Image: The Home Depot

​Corporate Challenge: Strategies to solve female underemployment.

Ironbound Strategy: Use the brand’s core values to help generate new stakeholder values for customers, employees, and society.

Ironbound Action: Georgia based The Home Depot discovered that over 30% of military spouses have college degrees but are underemployed because of frequent relocation.  Since 78% of The Home Depot stores are within 20 miles of a military base, the home improvement retailer created a program to guarantee employment to all spouses after an active-duty relocation.  Creating value for military spouses emboldens employees, builds pride for customers, and enriches society.

Image: John Deere

​Corporate Challenge: Enhancing education for the next generation.

Ironbound Strategy: Promoting education is a great way to create value for customers, employees, and society.

Ironbound Action: Illinois based John Deere committed $100M to helping with equitable access to education for underserved communities. John Deere became aware that farming families struggled with access to online learning during the school shutdowns of 2020.  The innovation based company pledged to change that.  Building educational programs create phenomenal value for society.  All stakeholders experience significant gains when education becomes a corporate priority.

Image: John Deere

​Corporate Challenge: Growing social consciousness among employees.

IronboundStrategy: Incentivizing employees to volunteer is an extraordinary way to create value for key stakeholders.

Ironbound Action: Illinois based John Deere sets aside $20M per year to pay their 70,000 employees to volunteer.  Each hour spent volunteering is rewarded with $20 towards the non-profit they served.  The brand growth potential for John Deere has been revolutionary.  More houses are built, food banks are overstocked, and trees are being planted at stellar rates in the metropolitan quad-cities region where John Deere is headquartered.  Incentivizing employees to volunteer uplifts communities where companies operate, creating timeless brand loyalty that influences generations. 
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Image: Proctor & Gamble

​Corporate Challenge: Helping solve the drinking-water crisis.

Ironbound Strategy: For brand acceleration, never stop creating value for customers, employees, and society.

Ironbound Action: Ohio based Proctor & Gamble has focused its innovation toward water conservation.  P&G wants to use less water to make products, use less water inside products, and wants customers to use less water while using P&G products.  Their first water conservation product is a dish spray.  P&G hopes their innovation towards a better planet will ultimately win over the hearts of younger customers.  

Image: Microsoft City of Tomorrow

​Corporate Challenge:  Leveraging your brand and products to help prevent a climate crisis.   
 
Ironbound Strategy:  One way to outcompeting competitors is to successfully convert unavoidable risks into opportunities.  Powerful brands focus on long-term sustainability by creating holistic value across employees, customers, and society.  
 
Ironbound Action:  Microsoft once the dominant leader in cloud-based computing solutions is now facing mounting competition.  These new and existing competitors threaten to derail a Microsoft driven future of Artificial Intelligence. To combat these competitors, Microsoft is adopting stakeholder strategies to entrench its technology into climate solutions.  In their 2020 Annual Report, Microsoft announced a $1 Billion commitment over the next four years towards innovative climate solutions.  In addition, they will be investing $50 Million in AI for Earth to accelerate using Artificial Intelligence to address sustainability challenges.  They will also help their suppliers and customers around the world reduce their carbon footprints using Microsoft technologies.  Finally, Microsoft intends to be carbon negative by 2030, and by 2050 remove all carbon it has ever emitted into the environment since its founding in 1975.  

Image:Ford Driverless Vehicle

​Corporate Challenge: Forming successful partnerships.

Ironbound Strategy: Innovation success stems from creating value for customers, employees, and society.

Ironbound Action: Michigan based Ford Motor Company partnered with Bosch and Bedrock to innovate. Ford provided driverless cars, Bosch provided dishwasher sensors, and Bedrock hosted parking garages where sensors were mounted to guide cars into parking spots. After months of trial-and-error, the 3 brands announced “Driverless Valet” which yields 20% more vehicle capacity in parking garages.  Unlikely brand partnerships yield high success when the goal of innovation is to create value for stakeholders.

Image: Driverless John Deere Tractor

​Corporate Challenge: Deciding to automate.

Ironbound Strategy: For guaranteed success, invest in automation when its purpose is to create value for customers, employees, or society.

Ironbound Action: Illinois based John Deere pioneered tractor automation 20-years ago, by designing a tractor that could drive itself in a straight line.  Today, Caterpillar has 350 fully-autonomous ‘earth movers’ running 24/7 at mines around the world.  Autonomous tractors are not designed to replace operators, instead operators engage with the automated machines nearby, in safety and comfort.  When the purpose of automation is to create value for stakeholders, it builds more excitement and has higher adoption rates.

Image: Ford Proud to Honor Initiative

​Corporate Challenge: Bringing ‘meaning’ to your brand, and creating excitement for your employees. 

Ironbound Strategy: Helping non-profits has a unique effect of also creating value for your own customers and employees.

Ironbound Action: Michigan based Ford Motor Company created an online store to sell genuine Ford merchandise in military colors and insignia, with all proceeds going to veterans organizations.  Ford leveraged its brand to grow awareness of veterans issues while growing its own brand awareness in the military enthusiasts segment.  This strategy could easily be employed by any company.  By bringing awareness to impact organizations, brands can create excitement with their employees and customers while simultaneously creating extraordinary value for society.

Image: Salesforce Ohana Floor

​Corporate Challenge: Giving away your prized assets to create value for society, and in turn exponentially grow your brand.

Ironbound Strategy: Look within your assets for new and creative ways to create value for your customers, employees, and society.

Ironbound Action: California based Salesforce decided to give away the top floor of their skyscrapers to nearby community organizations.  Known as the Ohana Floor (Hawaiian for Family) the top floor of Salesforce buildings are communal spaces designed for employees to spend non-working time together and enjoy the majestic views.  During evenings and weekends, Salesforce donates the floor space to all local community groups.  By giving away their top asset, Salesforce strengthened their brand by gaining free publicity within their communities.  This clever sharing of resources can be replicated by any brands that are looking for unique ways of empowering their brand image while creating value for society.

Image: Visa Innovation

Corporate Challenge:  Modernizing the C-Suite to be more inclusive and diverse.
 
Ironbound Strategy: Powerful brands thrive by responding quickly to market changes with new and innovative solutions. Being innovative is the outcome of a top down culture that develops a strong internal pipeline of creative leaders.  Top talent and future executives choose to stay with organizations that value all employees, focus on creating the best value for customers, and an overall meaningful mission to better society. 
 
Ironbound Action:  Visa Inc, founded 1958 in Fresno California, is one of the world’s most trusted brands.  In an effort to build a better world, Visa is modernizing the 21stcentury of businesses to include greater equality.  In their 2019 annual financial report, Visa was one of the first publicly traded companies to disclose diversity and inclusivity as part of their internal recruitment practices.  To help promote more women in leadership, they launched the She’s Next initiative in 2019 toincrease female entrepreneurship and women’s empowerment in society.  Powerful brands are stakeholder capitalists – building a pipeline of innovative leaders by creating holistic value for employees, customers, and society.