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(Work)

SEI

Codifying a brand’s culture
Year:
2024
Industry:
B2B
(Services)
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Intro

The best consulting firm you’ve never heard of.

There’s always a better way to do business, and SEI can prove it. After 30 years of helping the world’s most recognizable brands achieve more than they could alone—SEI became unlike any other management consultancy. They just had one problem; after years of helping other businesses, SEI needed help with their own.

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The Challenge

SEI needed a singular identity, but their work was anything but. Spread across dozens of industries, on countless projects, in numerous of teams, through over a dozen offices—the new identity had to empower their consultants while still giving them freedom to work and represent the brand their way.

Simply put, SEI’s identity had to be strong but universal, flexible—but most of all—usable.

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Codifying SEI’s culture

Through research, we learned that SEI’s work does most of the talking. Unlike other consultancies, they provide results without the overhead and flash that cost clients time and money. In fact, instead of flash, they built their business on no-nonsense solutions grounded in real-world expertise.

In other words, great work just works. This insight became central to our strategy and key messaging for SEI.

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Substance is our style

Visually, we updated the brand to reflect their pragmatic approach. The added depth in color and texture nods to the depth and dimension of the work. The illustrations and infographics, meanwhile, were updated to be hyperfunctional. Overall, the visual identity is an evolution toward clarity. Make the results stand out. At the end of the day, that’s what draws in clients.

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Never budget for buzzwords

In consulting, buzzwords, maxims, and rote messaging are impossible to ignore. Consultants carry the voice of their company, so most stock lines lean toward familiarity.

That doesn't happen in a radically relevant brand. That’s why, for SEI, we built out the guidelines as a toolkit that not only provided plug-and-play messaging, but also guidance on how to tailor components to individual consultant’s needs.

Conclusion

In summary, we made guidelines that could be used by the entire company with tools, commentary, and guidance rarely seen in brand guidelines. The result is a brand identity that extends beyond the traditional touchpoints and into the work itself—the part of the business SEI was proud to make their identity.

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Credits:

Designed by Reid Parsekian, Christian Tompkins
Design Direction by Meghan Murray
Verbal Identity by Cam Leberecht, Clayton Notestine
Brand Strategy by Tracy Clark, Dee Boyle
Project Management by Patrice Fielder

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