A well run company acts as one person. That's what a brand means.
For good or bad, in the mind of people companies are allocated as a "person". We give personal characteristics to brands, so we value companies that act predictably, have certain well-known values and are consistent with their own values.
It's the utmost responsibility even if your CEO changes every month, that the next CEO ensure continuity in spirit and operation of a company.
After all, sure, companies don't do things, people do. But also people don't do things, brain cells do things. When a person is acting erratic and inconsistent, you don't talk about their internal brain cell conflicts, you see a problem at the person level.
Same way erratically behaving brands & companies will be written off, because they don't stand for anything and have no reliable characteristics.
Companies that act inconsistently are said to have "left hand doesn't know what right hand does" problem. It's not a feature, it's a bug. It's no coincidence the analogy is to that with the mind of a single person. You may be collection of brain parts, but for proper operations it's crucial you operate self-consistently. Companies are no different.
This isn't your average company, though. It's Mozilla. Their main product is a completely open-source browser, and nearly 100% of their decision making is done out in the open, with the community's input being a massive part of it. So, while I agree with your assessment when it comes to most companies that can act like that, this is different in my opinion.
For good or bad, in the mind of people companies are allocated as a "person". We give personal characteristics to brands, so we value companies that act predictably, have certain well-known values and are consistent with their own values.
It's the utmost responsibility even if your CEO changes every month, that the next CEO ensure continuity in spirit and operation of a company.
After all, sure, companies don't do things, people do. But also people don't do things, brain cells do things. When a person is acting erratic and inconsistent, you don't talk about their internal brain cell conflicts, you see a problem at the person level.
Same way erratically behaving brands & companies will be written off, because they don't stand for anything and have no reliable characteristics.
Companies that act inconsistently are said to have "left hand doesn't know what right hand does" problem. It's not a feature, it's a bug. It's no coincidence the analogy is to that with the mind of a single person. You may be collection of brain parts, but for proper operations it's crucial you operate self-consistently. Companies are no different.