"Brands should step up!" - From purpose to brand activism at Magyar Telekom | Béla Szabó

Описание: In this episode of the SEED Executive Insights - Podcast Series, we talked to Béla Szabó, Brandcomms Director of Magyar Telekom. Béla dispelled the myths around the concepts and practices of CSR and purpose, while highlighted the essence of brand activism approach that they established at Magyar Telekom. Brands have growing influence not only as a key differentiator in business operation, but also as a problem solving entities. Béla shared his belief, that companies and leaders with a deeper understanding of people and culture could have more positive impact on business and society.

The interview has been hosted by László Aczél, SEED Faculty Member.
https://seed-uni.com/faculty/laszlo-a...

References, that were mentioned in the discussion:
● Gulati, Ranjay (2022): Deep Purpose: The Heart and Soul of High-Performance Companies - https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Purpose-H...
● Gulati, Ranjay (2022): The Messy but Essential Pursuit of Purpose, Harvard Business Review - https://hbr.org/2022/03/the-messy-but...
● Humu (2020): The mission-critical skills your managers need - https://www.humu.com/guides/the-missi...
● Edelman Trust Barometer (2023) - https://www.edelman.com/trust/2023/tr...

Béla Szabó acts as Brandcomms Director of Magyar Telekom, since 2017. Previously he held key positions at several large international advertising agencies, at Y&R, Leo Burnett and DDB. In the telecommunications industry, he worked for Vodafone's global organization in Hungary and London as Head of Branding and Marketing Communications.

Béla, as our distinguished SEED Alumni Member, has been recognized with the SEED Excellence Award for their recent achievements with Magyar Telekom and his outstanding professional and leadership performance.

For more info about the SEED Executive Insights, visit out our website.
▶ https://seed-uni.com/executive-insights/

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00:40 - Introduction by László Aczél, SEED Faculty Member
01:27 - From purpose to brand activism: Telekom's brand and communications approach
02:50 - Understanding purpose better: the difference between CSR and purpose-driven marketing
04:08 - Magyar Telekom's purpose in action: "driving Hungary's digital upgrade"
06:02 - Using purpose smartly: the concept of deep-purpose operation and Telekom's approach
09:41 - Discovering brand activism, as a more active purpose management activity
11:12 - Elevating consciousness with purpose-driven operation: the responsbilites and opportunities of companies and associations
14:34 - The growing significance of brands as unique differentiators and problem-solving entities
16:46 - Brands and NGOs could build strong partnerships in problem solving (instead of doing CSR)
17:32 - Brand activism and the role of leadership: elevating strategic thinking and operation in Telekom's brandcomm team
21:30 - Key takeaways from SEED's Executive MBA program: the journey of entrepreneurship
23:06 - (Brand) entrepreneurs within a large organization: being structured, strategic oriented, commercial savvy
24:43 - "We should all concentrate more on the culture" - the importance of understanding people and culture for creating better societies
27:20 - Internal cultural change within Magyar Telekom, the symbolic "T-shirt culture" and the agile operation
29:39 - Lessons from WPP's Stream conference and the missing culture of meaningful debates at Hungarian conferences