Good morning, welcome back to Off-Menu’s substack. For all you new folks, we’re a brand studio specializing in story & differentiation.
This newsletter is all about sharing insights, frameworks, & provocations designed to help you build a uniquely memorable brand.
Something I’ve changed my mind about over the years…
Good consulting isn’t about giving people the answers but helping them get to the answers themselves.
It’s a simple reframe, but one that’s influenced how I approach new projects.
Back when I first started Midnight (my first consulting company before Off-Menu), I was fixated on doing all the work myself.
Naturally clients hired me to tell them what to do; so I’d go and do it for them.
In the moment, I thought I was doing some of the best work of my career.
Final presentations went well.
Teams liked the work.
But over time I realized my suggestions didn’t stick.
Not in the way I wanted them to at least.
It was because I told them what to do instead of helping them figure it out on their own.
With Off-Menu, we’re running things a little differently this time around.
Rather than telling you what to do, everything we do is designed to get you to the answers yourself.
By asking provocative questions.
By facilitating different exercises to pull your vision out of you.
By surfacing inspiration from the most unexpected of places.
And then by playing everything back to you in different ways until you find conviction in your North Star; the operating system for your company.
Guiding you to the answers is often harder than giving them to you.
But it’s a worthwhile endeavor to help founders to build a uniquely memorable brand that stands the test of time.