even if you have this high-level vision and mission and you’re in a country that’s not, you know, in the headquarters country, you know, you as a leader it’s incumbent upon you to translate what all that means for your employees in that country. But then a lot of times, the companies don’t train the leaders to be able to do that. They have to have toolkits and they have to have direction and help to navigate that and to be good communicators and stewards of that vision and that culture.

Lori Teranishi: So, you know, it’s a lot to do. And I know everybody’s busy and they’re trying to make money and manage all these other risks. But really keeping your employees focused and really aligned with the culture is probably the most important thing you as a leader can do.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. And culture is one of those things where it’s going to happen whether you’re mindful or proactive about it or not so you might as well be mindful and proactive about it.

Lori Teranishi: I agree with you. It’s something that I think because of the change that we mentioned earlier, we talked about earlier, Lee, that I think culture and alignment on values and vision is going to become even more important because the world is going to be changing.

Lori Teranishi: I talk a lot about VUCA, the how we’ve shifted into a VUCA world. That’s not a new term. I think it was, you know, popularized, like, 20 years ago. But if you’re not familiar with the term, it stands for volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity. And in a VUCA world, everything’s happening faster with the greater sense of uncertainty.

Lori Teranishi: And so what I believe is required of leaders in this environment is, you know, as we shift from a world where the value of companies was determined by hard assets, like the number of factories you owned or the acres of land, in the digital world, human capital is the focus, and managing risk and reputation against multiple stakeholders is critically important. So that means as a leader, you have to think multi-dimensionally as I was mentioning across a number of stakeholder groups, and what these stakeholders perceive about you and your business is as critical as what they think about your products and services.

Lori Teranishi: So, you know, in that world, a stock price can plummet on a rumor. Your executive can be removed because he or she makes a careless remark. And in the younger generations, because of their changing values, you know what they expect from employers and brands are becoming as important as our sales growth or, you know, our products. So it’s just a different world. It’s really requiring so much more of leaders. But this is the world we live in. So we have to focus on culture and mission as leaders because we have to align everyone in this really confusing and complex world.

Lee Kantor: Yeah, especially in this competitive kind of search for talent. I mean, people quit bosses. They don’t quit companies. So everybody really has to be aligned.

Lori Teranishi: Yeah. I want to write a book with you, Lee, because everything you say, I just feel is right in my heart. And I think that – you know, you’re right. I mean, people, there are much higher expectations of brands and employers than ever before. And there’s more transparency. So you can’t just tell people what you’re doing, tell them you’re doing this or that. They’re watching your actions every day. And these are your employees, too. And they want to work for brands and companies that are authentic and that operate in the right ways. So there’s higher standards across the board for all leaders.

Lee Kantor: Now, why was it important for you and your firm to be part of WBEC-West?

Lori Teranishi: You know, as a woman-owned and minority-owned company, I feel that we need to try to, you know, be part of a community of Women Business Owners. And I’ve, you know, learned a lot from just interacting with the content. It’s nice to be part of a community of other women. It’s very lonely at times, being a founder and running a business. I had no idea how hard it would be to run a business. I mean, I do love it, but it’s not without its challenges. So having a community of other women entrepreneurs who are experiencing some of the same things is very comforting. And it’s an environment, an ecosystem in which, you know, I can learn from others. So it’s been a real benefit and a value to me.

Lee Kantor: Now, do you have an ideal customer? Is there a niche or a kind of a sweet spot for your firm?

Lori Teranishi: We tend to work with companies that allow us to interact with the highest levels of the organization. We are typically brought in by the C-suite or by boards to help them tackle big problems or big initiatives. So we tend to work with companies who really value communications performed at a strategic level. So in other words, we don’t, we’re not sort of developers of content or necessarily just launching new products. We come in where there are sort of bet the farm issues at stake, or a company wants to make a big transformation or transform their culture. We talked about that.

Lori Teranishi: So that those are the types of of companies we work for. They don’t have to be multinational companies. They can be smaller companies. But the reason why they hire us is we have a lot of people that have sat in their seats on the corporate side who managed large global corporate communications, functions or who are otherwise in situations in corporations so that we can advise at that level.

Lee Kantor: So what do you need more of? How can we help? Do you need more talent? Do you need more clients? What do you need?

Lori Teranishi: Both. I want to be greedy today. I think that we – you know, there’s – we are always looking for talent. We believe people are our greatest asset. And we – you know, I have this – the reason I started iQ 360 is I really believe communication is one of the most powerful tools that an organization has in its toolkit.

Lori Teranishi: And the way that we practice communications, I believe, is sort of game changing for companies. We’re not just there existing to help make the company look good. We are asking the kinds of questions that oftentimes help our clients to change the way they act and have changed policy. And so, you know, I really would like to continue on this journey and continue to advance my profession and make our profession a lot more integrated with the business.

Lee Kantor: So if somebody wants to learn more, have a more substantive conversation with you or somebody on the team, what’s the website?

Lori Teranishi: It’s www.iq360inc.com.

Lee Kantor: And that’s the letters I and Q; the numbers three, six, zero; and the letters I-N-C dot com.

Lori Teranishi: Correct.

Lee Kantor: That’s us. Well, Lori, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Lori Teranishi: Thank you, Lee, for this opportunity. It was wonderful to talk to you.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Women In Motion.