Today, like every day, there were many meetings on various topics sprinkled throughout my day, but two of those meetings gave me pause. They had a resonated theme, and they took me back to a costly mistake I made years ago.
I was in a new downtown leadership position and wanted to show results. Well-intentioned, I took the time to talk to my merchants and board members and quickly concluded that a rebrand of our district would be a game changer. I wanted our brand to be more inclusive, demonstrating to businesses outside our main street that they were part of our district. I sought a freshness that would signal growth, energy, and a rethinking of the place. I did all the right things, mostly. I hired a locally based agency to do focus groups and flesh out our brand identity. I got board members, staff, city leadership, and our business community involved. The agency built an excitement around the new direction and launched a pre-campaign to build hype. It was, mostly, going really well. When the brand launched, there was a big reveal event that was well attended, and the staff was engaged and re-energized. Success! (wait for it). Not long after this, our closest neighborhood took our beautiful new identity and graphically turned it into something less than flattering, and I’m keeping this PG.
I want to pause for a moment and recognize that I have just used a lot of “I” statements. I believe WE accomplish all great things as part of a team. But in this case, I want to own the mistake that was made. I want to be clear that I didn’t execute this rebranding with the awareness and consideration that could have literally changed the next decade of our relationship with our neighboring residents, and my team paid the price with me. I didn’t slow down enough to learn what they valued. I didn’t go to their neighborhood meetings and hear their perspective and I didn’t build their trust around our plans. I focused on my rate-paying district stakeholders rather than the greater community. We had negative interactions with some of these residents for years to come. To them, my desire to create an inclusive brand felt more like a path toward gentrification akin to a welcome mat for luxury housing developers.
Fast forward to today. I had the privilege of meeting with a few residents in a historic residential neighborhood in our district. They wanted to share their history, they wanted us to hear their frustrations, and they wanted us to slow down and listen. We did. And we learned a great deal. In the end, their requests were quite simple. They would like communication to flow at every stage of future projects. They want their voice to be considered and valued as the neighborhood experts. Finally, they would like our organization to advocate for the preservation of the quaint, historic character of their neighborhood. Two hours flew by as they talked of safety, respectful design, decreased setbacks and porches that host impromptu neighborhood wine nights. They were honest but kind, blunt but warm.
A few hours later, I took part in a de-escalation training at our police station. The instructor, a retired police officer with decades of service, gave detailed descriptions of de-escalation techniques and focused on the science of brain chemistry when people are in distress. One of the key calming strategies for police officers is simply to listen. This very impressive cop, stood in the front of our training center, and talked about the necessity for people to feel seen and heard when officers need to de-escalate high stress police interactions.
The links are inescapable. My inability to listen years ago led to tense interactions with neighbors for years. There was no baseline of trust and there was nothing to build upon. The greater community suffered as a result of that ongoing tension. Today, I had the opportunity to walk that same path, choose right instead of left, and then immediately had a coach confirm my lesson through a lecture and a Simon Sinek video. If we just learn to listen – really listen – we can play the long game and set the course for real change.