Translating academic research into advice for managers is a tough skill. I really don’t think we value the skill enough. We hope that researchers will effortlessly translate quality research into quality managerial advice. There seems little reason to believe this. Many otherwise excellent researchers giving advice to managers are not at their best.
Researchers Giving Advice To Managers
Barbara Kahn’s Global Brand Power seems to exemplify this problem. It is a book with many great qualities. The focus is on things that are important to managers. It explains techniques to measure brands and understand branding. Overall, I would say it is a good book.
Still, Kahn probably wanted to write in an accessible way. As such, she opted for certainty in her writing style. Academics often do this when writing for managers, they abandon the cautious language used in their academic papers.
The problem is that attempting to be punchy often leads researchers to make comments that are certain, but certainly false. For example, Kahn’s first sentence is: “Brands today must be global.” (Kahn, 2013). This is punchy, but unfortunately, it is clearly incorrect. There is nothing that assures that brands must be global. Indeed, there are plenty of local brands.
There is even nothing that says that brands need to be global to be successful, there are plenty of successful local brands. The point was probably meant to be that a brand that is global needs to be globally consistent. Yet, even this isn’t self-evidently true.
Speaking To Managers
It is great when academics try to speak to managers. That said, we need to be as careful in what we say in our translations for managers as we are when we develop research ideas. I think it would be useful if academics prized the skill of translation more.
For more on managerial relevance see here, here, and here.
Read: Barbara Kahn (2013) Global Brand Power: Levering Branding for Long-Term Growth, Wharton Executive Essentials.