These days, the PR function at Johnson Controls is to remind its business customers that the company was doing sustainability long before anyone knew what to call it. In this SLM interview, senior execs Darryll Fortune and Monica Levy discuss the birth of "Ingenuity Welcome," the company's new rebranding campaign, and why you won't hear them use the word "green." (To listen to our conversation, click here.)

SLM: What's the back story on Ingenuity Welcome?

Monica: What it's about is giving Johnson Controls a brand scale that matches our business scale. We're a Fortune 80 company. With 180,000 employees worldwide in about 1,300 offices, we're actually larger than many better-known businesses. This rebranding effort is aimed at strengthening our position as a B2B brand.

A couple years ago our then-CEO, John Barth, initiated a brand audit designed to figure out what was most important to our customers and how we rated on those things relative to our competitors. Based on the findings of that audit, we decided to make sustainability a key part of our brand promise.

SLM: One thing that struck me about this rebrand is that it focuses primarily on innovation as opposed to sustainability. How does that fit into your brand strategy?

Monica: I think innovation is central to developing sustainability as a core tenet of your business, regardless of what business you're in. At Johnson Controls we call this "ingenuity" - we're focused less on developing new technologies than we are on applying existing technologies for maximum efficiency. One of the things we learned during our brand audit is that the marketplace associates Johnson Controls with integrating products, technologies, and services in practical ways. We'll go to a facility manager and say "First, let's examine how you're running the building today and what can be done to optimize efficiency with the tools you already have at your disposal. Then we'll look at what new products and systems are available if you're interesting in making some capital investments." Our customers are always looking for more ingenuity and insight into how they can save energy and cut costs.

SLM: So unlike a lot of sustainability-oriented rebranding efforts, "Ingenuity Welcome" doesn't trumpet a new corporate direction so much as emphasize products and services that have long been part of the core business at Johnson Controls.

Darryll: From the perspective of what we're providing our customers, we've been doing some form of sustainability for almost 100 years - but with the rebranding we’re now taking credit for it. We're starting to be more aggressive in using the term sustainability now that it's so much more accepted in the industry. Our customers run the gamut from retail facilities to shopping malls to hospitals to airports. Those customers already know Johnson Controls and what we're about. Now we think it's time to tell the rest of the world about our sustainability efforts, in all our businesses -- building efficiency, automotive experience and power solutions.

SLM: Part of Johnson Controls' current brand identity is its vision for a "comfortable, safe, sustainable world." One word I don't hear, though, is "green." Why not?

Monica: Certainly we consider "green" to be a major piece of our sustainability effort, but we really look at sustainability as more than just environmental stewardship. For us it's also about social responsibility and economic prosperity - the triple bottom line.

SLM: Were you concerned that the word "green" carries too much baggage?

Darryll: When I started at the company in 2001 "green" was certainly the hot topic, as in "high-performance green buildings." That was fine for the time. Since then, though, I think the sustainability space has really evolved. We want our customers to look at sustainability as a business strategy and we talk to them about the triple bottom line -- environmental stewardship, economic prosperity and social responsibility.. Green focused solely on the environment, but sustainability is much more than taking care of the environment.

SLM: How is that strategic commitment to sustainability playing out within Johnson Controls?

Darryll: We've found that it comes down to the employees - when they're engaged and understand your vision, you have a much greater chance for success. We recently held our annual Vision Week during which we encouraged employees to find ways to become more sustainable, not just at work but also at home. We even have a personal sustainability navigator game, which they can play online or with a deck of cards in the breakroom.

I've never seen employees swing into action as quickly as they have in the eight months since we launched "Ingenuity Welcome." They're very articulate about the changes that the company has made. They can not only recite the vision for a "comfortable, safe, and sustainable world" - they can actually tell our customers what it means.

Monica: When I began working at Johnson Controls three and a half years ago I'd ask employees "Who are we and what do we do?" and I'd get answers that were very specific to the products that we make - batteries or automotive parts or building products - valves, etc. What was missing was any conception of how our work impacts human life. We have products in 200 million cars and more than 10 million homes and commercial facilities. When you go into a building or step into a vehicle, there's a good chance that you'll encounter a Johnson Controls product. This rebranding effort has really communicated to our employees the idea that we do have an impact on human life, and that that's different from what we make today. Our products will change over time, so it's important that we maintain a sense of connectedness as far as who we are and how we matter.

That's important for a number of reasons. In particular, I'm struck by the number of employees who admit they had been thinking about leaving Johnson Controls because they felt we weren't modern or progressive enough. Just in the months since this rebranding effort launch I've talked to quite a few who say that this has had a big impact on their decision to stay.

When you think about great brands, they all have a point of emotional connection to their audience - and I think we've found ours now. For me that's been one of the most redeeming aspects of this effort.

SLM: What kind of feedback have you been receiving from outside the company?

Darryll: Now whenever we showcase our products and service to customers they inevitably want to hear about our sustainability efforts, whether it's on the agenda or not. Even if a company isn't actively engaged with improving sustainability performance they're still having to answer to shareholders and other constituents. To me that's an important gauge of the level of interest that's out there right now surrounding sustainable business solutions.

Hear Darryll and Monica speak live at Sustainable Brands ’08!