Why is it so important for a general audience to elaborate on IR (Integrated Reporting) in connection with branding, that the topic found a place here?

This blog might seem a bit obscure from moment to moment; it is written in language that is not always easy. I hear that comment quite often.

Why then do I not adjust myself?

There are two reasons.

1. I firmly believe that all issues elaborated here are essential to everyday life; to the everyday sustainability of us, humans. It is precisely because the topics elaborated here have disappeared from everyday discourse that we lose our ability to understand the world around us and ourselves within it, and, with that, we diminish our sustainability factor.
2. I try to simplify the language; however, some arguments can not be simplified further. Human totality is irreducible. The world around us is complex, and we are complex beings (unlike robots or AI). One cannot climb a mountain without feeling tired at the top.

So, try to bear with me. And, sorry, for all those instances where a simplification is possible, but… I do not know how to achieve them.

So, what is Integrated reporting?

Integrated reporting is based on two premises:

1. That organisations behave like living beings (biological premise).
2. That living beings exist holistically (holistic premise).

Taken together, these two premises limit the possibilities of organisational philosophy, explanation, design, governance, control, risk management, and reporting.

Disclaimer

Do not look for the above two premises of IR on the Integrated Reporting Council’s official site. Although IR mentions integrated thinking as one of the five key principles of integrated reporting, you will not find a more in-depth explanation of why it is so essential for an organisation to think of itself as an integral whole. The term holism is absent from the methodology of IR and the surrounding materials, which includes no allusion to organisations as living organisms.

Those who have read at least a few posts on this blog know that it is about sustainability and how to survive in a complex living world. You can’t talk about sustainability without understanding its context. And the most basic context of sustainability is life itself. Understanding the evolution of life in the Darwinian sense, at both the genetic and memetic levels, is the first step toward understanding organisational sustainability. And since IR has been established as a methodology to enable organisations to be as sustainable as possible, a significant shortcoming of the otherwise excellent IR methodology is that it does not delve deeper into the biology of life.

Loose grip

In Brandlife, I devoted a lot of space to the question of how to manage organisations as living beings. Successful managers sense (know) when to tighten their leadership grip and when to loosen their grip. Power only comes when the grip of leadership is loosened. Every golfer knows how difficult it is to hit long shots accurately with as loose a grip as possible because a tight grip not only shortens the flight distance of the ball but often kills the shot altogether. You have to establish strict rules (in operation) to loosen your grip on management and “let it go,” as explained in said book.

You could find similar examples in risk management. Risk management is the best example of a loose grip theory. If one can manage with a tight grip in theory (and therefore underperform), it is impossible in practice to manage a crisis arising from risks in this way. An event is only a crisis if it happens so quickly that you cannot control it. If you are in control of the situation, it is not a crisis event. So when a crisis occurs, no manager is in control of the situation. It’s up to everyone involved to react “intuitively” according to the plans previously planted in our “muscle brains” (crisis plans from risk assessment). The crisis is the definitive proof that the organisation lives as a memetic entity precisely because it is completely removed from the manager. Every cell becomes the unconscious memetic manager, just as every cell in our body is the ultimate manager for us humans.

Dual nature of life and reporting

But then we must ask about reporting. Reporting is a management activity, but it is also a written result. With that, I pointed out the double meaning of integrated reporting (there is actually nothing else like it!). Reporting is:

1. Management activity (complex, dynamic, fluid, holistic, integrated, analogue).
2. Reporting output (one-dimensional, static, frozen, digital).

As a management activity, it is part of the creation, re-creation, and reproduction of memetic organisations. As a reporting outcome, it is part of the internal feedback system and external stakeholder relationships that provide fodder for their actions.

The attentive reader will notice that this IR reflects the dual nature of our lives, as it is also represented in branding theory. There, we speak of brands (complex, analogue) on the one hand and brands (frozen, digital) on the other.

It is not surprising, then, that branding provides tools to integrate reporting.

Branding as integration

Existing theory on integrated reporting is relatively weak in its integration. All available sources point to the need for integration and the drivers of integrated thinking within the organisation. Still, no one explains how to achieve integration in practice and what the tools for such integration are. Fortunately, the answer is quite simple: organisational integration is based on branding and branding principles. As explained in the Standard Branding Model ©, it provides managers with tools for integration processes in the organisation. The standard branding model provides a blueprint for actions to achieve the first step in IR, integrated thinking. As explained in many places, the brand is also an integral (core) part of the business model. And the business model not only explains the value engine but also provides the index (digitisation) for the integrated report, freezing the second part of the IR. Such an index can be further broken down into KPI’s.

The story of IR seems complicate,d but becomes completely transparent when we understand organisations as living memetic entities. Brands are the agents that integrate organisations; thus, brands and trademarks are just tools for integrated thinking within Integrated Reporting.

Feature personal photo: Shwedagon Pagoda, Myanmar. Unification and integration.