Last week we were fortunate enough to receive The Danish Communication Award 2011 from the members of Danish Communication Association (Dansk Kommunikationsforening) in the concert hall of DR. About 250 participants in the audience of corporate communication professionals voted after presentations of the five nominated communication projects. A few hours later we got the result and were called to the stage to receive the award. I went on stage with the executive of the project from Movia, Maja Nellemann, and my colleague Louise Kramer, who is project manager at Stagis.

Many of the participants (including myself) summed up the events on Twitter - look for #komdag. You can see my tweets on twitter.com/#!/nikolajstagis. At Stagis we've been blogging about the project quite a few times since we started implementing it in 2008. Here's the most recent about the nomination for the award. Or you can find more about the project on our website by clicking "cases".

We are really proud of the award and the acknowledgement we've received from our colleagues in the field of corporate communication. Our project "Bus drivers with character" received about twice as many votes as the next nominated project and the audience cheered after seeing a short introductory video with bus driver Torben who was - as always - quite entertaining. What makes me just as proud as receiving the award is meeting some of the bus drivers who has been involved in the project, and who tells me that it made a difference in their lives. Like the bus driver Linda, who was awarded the Danish bus driver of the year on September 2nd and is soon flying to Singapore to see public transportation there and meet bus drivers in that region. She loves the bus and the passengers and now she is going to board an aeroplane for the first time in her life to fly to Asia! You can meet her on "Bus driver TV".

Danish article about the project online (Update November 18th)
Danish Commucation Association (DKF) just released a Danish article about the project. You can read it on kommunikationsforening.dk. There are videos and lots of other articles from the event on the site, too.

We are closing the office for two weeks, from July 16th through July 31st as we leave to spend time in the sun rather than in the hot office in Kompagnistraede, Copenhagen. We will be back, ready to take on new projects and finalize ongoing work from August 1st.

I have been spending most of my time in June and July in Rome, Italy, working on my book projects. The manuscript for the Danish book titled "Den autentiske virksomhed" was finalized in June after massive editing from a total of 365 pages to 303. While the Danish editor at Gyldendal is reviewing it I will be starting up the other half of the project which is to edit and change various parts in order for the book to be published in an international version. Also, I've been spending time in Italy working with some Italian case studies. On Friday, I'm interviewing one of the masterminds behind the city planning in Rome through the past 20 years, Eugenio La Rocca, Superintendent of Cultural Heritage of the City of Rome during the 90s and 2000s. We will be discussing the paradoxes between massive cultural heritage and the need to change and develop a city. Two important factors that do not always work out nicely - just like in all other aspects of understanding, preserving and changing organizational identity in organizations, large and small.

When I return from Italy and my colleagues return to the office in Copenhagen August 1st, we will also be welcoming a few new members to the Stagis team. During May and June we have been busy recruiting new skilled people and four new faces will show up at Stagis during August and September. I look forward to that and I know everyone else does too!

It is about 35 degrees celcius in Rome today - a bit too much to be in front of the screen if you ask me - I hope you will enjoy the summer as much as I do! Enjoy La Dolce Vita!

For the past three years I've been working on 'Den autentiske virksomhed' (or, The Authentic Company, as it may be in English). Now I'm finally coming to an end. There is a full 360-page manuscript which I'm now editing to about 300 pages. I'm planning to deliver the final document to the publishing house Gyldendal Business sometime in May and hopefully see a real book looking a bit like the picture above during the summer. Besides my theory on business strategy development based on the authentic strengths of the organization, there is a string of case studies in the book. Some of them are Noma, LEGO, Ducati, Alessi, Hästens, Novozymes, BMW and Absolut. I've been really lucky to visit them and talk to their CEOs, owners and leaders.

During the fall I'll tour Denmark to talk about The Authentic Company and discuss how companies of all sorts can explore and develop their strengths from within. Some of the talks are already being arranged as I receive calls almost every week from people who want to discuss authenticity and what it means. Here are some of the talks that I'm doing soon:

14. April 2011, Hewlett-Packard Denmark (workshop)
3. May 2011, Vanebryderdagen 2011, 'Bremen' in Copenhagen (conference)
5. May 2011, Dansk Industri (talk)
11. May 2011, Dansk Kommunikationsforening (Day seminar)
13. May 2011, Medieforbundet i DR (workshop)
23. May 2011, Danske Fysioterapeuter (talk)
23. August 2011, FTF (workshop)
10. October 2011, Master of Management Development, CBS (education)
1. November 2011, Efterskoleforeningens lederkonference (talk)

During May we'll put more video clips from some of my talks on the website and once we get closer to the release date of the Danish book we'll start publishing parts of the content here on the blog, on Facebook and elsewhere. We'll make sure you get notice!

If you want to know more or want to book me for a talk, take a look at stagis.dk (Danish) or stagis.com (English). Lots of students want to know more - don't hesitate to write!

Erfaren kommunikationsrådgiver med partner-potentiale søges
Vil du være med til at undersøge virksomheders styrker og give dem liv gennem udvikling af organisationskultur, design og innovative kommunikationsløsninger? Vi rådgiver store virksomheder, offentlige institutioner og byer på strategisk niveau. Lige nu søger vi en erfaren kommunikationsrådgiver til at udtænke og gennemføre kommunikationsprojekter, som udvikler kundernes autentiske identitet og styrker deres markedsposition.

Du får til opgave at rådgive om strategisk kommunikation og gennemføre branding- og kommunikationsprojekter med udgangspunkt i din kommunikationsfaglighed. Du kan både levere et solidt praktisk kommunikationshåndværk og har gode relationelle evner og projektleder-kundskaber, så du kan samarbejde tværfagligt om forretningsstrategi, udvikling 
af organisationskultur, corporate design og kommunikation.

Matcher dine ambitioner jobbet?
Du har allerede erfaring med rådgivning om corporate communication, du har udviklet kampagner og PR-projekter, produceret artikler og plantet masser af historier i de danske medier. Nu er du klar til at udvide din rolle og præge vores udvikling og vækst. I Stagis får du både ansvar for at drive og udføre projekter for eksisterende kunder og proaktivt skabe ny forretning med udgangspunkt i dit faglige område og Stagis’ koncept om autenticitet. Det bliver også dit ansvar løbende at håndtere den eksterne kommunikation for Stagis, om vores projekter, metoder, Nikolaj Stagis’ nye bog og de begivenheder der følger.

Vi er fortsat på jagt efter en erfaren kommunikationsrådgiver. Læs mere om jobbet på stagis.dk

(From left: Karen, Niels, Peter, Lone, Mette and Marc)

We just ended a great Valentines Day. During the day some 300 bus drivers in Copenhagen have given roses to their passengers as part of Chauffører med karaktér (Bus drivers with character), our ongoing project to help the bus industry to increase their brand value and attract more customers as they strengthen leadership and pride in the work. The bus drivers are giving their customers 'good moments' (gode øjeblikke) and receiving comments from the passengers on the website www.buschauffor.dk. But I thought we needed a good moment at the office as well, so a bunch of us leaving the Stagis office today got roses to bring home as well. Happy Valentines!

This afternoon, December 21, we are shutting down the office for almost two weeks, celebrating the holidays and the new year. The year 2010 certainly hasn’t been easy for us at Stagis – a bit of a bumpy ride. Where the global crisis of 2009 left us untouched (actually it was a very good year in many ways) we experienced more trouble during 2010. Some projects were postponed, one of our most loved public clients got notice that they would be restructured and would seize to exist and several others met obstacles on their way. And of course these things have impact on us.

During the spring and fall I found some time to get on with my book, “The Authentic Company” which I will finally be finishing during Christmas and New Year. I’m currently working on the last two chapters talking about empowerment and creating a sense of nearness. I’ve been working on the project for about three years, researching and writing. Certainly longer than I thought but quite common, other writers and researchers tell me. The book will be released in Danish during the spring and I will be working on an international edition in 2011.

On a more personal note, 2010 was difficult as I lost my Dad who died from leuchemia in July. After almost three years of fighting his disease, meeting literally hundreds of health professionals in Denmark and Germany, we had to give up. Thousands of people lose their loved ones every year to some sort of cancer and I can only recommend that you support those who are effected by the disease, if not personally then donate to those who do research or otherwise help out. In Denmark, Kræftens Bekæmpelse is a place to start.

In spite of difficulties, my hopes are high for 2011. We’ve got a record high volume of orders and projects planned for the next 12 months, we are recruiting new staff (look out for an experienced project coordinator and a creative PR and communication adviser and let them know!) and personally I’m looking forward to sharing my book with all of you. I’ll make sure to talk more about that from January onwards.

I whish every one of you happy holidays and a happy new year!

Last week I signed a contract with the public transportation organization Movia who represents the public bus industry in Copenhagen and Sealand. In July, the Danish Transportation Agency decided to allocate a little less than 10 mio. Danish kroner (about 1.3 mio Euro) to giving the bus drivers a better image in the general public. The project covers training of the bus drivers, better internal communication in the industry and numerous activities and communication that will change the public perception of the bus drivers. Most of the activities will be happening over the next 15 months.

Bus drivers thrive after pilot project
During 2008 and 2009 Stagis developed the strategy as well as the project in details, gathered the parties involved and gave the project the it's name and visual identity. From March to October 2009 we orchestrated the pilot project called 'Chauffører med karaktér' (Bus drivers with character), testing some of the ideas in order to prove the effects of the strategy. As you can imagine, the results were overwhelmingly positive. As mentioned in the casestudy on www.stagis.com and a May blog post, 90 percent of the bus drivers claimed to thrive at work in October of 2009. Six months earlier, only 68 percent agreed. Generally, the bus drivers know that people don't have glorious thoughts about them. In the same survey, only 13 percent of the bus drivers thought that their job had a good image in the public. When the pilot project ended, that had increased to 24 percent. Partly due to the positive media appearances that we spun off. Partly because the passengers had sent hundreds of text messages with their stories about good experiences in the busses. The strategic goal behind that change is simple: If the bus drivers are happy about the work, they will treat their passengers better and hence the perception of the bus ride will change for the better.

So what's next?
There are already several courses going on at 'Movia Akademi' this month and next week I'm meeting with a group of bus drivers who was attending the Academy last year. They created such a strong relationships with each other that they still want to meet and bond now, a year later. I'm really looking forward to seeing them again!

In a couple of weeks we will start to announce more about the specific plans and the ideas will start to materialize. For now, I'm really pleased that the ideas we developed will continue to live and that the bus drivers will continue to make positive changes. For themselves and for all of us in the back of the bus.

Check out four bus drivers 'with character' on the Danish website we created at the end of 2008 on buschauffor.dk. I love all of them but my favourite is Sezgin who was the youngest bus driver in Copenhagen at the time.

The last few weeks has been the first, in my new position as both a member of the Stagis team and as a master student in London. I had the privilege to be accepted at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design’s MA in Communication Design. The school is located in Clerkenwell and Holborn in the center of London and is a part of University of the Arts London. The course is focused on developing designers who question and develop the communication design scene, work with concept developments and problem solving instead of focusing on particular practices.

And how does being in London match with me still working as a designer at Stagis? During the week I will be in close contact with the colleagues at the office in Copenhagen, and I try to be present at the office as often as possible, in order to work on projects and stay in touch with clients. In the meantime I work from London, with the kind help from Skype and other technology wonders, which makes it possible for us to maintain our work processes and work as we use to!

Of course being both a student and a professional requires a hole lot of time, and the work load will probably be a bit more that I’m used to, but as this an amazing opportunity for me to develop my practical and theoretical design skills, I’m convinced it's worth the work. Central Saint Martins is considered one of the best design universities, and I already had the pleasure to be enriched by interesting lectures and skilled tutors. 
The shaky image above is from one of the lecture hall’s: To thine own self be true – a Shakespeare quote I used to see every day on the wall at Stagis.

Study focus
My major interest and motivation to do a master, is to study the relation between theory and practice related to identity design. At Stagis we always investigate the indicators of authentic organizational identity before we develop identity design. At Central Saint Martins I will focus my studies towards the way we map or survey the identity, and then how the collected data is transformed to a concrete design proposal. The particular process of mapping and translation is in my opinion a very interesting and important phase of the design process, and I’m aiming towards improving myself as a designer and this area in particular.

Yesterday afternoon and evening, Stagis hosted the 21st DDA Bar, an event for the members of Danish Design Association. Peter Kreiner, CEO of Noma gave a brief talk on the success of Noma. He also added an important comment on the window of opportunity that not only Noma and Danish restaurants have due to Nomas status as the Worlds leading restaurant. Other Danish companies, especially the creative ones, could use the possibility to travel out in the World and export more of our social and creative skills. At the end of the two talks we decided to create a new platform in Danish Design Association focusing on internationalization in the Danish design industry.

Nikolaj gave a talk on authentic organizational identity, demonstrating our concept of authenticity and explaining how we come about understanding the authentic strengths of the company in order to help them grow into authentic market positions. He used Noma, Bøgedal, Absolut and Ducati as casestudies – all part of the book that Nikolaj is working on (he says there are only the last 80 pages left to go).

After the talks our guests looked around the Stagis Museum which has been updated and we served local, nordic snacks from Manfreds (former Noma chef) and DinBaghave (“YourBackyard”), all organically grown, primarily delivered from Kiselgården, a small farm who also delivers to Noma.

Thank you to everyone who joined us - both new and known faces! We had a lovely evening.

If you want a tour in the Stagis Museum, let us know – just call or drop a line to email@stagis.dk. You can read more on the Danish Design Association website and see more pictures on our Facebook Page.

Vi søger en senior kommunikationskonsulent til at skabe og gennemføre projekter som udvikler virksomheders autentiske identitet og markedsposition. Konsulenten får til opgave at rådgive om identitet, PR, pressehåndtering, opbygning af image og omdømme og gennemføre projekter med udgangspunkt i sin kommunikationsfaglighed. Jobbet stiller både krav til, at konsulenten kan levere et solidt praktisk kommunikationshåndværk og har gode relationelle evner og projektleder-kundskaber, da vi arbejder tværfagligt med organisationskultur, corporate design og kommunikation.

Jobbet som senior konsulent
Vi forventer at du tager aktivt ansvar for virksomhedens udvikling og vækst. Du får ansvar for både at drive og udføre projekter for eksisterende klienter og proaktivt skabe ny forretning med udgangspunkt i dit faglige område. Du får ansvar for en andel af vores salgsarbejde. Det bliver også dit ansvar løbende at håndtere den eksterne kommunikation om Stagis, om vores projekter og om de begivenheder vi laver. Projekterne gennemføres i samarbejde med både interne og eksterne kolleger og samarbejdspartnere. Vi arbejder primært med danske kunder, men forventer at skulle arbejde mere internationalt fra 2012.

Kender du nogen der kunne være interesseret? Så del det med dem. Læs mere om jobbet på www.stagis.dk eller send en email til nikolaj@stagis.dk.

(Danish job-post, we are searching for a senior communications consultant who could potentially become a partner in the firm. Must write and speak fluent Danish)