 As a product company that makes food we really had to start to think about how do we change ourselves into a service and experience company. Hello and welcome to Top of Mind. Today I'm here at Brand Week and I'm here with Brad Hiranaga who is the Chief Brand Officer of General Mills North America. Brad, hi and welcome to Top of Mind. Hi Nadine, thanks for having me. So I wanted to check in with you and find out what's Top of Mind with you today. Yeah. So what three things are really exciting? I think a couple of things that we're working on that I wanted to share. One is kind of a continuation of what we did launching our mission. Our mission is only about a year old about being a force for good and so the work continues to deliver on commitments that we've made around hunger and we talked about where we've made more progress against trying to deliver you know 30 billion meals over the next decade. We made progress in terms of doing a billion acts of good which we talked a little about and then we've made progress as well as a third area which is about turning a million acres of land by using regenerative agricultural practices and so progress continues against that so that's definitely one of the things on my mind. A second area that we've talked about just how about we're thinking about holistic innovation and so as a product company that makes food we really had to start to think about how do we change ourselves into a service and experience company because you know service and experiences are double or triple the rate of growth that product companies are right now and so thinking about how we take products and surround them with services and then create experiences around them is a hugely on my mind as I know it is on a lot of people marketing and then the last area is really more about mindset and and we've talked about how do we move as we've really pivoted to try to find new ways to grow to finding ways to really cultivate create a growth mindset and there's some things that are really in early stage right now about how do we focus more on health and wellness of our employees and that especially that mental health and wellness area as well as trying to inspire them with different ways to think those are varying areas but like really fun big cool things to be working on right now and so when you're you're doing all of this obviously massive amounts of work a billion acts of good lots of people that you're impacting how do you think about innovation what's coming down the pipe that's got you really excited we've really started to think about the intersection of brands culture and then technology and making people's lives easier and then starting to think about what human problem are we solving and so one area of innovation that's really cool that's we've been working on since the summer is our box tops for education program over the last 20 years we've delivered about a billion dollars to education but the problem has become kind of dated and the brand hasn't been as relevant as it's needed to have had people fall off and so we digitized it this this summer and so now instead of having to cut off the box top and mail it in you can scan your receipt and anything that's box tops sponsored on that will immediately go into the app and you can determine exactly which schools you want the dollars to go to so it's about making that consumer experience a lot easier and allows us to hopefully get more money to schools which is what box tops is all about and we're really starting to focus even how we're thinking about teachers and really starting to make their experience within box tops and what we can do even more remarkable and so that's technology that's innovation that's taking a platform that was really solid but needed to be reinvented and taking all those elements and trying to make something that's better and then let's talk about challenges like what challenges do you have to overcome to be able to do any of these things well I think you know in marketing today there's so many different options and things you can do and it's very difficult to say no to everything and focus just on one or two things and so one of the things we've tried to incorporate is how do you get over across barriers how do you find ways to grow by having an and mindset and this and mindset I think is really important because it's not only going to be data that's going to tell us how to target or personalize experiences for consumers and it's not only going to be inspiring things that make me feel good um you know that's in my gut it's going to be both and so as our marketers are trying to figure out how do they create solutions we've really tried to push this forward as you have to be about the end and so whether that's top line growth or bottom line growth you know one or the other is not good enough it has to be both um and I think figuring out the marketers and the brand builders that can do that those are the folks that are making a huge impact for our company and it's fun because you can say I I going into everything and saying I don't have to decide this or the other thing I can decide and both of these things allow you to create new solutions that are going to be really really impactful for consumers my last question for you is given all these incredible experiences that you've had and how you're helping to shape the future marketers as well what is your favorite career tip that you've either received or given do what you love to do I'm very fortunate to be in a job that I love to do I've been a general most 15 years um a lot of times I talk to people that have moved across careers and they're like wow they moved a lot but I love getting what I get to do we're a company that believes in doing good we're a company that believes in building brands and making consumers lives better um and I love every element of that so I feel very fortunate that I get to do something that makes me feel really good about myself and the impact that we're going to make and when I get to a point where I don't feel that anymore then I think that's a good sign signal that you need to do something different but I felt that that's been something that's been true to me and I try to pass it on to the people and sometimes that means they leave the company that we're in to go pursue another passion and sometimes that means they do a different assignment but I think ultimately it's about finding that happiness and that satisfaction in what you do every day because that's what we're all really living for and to get to do that in your job is really I feel really fortunate to be able to do that thank you so much for being here I'm very excited to have you back thank you for having me yeah and thank you for being with us on top of mine