The biggest hurdle to innovation is the corporate longing for certainty about costs, market size, revenues, profits, and other quantities, all of which can’t be known when an idea is new. Ironically, there seems to be no hurdle to investing in dying businesses, decaying strategies, and shrinking markets, all of which can be seen without a crystal ball. It seems we prefer the devil we know.

The stock market is spiraling downwards. Large institutions are looking for handouts. Corporations are cutting head counts. Budgets are slashed to the bone. Time to huddle in the basement? Not if you want to thrive in the next economy.

These days it’s easy to explain branding—just cite Apple or BMW and people get it. But what about companies that don’t sell sexy consumer products—what does good branding look like to them?

Most corporations generate a steady stream of designed artifacts—products, print communications, websites, advertising, manuals, financial reports, signage, retail environments, packaging, trade show exhibits—the “posters and toasters” of 20th-century commerce. When you add the growing list of emerging opportunities—customer experience, service planning, decision design, strategy mapping, and culture development—you begin to appreciate the need for strong design management.

As the drumbeat of innovation grows louder, corporate leaders are feeling the need for stronger internal design. But before a company can even think about building an in-house design capability, it will need to address the problem that has plagued in-house designers since the days of the cave painters. This can be reduced to seven letters: R—E—S—P—E—C—T. As soon as the department is established, its value starts to depreciate. Within months the new group is inundated with low-level tasks and excluded from high-level conversations.

What kind of name will work hardest for you? Should the name literally describe the offering, or should it suggest a benefit? Is it better to imply an idea, or to invoke a brand’s history? Getting the answer to these questions will help you choose the right name. But before you can do that, you have to know your options.

Companies need positioning because customers have choices—and if you don’t stand out, you lose. Positioning is what differentiates a brand in the customer’s mind. To win the positioning game answer this simple question: What makes you the "only"?

Ever wondered how a mission statement relates to a tagline, whom a purpose statement matters to, or what a trueline is?

These days when CEOs and corporate marketers talk about investing in brand, they’re probably referring to traditionally visible touchpoints such as product design, advertising, or web experience. That’s great, but what they, and most people, don’t realize is that branding is much more than just the stuff you can see.