Just Do the Work
The City of Austin rolled out its new logo this week, and we (the people) aren't exactly thrilled.
I'll admit, the thinking behind its creation appears noble. Accurate, even. The logo reflects the hills, rivers, and bridges that serve to connect us to one another. The colors are inspired by our surrounding environment – violet crown skies and the green canopies of our parks and trails. In theory, so cool. In execution – eh.
Like all things in life, sometimes you win and sometimes you learn. This feels more like a learning moment. If I were the design team behind this launch, here are the takeaways I’d focus on:
Quit playing it safe: Real, expansive, terrifying transformation asks us to surrender the need to know. Branding, when done right, isn’t just about color palettes or typography—it’s about excavating the truth. It’s identity work. And that means reckoning with the messy, vulnerable, emotional underbelly of your brand and your audience so you can emerge better.
If you're getting reactions like, "As long as it’s clean, memorable, simple and eye-catching, it does its job,” I wouldn't call that a win. If it is something elusive and un-obvious you want, then it’s time to do things differently. If you want to intrigue, entertain, or give people something to believe in, agree or disagree with, those are all good signs. Only then will you be able to reveal something honest, true and personal.
2) Do the deep work: Companies think that updating their logo, tweaking their website or hiring a new hot-shot social media manager will do the trick. And guess what? Nothing changes. Because the work wasn’t deep enough. What’s broken isn’t the color scheme—it’s the story. There is misalignment between what you say and how you act to the people who you want to reach. It could look like the refusal to choose a side, the fear of alienating someone, or the craving to please everyone. Or perhaps in this case, the ultimate logo design process by government committee.
