“Some people tap their feet, some people snap their fingers, and some people sway back and forth. I just sorta do ‘em all together, I guess.” Elvis Presley, 29th August 1956
He’s created some of the most recognisable high street brands of the past two-decades but today global marketing guru Chris Barez-Brown is turning his attention to helping everyday people find their inner superstar and become the Elvis in their company.
“When I first heard Bono of U2 ask the question ‘who is Elvis around here?’ I was struck by how fantastic a question it was. It’s powerful, it’s provocative and every time I’ve asked it, somebody has been able to answer it - that’s what I love about it. We all know that someone who stands out from the crowd.”
For Chris, the enduring spirit of Elvis makes him stand out from what was a generation of stars, “it’s not about the jumpsuits and the Vegas or the hamburgers at the end. Elvis is somebody who shone brightly. He broke rules, got stuff done and was a bit of a maverick and therefore it’s a lovely shorthand for what I think people can be a bit more like in work. People who have a bit more about them, a bit more charisma and a bit more energy.”
His latest book ‘Shine: How to Survive and Thrive at Work’ is a triumphant kick up the backside for a work force lacking, motivation, self-confidence and innovation. As Chris’s calls it, we are facing a crisis, “western society has a numbing effect on us and makes us a little bit duller. We need to wake up to this fact, start to understand it and what can do to tap into the genius within.”
Famed for building Carling Black Label into Britain’s first billion-pound brand, Barez-Brown recalls his own personal realisation that his relationship with work and energy needed to change. “When you are stuck in the work that you do it is very difficult to get a true perspective. I was doing really well at Carling Black Label. I was on the fast track programme, everything was looking shiny with the biggest budgets of anyone my age but yet I knew that this still wasn’t what I wanted to do. I had no idea what that was but the difficulty is that when you are surrounded by stuff and busy you’ll
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