Closing the gap between value and voice
Every great company hits a moment when its brand stops keeping up with its reality. ghSMART had reached that point. We spoke with Geoff Smart, Chairman and Founder of ghSMART, about his rebranding journey to close that gap. He didn’t pull any punches.
“We had embarrassingly bad branding and super-high customer satisfaction. Our work was elite but our marketing didn’t reflect it.”
The disconnect was obvious: the brand was lagging far behind the business. ghSMART had built a reputation as the pre-eminent leadership advisory firm trusted by Fortune 500 CEOs and private-equity giants yet the website, visuals and language felt dated—more commodity than category of one.
“We were shooting ourselves in the foot. Why market like everyone else when we deliver something no one else can?”
The “who deficit”
The lag had a simple cause: there was no one truly owning the brand. Partners were constantly innovating and improving services but no one was putting that evolution into words. “We had a ‘who deficit’—a gap between what we were doing and what anyone knew we were doing.”
That gap created risk. When a brand doesn’t evolve, the assumption is the company hasn’t either. Their work in the field was rapidly advancing but the brand was holding the firm back. The only way forward was to bring voice and value back into alignment. “We needed to translate what we actually do into language and visuals that carried the same precision and professionalism as our work.”
Authenticity before everything
From the start, authenticity and differentiation were non-negotiable. “We didn’t need obvious. We needed smart, non-obvious differentiation that only comes from our people and an agency partner willing to put in the hours.”
The process demanded depth, not speed. “It’s tempting to grab the first clever line and call it done. But the real insight comes after dozens of conversations—when patterns emerge that reveal who you are, not just what you do.”
It wasn’t about getting the first idea right; it meant doing the work to find truth that would hold over time. “We had to keep pushing past the surface. When we did, we landed on language so clean that even a six-year-old could get it. That’s where the brilliance lives.”
It wasn’t just the right words—it was codifying what ghSMART actually delivers: the structured approach and thinking that turns complex, intangible leadership decisions into repeatable, confident outcomes. The rebrand had to reflect that. Rigorous yet human, analytical yet alive.
Out with old
Letting go proved just as important as finding the new. “Our old A-with-the-underline logo was sacred. But letting go is like decluttering your house…you thank it, take a picture and throw it away.”
That discipline—to release what no longer serves—became the foundation of the work. It cleared the path for two ideas that defined the rebrand: The Power of Who, the firm’s positioning idea, and The Leading Edge, the concept behind its visual identity. Together they captured the precision, depth and humanity that had always defined ghSMART but had never been clearly articulated.
“The moment those ideas landed, everything clicked. The visuals, the stories, even the way our partners spoke about the firm…it all started to sound like us again.”
The moment of alignment
Once the new system took shape, the results were immediate. “All of a sudden, everything felt like us. It wasn’t about being flashier, it was finally being honest about our value.”
That alignment did more than fix perception, it re-energized belief. “Everything looked more professional…like we really had our act together.” The firm’s people could see themselves in the brand again and clients could feel the confidence that came with it.
Key takeaway:
A rebrand isn’t cosmetic, it’s corrective. It forces a company to confront the gap between who it is and what it projects. ghSMART didn’t invent a new story; it revealed the one that was already true. When a brand finally catches up to reality, belief compounds—inside the firm, across clients and in the market itself.
The reward isn’t recognition, it’s resonance.
Read Part 2, where we’ll dive into the internal, cultural impact of ghSMART’s rebrand and how the brand became a force multiplier from the inside out.
