84 slide:ology
When my husband and I hired a life coach to facilitate the writing of our life mission
statements, it became one of the greatest clarifying exercises I’ve ever done.
Revealing Yourself Through Design Decisions
My husband, on the other hand, found his verb in the
second column and didn’t need to continue. When he
revealed his verb, our worlds suddenly made sense.
We’re as opposite as two individuals could be. His life
verb was “relax.” Finally, it made sense why we both
wanted to approach vacations, finances, child-rearing,
and business differently.
If we were to express our life mission statements visually,
they would be very different. One might consider this a
type of personal brand. Mine would have colors that are
fiery and passionate while his would be serene. My type-
face would be big block letters so the troops can read the
flag in battle, whereas his would be a script font overlaying
a putting green. You get the point. The design decisions
you make represent you and feed your audience’s per-
ceptions of who you are.
It also enriched our marriage. The coach guided us
through several exercises, peeling back our psychologi-
cal layers like an onion, to reveal our core values—the
most critical element of a life mission statement. At its
heart, it comes down to what you value, what you do,
and for whom you do it.
One of the exercises involved scanning several pages of
verbs to uncover how we perceived our individual moti-
vations: after all, the most important component of the
life statement is the verb. Out of the entire list, we were
asked to narrow our selections to three. Unfortunately,
after perusing the list I began to panic because I couldn’t
find my verbs anywhere. I always felt I was different
but even with hundreds of verbs I didn’t want to settle.
I got a bit choked up and apologized for being odd.
The coach asked me what my verbs were and without
blinking I said, “conquer and liberate.” He thought those
choices were great. Was he kidding?
Thinking Like a Designer 85
Most branding exercises employ adjectives to describe an organization. But they only tell you
what it is. We prefer to define what it does. Circle a few verbs that resonate with you.
What do these verbs tell you about the character of your company?
Accomplish
Acquire
Adopt
Advance
Affirm
Alleviate
Amplify
Appreciate
Ascend
Associate
Believe
Bestow
Brighten
Build
Call
Cause
Claim
Choose
Coach
Collect
Combine
Command
Communicate
Compel
Compete
Compliment
Compose
Conceive
Conquer
Confirm
Connect
Consider
Contact
Construct
Continue
Counsel
Create
Decide
Defend
Delight
Deliver
Devise
Direct
Discover
Discuss
Distill
Distribute
Draft
Dream
Drive
Educate
Elect
Embrace
Enjoy
Encourage
Endow
Engage
Enhance
Enlist
Enliven
Entertain
Enthuse
Excite
Explore
Express
Extend
Facilitate
Finance
Forgive
Foster
Franchise
Further
Gather
Generate
Give
Grant
Heal
Hold
Identify
Illuminate
Implement
Improvise
Integrate
Involve
Keep
Know
Labor
Launch
Lead
Liberate
Light
Live
Love
Make
Manifest
Master
Mature
Measure
Mediate
Mentor
Model
Mold
Motivate
Move
Negotiate
Nurture
Open
Participate
Pass
Perform
Persuade
Play
Possess
Practice
Praise
Prepare
Present
Produce
Progress
Promise
Promote
Provide
Pursue
Realize
Receive
Reclaim
Reduce
Refine
Reform
Regard
Relax
Relate
Release
Rely
Remember
Renew
Resonate
Respect
Restore
Revise
Sacrifice
Safeguard
Satisfy
Save
Sell
Serve
Share
Speak
Stand
Summon
Support
Surrender
Sustain
Take
Tap
Teach
Team
Touch
Trade
Translate
Travel
Understand
Use
Utilize
Value
Venture
Verbalize
Work
Worship
Write
Yield
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