Brand Ethos in the Age of AI

Much has been written about the fundamental character and values of a brand over the years—what we refer to as “brand ethos”—to the point where many businesses hear the terms mission, vision, and values and do the proverbial shoulder shrug.

Brand ethos exercises have become, to many people, superfluous. Why focus on the “soft” work of articulating what your brand believes in when there’s the real “hard” work of conducting actual business to attend to?

This skepticism is understandable. Brand work can feel intangible and is notoriously difficult to quantify. Many leaders struggle to see the value in dedicating time and resources to it, preferring instead to craft a few universally agreeable values about ethical decision-making and move on.

But in an era where AI is disrupting markets in unprecedented ways, where new competitors can capture significant market share with minimal resources, your brand ethos has never been more crucial.

Understanding your company’s “Golden Circle,” as Simon Sinek defines it—your why, how, and what—provides the framework needed to navigate the complex decisions that lie ahead, which are sure to involve your approach to AI.

Recently, I heard philosopher and technologist Scott Dayton speak on the role of ethics in AI transformation. He believes that it’s ultimately your brand’s purpose and values that guide you on your AI transformation journey.

“AI can’t distinguish good from bad,” he writes, “it only knows true and false. It lacks moral agency, so it doesn’t have any ethical principles that guide it. But the person using that AI does. And that’s why AI ethics matter: because AI will be designed and used by people, and people behave according to their values.”

Organizations behave according to their values as well, which is the one of the primary reasons to engage in brand work to begin with.

If you haven’t solidified your why, how, and what, if you haven’t illuminated your values, then how can you be the best version of yourself that you can be?

How do you know who to hire and what work to say no to?

How do you make decisions that will shape your organization’s future in an AI-driven world?

Creating your brand, or solidifying it, or transforming it, is ultimately an exercise in clarity. It’s work that allows you to get crystal clear about who you are, what drives you, and what you’re trying to become.

Defining the ethos of your brand allows you to surface and then inhabit a confidence that will serve you in the years to come—when you’re tested as an organization, when you have to make increasingly harder decisions about AI adoption and implementation, when you need to stay true to your core purpose while embracing transformative change.

If the first part of your business story is about saying yes to opportunities, then the second half is about knowing when to say no. And the only way to know what deserves a no is to have absolute clarity about what you stand for and what you believe in.

In the age of AI, this clarity isn’t just nice to have—it’s essential for survival and success.