The Fruit of the Need to Reposition Positioning:
Strategic Centering
Leucip Institute
Meltem Heper | Murat Öksüz
Is your Strategy headed to Entropy or Longevity?
Entropy: Natural but sneaky...
Entropy is the universal tendency for order to shift into disorder. Entropy in daily life reflects the tendency of systems to move from order to disorder unless conscious effort is made to maintain order. Think of a messy room. A tidy space naturally becomes cluttered unless effort is made to keep it organized. This everyday example reflects the need for conscious action to maintain order.
Human nature, like the rest of the universe, is also prone to entropy.
Over time, our life can become a mess if we let it. As Socrates famously said, "The unexamined life is not worth living." To truly live, it is important to question, focus on and actively take responsibility for our True Role in life. Without this awareness, this compass, we risk succumbing to life’s tendency toward chaos.
History shows that this principle extends beyond individuals to larger systems in all areas of life.
Ibn Khaldun observed that empires rise and fall in predictable cycles. Founders bring an original vision but with expansion resources dwindle and costs soar, inevitably leading to collapse.
The same pattern can be seen in businesses, where less than 10% survive into the third generation. Having lost their founders’ passion, they overreach, lose focus, and ultimately dissolve.
Entropy is natural but sneaky...
The price is clear for all organisations, whether public, private or third sector:
Moving away from their True Role,
Loss of the natural attraction power they possess from birth in their unique area,
Unnecessary costs incurred while losing their value...
Ultimately, this downward spiral ends with disintegration: disintegration that could have been resisted with awareness and intentional effort.
The Choice Is Yours
Disintegration into nothingness i.e. Entropy, or staying power for generations, i.e. Longevity?
Which one will be the result of your strategy?
The choice is yours.
As mentioned, the work starts with awareness.
The pre-Socratic philosopher Leucip put forward something that seems simple to us now but was revolutionary at the time. He thought that something would eventually reach a point where it could not be broken down. He put forward the first concept of an atom, coming from “atomos” meaning “indivisible”.
This was the inspiration for Leucip® Institute:
To start from the atom, which is in everything and is indivisible; to go deep down to our undivided essence.
To return to our essence that hold us together and add value to our own universe in our own unique way.
To ensure that organisations that are heading towards death due to entropic disintegration return to their centers, the essence that holds them together.
It is in your hands to Center on Your True Role, the most advantageous Position you can own, to Clarify, Strengthen and Sustain it light of the Leucip Laws of Longevity…
Easier said than done?
Yes.
While entropy is natural, it takes discipline to adopt the Longevity Mindset...
The Longevity Mindset
The Longevity Mindset is the awareness of knowing what keeps us together, our True Role, acting accordingly, and doing so consistently.
The good news is that the Longevity Mindset can also be internalized...
Our focus is to make this process easier.
For you to rediscover your True Role,
To become the Magnetic Center of your field,
To Maximize your Intrinsic Value while Minimizing Extrinsic Costs.
As a result of all this:
For Longevity.
Strategic Centering
Repositioning Repositioning
We talked about Centering on our most advantageous Position, Our True Role and transitioning to the Longevity Mindset against Entropic Disintegration.
Why are we talking about repositioning positioning in this context?
How did we get to this point and how do we see the future?
The scenes we encountered on the journey of explaining, implementing and globalizing Positioning, which we have been pioneering for years, inspired the field of Strategic Centering.
We witnessed that
While a different definition is put forward by everyone, the real definition is unknown, causing;
A lack of understanding of the central role it plays, the decisions it influences, and its principles.
A lack of capabilities to implement it correctly,
A total case of “lost in translation” when it comes to globalisation.
To include a few quotes from the introduction written by one of our founders, Meltem Heper, for the book “Positioning in the 21st Century”, of which she is a co-author: (©The Kitap, 2022):
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as a consultant who had achieved considerable success while managing dozens of brands not only in theory, but also at every level from brand manager to general manager and from the most global to the most local, I had seen that above all else Positioning was the basis of this success and decided to center on it…
…
I started writing blog articles to create this awareness and during this journey I saw that there was complete misinformation about Positioning both in the world and in Türkiye.
I realized with horror that even the correct definition of Positioning, let alone the literature and principles of Positioning, was still not understood by the vast majority of business and marketing circles.
Positioning is not a concept under the marketing function as it is commonly believed to be.
Positioning is an umbrella concept that starts with the CEO, it is the basic strategy that guides all functions.
It can Make You when done right or Break You when done wrong.
…
why was it so difficult to understand such a vital, simple, and clear axiom (basic proposition)?
First of all... this axiom, which affects the entire company beyond the P's of marketing (product, price, place, promotion), is mistaken to be just a communication concept...
Secondly... easy to copy product differences or image statements are mistaken for Positioning.
Thirdly the inability to understand that… Positioning… has a series of principles.
It is time to put these timeless principles in their rightful place…
It is time to properly understand, apply and continue adhering to them...
Urgently so...
In the 20th century, even when competition was not so intense, those who broke these rules sooner or later paid the price.
In the 21st century, when things are getting even more heated, there is no longer any compensation for these mistakes.
…
Meltem Heper
September 2022
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Under these circumstances....
In the book, which we have completely recompiled, developed & expanded for the Turkish edition,
Beyond the correct definition of positioning,
We aimed to establish
1. the central position it has taken for companies, individuals and countries
2. the fact that it directs all functions
3. the principles we have curated from 50 years of literature with examples from Türkiye in a clear step by step content layout
So what is Positioning?
First of all, if we were to ask what competition is, it is the battle between companies to capture market share, much like the wars between countries to claim territory.
What is Strategy?
"Strategy is Owning the Most Advantageous Position".
Jack Trout, Trout on Strategy
Strategy, just as it involves concentrating forces at the most advantageous position in territorial wars, is about claiming the most advantageous position in people's minds in market wars. It is about claiming one of the truly existing positions on the battlefield, the mind, not on paper as in traditional segmentation methods. It involves determining which positions—whether offense, defense, flanking, or guerrilla—can be occupied, and knowing when to cease wasting resources on taken strongholds and instead, conquer new territories.
Today, even with drones replacing tanks and rifles, the guiding principles behind strategic decisions remain the same.
Positioning is about owning a word, concept, or category in the mind; it defines what you are, and more critically, what you are not.
How important is it?
It is the central strategy that guides all functions.
It is the only strategy that helps both increase your value and reduce your costs.
It has a direct impact on valuation; it starts and ends with the leader.
It is the Number 1 Priority of Senior Management.
“Strategy Is About Creating A Unique And Valuable Position.”
Michael Porter, Harvard Business School
In conclusion,
Strategy is Positioning.
Positioning and Asymmetry: All the Talk not the Walk?
When we tried to instill this understanding in people's minds, we observed the following:
Strategy is considered the domain of top management,
Positioning is it the responsibility of marketing? brand managers? or agencies?
Those unfamiliar with the topic mistakenly believe that positioning, the central strategy that guides all of a company's functions, is merely the talk not the walk.
Positioning remains unknown to R&D, is often delegated to marketing, which tends to focus more on a single 'P' (communication) rather than the 4 Ps of marketing, or is entirely left to the agency without taking any responsibility.
When things go wrong, senior management has no clue about positioning, and the blame falls on the agency.
Especially in organizations lacking a category hierarchy (umbrella brand > sub-categories > sub-brands management)...
Having spent years thinking about how the mind works, we know how difficult it is to change people's minds.
A striking example is that even though Al and Jack have taught Business Strategy courses to top executives at war colleges, when Al passed away, the New York Times headline (in summary) read ‘… Adman … Dies at 95.'
We're applying our own medicine and creating an entirely new space to Reposition Positioning it where it deserves; at the center of the senior management agenda…
Strategy is Being Centered
We are Repositioning Positioning;
We are branding the Most Advantageous Mental Position you can Own as your True Role, placing it at the heart of the leadership agenda,
Contributing to Clarifying, Strengthening, and Sustaining it in order to drive all your activities,
In light of the Leucip Laws of Longevity, which we introduce as a powerful synthesis of profound knowledge and experience on human nature.
In Summary:
Strategic Centering means:
Centering on the most advantageous Position you can own, your True Role,
Clarifying, Strengthening & Sustaining it,
in light of the Leucip Laws of Longevity.
This is the natural path to becoming the Magnetic Center of your field and
The Number 1 Strategy to achieve Maximum Intrinsic Value with Minimum Extrinsic Costs.
True Role:
The Intersection of Your True Inner Strength & Available External Roles
Your True Role lies at the intersection of your true inner strength and available outer roles, it is your unique contribution to the world and the most advantageous position to own as a company, an individual or a country.
Google = Search, Leucippus = Atomism, Turkey = Intersection between East and West, etc.
This intersection is an important differentiator in this field, leaving behind positions that opportunistically only look outward and forget their essence.
If you cannot engrave your True Role in the minds of those inside, you cannot sustain it in minds of those outside.
Find Your Center, Be Centered, Stay Centered
At this point, it's worth briefly mentioning the 3 key steps, now proven by neuroscientists, to achieve anything in life:
Intention, Focus, Consistency (aka. “Intention, Attention, No Tension”)
A clear intention, focusing on this intention, and continuing to focus consistently while maintaining flexibility despite the obstacles that arise.
Essentially, a form of brainwashing...
The main phases of Strategic Centering reflect these steps:
1) Clarify
Clarify your True Role.
You can't own everything: decide what to focus on and what to say no to.
Find Your Center...
2) Strengthen
Strengthen Your True Role
Get rid of asymmetry, make sure that not only your talk but also your walk, all your functions are designed according to your True Role.
Be Centered
3) Sustain
Sustain Your True Role
Establish systems to protect against the whims of every new manager: refresh and remain consistent without losing focus.
Stay Centered.
Find Your Center, Be Centered, Stay Centered
The Leucip Laws of Longevity
All the while, remember human nature, how the mind works - the laws of longevity - don't cut corners when faced with challenges...
We introduce the Leucip Laws of Longevity as a synthesis of profound knowledge and experience in the following 3 key fields:
Positioning Principles
Neuroscience
Management / Marketing / Brand Science
in the most comprehensible, actionable, and globalizable format.
We invite you to stay tuned to Center on your True Role, to Clarify, Strengthen and Sustain it in light of the Leucip Laws of Longevity.
Internalize the Longevity Mindset
Although entropic disintegration is a result of human nature, short-termism has no end; our future depends on how well we can manage this beast, on finding, focusing on, and sustaining our True Role.
If we don’t want to eventually disintegrate into nothingness…
You are invited to take the first step on this journey with the Strategic Centering Summits tailor made for your organization by Leucip Institute.
Put aside classical strategy playbooks,
Remember the Laws of Longevity,
Step into the world of centenarian institutions.
As we stated earlier:
The Longevity mindset is the awareness of knowing what keeps us together, our True Role, acting accordingly, and doing so consistently.
The good news is that the Longevity Mindset can also be internalized...
Are you ready?
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