The Importance of Stewardship to Place Development, Governance and Branding.

Author - Malcolm Allan Co-founder of the Place Brand Academy

The Proposition

With an emerging, and overdue interest in the field of place branding on the importance of brand stewardship as a core component of brand governance, development, implementation and management, and recently published research by Bird Global Advisory and CITIFI on the failings of place brand management and implementation, which concluded that “The next era of place leadership requires ….Boards that act as stewards of the Place Operating System”, there is an opportunity for our field to properly understand how to build brand stewardship into brand delivery and brand governance and to take part in the emerging and timely debate on the wider importance of place stewardship and governance and its introduction across the varied disciplines of place, which is an opportunity for our sector and practice to play a more central and positive role in wider place planning, development, stewardship and governance.

This blog post explores the wider role of stewardship in urban development and destination development, places where stewardship is developing with lessons for place branding, the role and responsibilities of stewards, the character traits of effective stewards and the mix of skills and experience that identify people as effective stewards, people who can populate the brand operating system at the level of brand governance, brand management, brand implementation and promotion.

In this blog, based on my experience as a town planner, economic developer and place brand strategist, I set out my ideas and proposals for what is involved in effective place brand stewardship, the character traits of effective brand stewards, what makes an effective steward and the role and responsibilities of place brand stewards in brand implementation and management and its contribution to place and brand governance.

A major challenge in introducing place brand stewardship into current brand management and implementation is how to adapt the current approaches to realise the significant added value of brand stewardship that will improve the conduct and impact of “the brand operating system”. A related challenge is where and how to identify and recruit people who are or might make effective stewards.

The Origins and Practice of Place Stewardship

Current and historic literature on farming and land management reveals that stewardship of has been an established and valued practice for a long time with stewards not necessarily being the owners of the land and buildings but having a responsibility on behalf of an owner, or a wider community, for its maintenance and enhancing its value and generating benefits. In current parlance it means careful, responsible and active care of natural resources to ensure ecological health and productivity for future generations. In short, it is the idea of people acting as custodians of place, land and natural resources for the benefit and well-being of others rather than treating them purely as commodities.

A crucial point for place branders to recognise is that an effective steward acts on behalf of a wider community, district, town or city not just as a manager of the place with short to medium term objectives but also as someone who has a longer term perspective, focussing on protecting what is valued in the place and creating value for it for many not just a few, making it a better place – to live, work, study, experience and visit.

While discussion on place stewardship in place branding is a recent conversation it is worth noting that there has been a longer conversation on stewardship in organisations dealing with the planning, development and management of the built environment and its governance, one which recognises the practice as an important element of place governance.

For example, the UK Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA) believes that place stewardship should be focussed on managing and developing places which enable residents, businesses, investors to flourish in perpetuity and that choosing the right approach to stewardship of place development includes consideration and selection of the right stewardship organisation or governance vehicle.

This approach treats stewardship as a governance issue, not simply a management or maintenance issue. It moves from a consideration of who plans the place to who takes responsibility for the continuing quality, identity, experience of and well-being of the place.

And it argues for stewardship to be considered throughout the whole cycle of the place development lifecycle – planning, procurement, development, promotion, branding and long-term management.

In short, it needs to be “Forethought” rather than an “Afterthought” a key point I made in the Brand Finance Brand Forum workshop on stewardship held in London in May 2026, which “struck a chord” for many of the participants and subsequent commentators.

An appropriate example of forethought about stewardship is the thinking of the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) which has been advocating “Destination Stewardship” since 2021 and in its work with the Travel Foundation and the European Futures Institute. Its framework explicitly sees destinations as shared systems requiring collaboration between public authorities, businesses and communities.

In 2026 the WTTC published seven principles for destination stewardship4 to help manage tourism growth and benefit local communities, arguing that destinations should move beyond simply managing visitor numbers towards collaboration on planning, decision making, promotion and investment.

In addition, The Destination Stewardship Centre, a global nonprofit network organisation that helps protect the world’s distinctive places through stewarded tourism management, which acts as a virtual hub and network, has worked with a range of destinations to create Destination Stewardship Councils, examples include Big Bay Michigan, Columbia River Gorge, Pennsylvania Wilds, Sedona in Arizona, Thompson Okanagan in British Columbia, and Tequila in Mexico.

These Stewardship Councils have moved from a purpose of “How do we market the destination?” to “How do we ensure tourism contributes positively to the future of the place for the benefit of locals as well a tourists?”

Other recent examples are New Zealand whose tourism policy includes regional destination management plans which explicitly embed stewardship of visitor behaviour into business practice, a good example being its “Star Grazing” initiative which attracts off-season travellers away from busy hotspots and into rural areas to experience cultural storytelling, eat local food and enjoy low-impact stargazing beneath dark night skies.

And, more recently, we have the example of The London Royal Docks Place Stewardship and Community Participation Programme for 2026-29, a Compact created by the Greater London Authority (GLA), whose purpose is explicitly to strengthen long-term place stewardship as the Roal Docks undergoes major regeneration. It has created area-based stewardship pilots in Silvertown, Royal Albert Wharf and Royal Victoria Dock. This initiative is an excellent example of place stewardship being designed into the governance and delivery of a “new place” from the outset.

More widely, a variety of conversations are taking place in the realm of place about what constitutes and describes stewardship, for example:

- People working on destination stewardship are largely talking about tourism, residents, environment, visitor experience and destination governance

- People working on place development stewardship are primarily talking about town planning, economic development, asset protection, place management and governance

- People dealing with environmental stewardship are focussed on long-term care of natural and cultural resources

- And in our sector people are talking about perception, identity, positioning, reputation, communications, stakeholder alignment and exploring the relevance of stewardship to brand governance.

The challenge for the effective governance of place (not just place branding) is how best to align these conversations to enable stewards to take joint action and define a more comprehensive description or definition of effective place stewardship and its role in place governance. As place branders this is an opportunity for our sector to play a valued role in this conversation.

Towards a Shared Definition of Place Stewardship

In my view place stewardship should be a collective shared responsibility of place governors, stakeholders, investors, businesses, planners, marketers and branders, to ensuring that a place’s development, desired and actual offer, identity, reputation and promise are clearly articulated, understood, developed, and protected over time, creating a positive legacy for the future well-being of the place.

This would create a much larger role for place branding to articulate what a community of stewards is collectively creating rather than as a mechanism for creating a stand-alone and separate interpretation of a place and what it offers.

For example, it can shift the emphasis from “who manages the brand” to “who takes shared responsibility” for the place’s identity, reputation and safeguarding its future development.

At its simplest stewardship means taking responsibility for something that a place professional does not own but has a duty to care for, protect, develop and pass on in good condition for future generations.

As a sector we have an opportunity to actively promote and participate in a vitally important conversation on exploring place stewardship as an over-arching professional discipline that connects place-making, place management, destination management, community development, place identity, place reputation, place perception, place marketing, future brand development, implementation and management.

This, in turn, leads to questions on what constitutes effective place stewardship, what makes for an effective steward; desired experience, knowledge, skills and character traits, where they are required in the structure of place governance, what professional standard should they meet and who should establish that standard?

As a start we need clarity on what the role of stewardship in place brand governance and brand delivery might entail, and clarity on their desired competencies, on their roles and responsibilities within a governance structure.

Stewardship Roles, Responsibilities and Cooperation

As stated previously my view of brand stewardship is that it is the collective shared responsibility of place governors, stakeholders, investors, businesses, planners and branders for ensuring that a place’s desired and actual offer, identity, reputation and promise are clearly articulated, understood, developed, and protected over time creating a positive legacy for the future of the place.

In considering who might be identified as potential or existing stewards for the development of a place in this way it is important to understand what their potential role and responsibilities might be.

At its simplest stewardship means taking “responsibility” for something that you may own but much more widely for things that you do not own but have a contributory duty to care for, protect, develop and pass on in good condition, by taking shared responsibility for the health and future of the place being governed and managed.

A good steward understands that they have temporarily been entrusted with something that must remain valuable beyond their tenure.

This is particularly important for place governance as political leaders, chief executives, destination organisations and place brand managers are all typically temporary custodians of something (the place) that belongs to a much larger community and has a much longer life.

This is why stewardship is potentially much more powerful than simply describing someone as either a brand stakeholder or brand manager, although both might be effective stewards if their experience, skills and character equip them to be stewards.

Many place brand managers ask how do we communicate the brand consistently? A place steward asks how we ensure that brand governance and implementation consistently behave in a way that makes the brand real, credible, valued and positively reputable, for the present and for the benefit of future occupants of places.

Consequently, stewardship involves ensuring that different stakeholders and actors in the place understand that they have shared and individual responsibilities for the brand today and as it evolves, as stewards for their own investments; offers, services, events, programmes, etc. and are open to contributing to shared initiatives, assessing their potential impact, both positive and negative, on the place in the future.

The place brand therefore needs to become a shared organisational asset which requires distributed stewardship communities working together rather than being concentrated in and the responsibility of just one team. The challenge here is to establish how these communities should be managed and collaborate and who should do so.

A potential model of distributed stewardship operating as a community of place stewards would include:

Civic Stewards – responsible for long-term public purpose, policy and democratic accountability

Development Stewards – responsible for physical, economic and infrastructure development

Community Stewards – responsible for encouraging belonging, inclusion, local identity and lived experience

Cultural and Environmental Stewards – responsible for heritage, culture, landscape and sustainability

Experience Stewards – responsible for what resident, visitor, workers, students and investors experience

Brand and reputation Stewards – responsible for brand strategy, identity, narrative, reputation and coherence

In this model there would be:

- Shared long-term purpose

- Stewardship responsibilities that are clear and shared

- Stewards who are connected and collaborate

- Cross boundary and institution conversations as a norm

- Alignment of place development and brand management decisions

- Consideration of future generations in terms of potential impacts and benefits

A clear and present challenge is how to unite these communities in “Common Purpose” for the benefit of the place and who should take a lead on organising and managing “The Unity”.

An Ideal Place Steward Profile

A significant challenge in developing place stewardship as a recognised and valued discipline is that there is no widely accepted definition of a place steward, let alone a place brand steward.

Below I set out a profile of my ideal place steward based on my experience over 50 years of working with employing and training people in the place disciplines of town planning, economic development, place making, place marketing and place branding, including people who have taken on stewardship roles.

Typically, they are people who:

- Have an ability to bridge different professional place disciplines by creating and building coalitions, building trust between them to create lasting positive relations.

- Can align diverse place practitioners around a mutually advantageous shared place development vision using language that bonds and unites disciplines rather than perpetuating differences.

- Are skilled at connecting people in different disciplines who have not traditionally worked closely together, a good example in my own experience has been bringing together developers, architects and town planners with place brand strategists to work on brand-led place-making, a good example being my work with Colliers International (Dublin) on the development of the Cork Brand Strategy in Ireland

- Have a long-term perspective on their place, able to think beyond short-term political and funding cycles, understanding that their place will change over time and that its brand will evolve to reflect and respond to change.

I have found and worked with people like these in central and local government – politicians and officers in a variety of place disciplines - in voluntary and community sector organisations, in further and higher education, in chambers of commerce, in businesses taking an active part in place development as investors, in the provision of services and real estate development and management companies and in destination development and management and marketing organisations.

They can be identified when you clearly understand what kind of people you want to find and engage in the stewardship of place development and place branding and where they would be most effective, for example on a brand partnership board, on a brand development group, on a brand management team or actively involved in the development and delivery of “On-Brand” projects, brand offers and services.

To be able to do so you need to become familiar with the range of skills, experience and competences that effective stewards need to possess and exhibit and decide what is the desired mix for stewardship of your place ad its brand – for stakeholders on your place and brand partnership or governing body, your brand management team and for the development and implementation of individual organisations and business’s “On-Brand” offer of projects and services.

Desired Stewardship Characteristics, Competencies, Skills, Experiences and Knowledge

Why should you give serious consideration to these important attributes? It’s because place governance, place development, place making and branding is complex.

Shared place brand stewardship requires a different mix of skills and experiences from stand-alone place branding and typical national and local government management.

And, not every key stakeholder will make an effective brand steward regardless of their seniority, so it’s important to be clear on what kind of people you may be looking for to steward the governance, development, management, implementation, promotion and care of your brand in the present and in the future.

Ideally you should be looking for people who already have or plan to have a “stake” in the ongoing development of your place – examples being managers and expert staff of commercial businesses, committed investors, real estate developers, managers of community organisations, providers of print, broadcast and digital media. They may offer you expertise, contacts, specialist knowledge, access to capital, etc. but they may not have the desired mix of experience, competencies and skills you desire for brand stewards.

Typically, in my experience, people worth considering are willing to contribute time, knowledge, ideas and resources, initially for the development of the brand strategy and subsequently for the resourcing of key On-Brand projects, and a commitment to “stay the course” for their delivery and management.

A further set of considerations involves the character of potential stewards.

Desired Steward Characteristics

In my experience you should be looking for people who:

- Are truly “invested” in the place for the long-term and understand the need to improve it for future generations and can demonstrate this in their work.

- Are able to see the big picture of what the place might look like in the future while handling the detail of how to get there over time.

- Are willing to play a more active role in nurturing the ongoing development of the place and delivering on its promised offers, projects and services.

- Are willing to consider investing in other’s and collaborative projects.

- Are articulate and willing to speak-up for the place positively as ambassadors and lobbyists and are effective communicators, able to tell the “story” of your place and its brand.

- Are curious about the potential of your place and willing to consider new ideas and approaches for the development, implementation and stewardship of the brand delivery.

- Ask “What can I do for the Brand?” rather than “What can the brand do for me”.

- Are open to being questioned on their ideas for the place and demonstrate a willingness to compromise when necessary to achieve progress.

- Are willing to “give-to-get” to reach agreements

- Are active listeners to other’s viewpoints and ideas.

- Are willing to work/learn together in common purpose

- And demonstrably live the values of your brand

Desired Steward Abilities

In my previous role as a brand strategy consultant I have identified abilities which can have a positive effect on a brand’s development and stewarding its delivery:

- Ability to think beyond short term issues and challenges and take a longer-term perspective on how the brand should develop.

- Ability to use their power “softly” and effectively for the benefit of others – favoring persuasion over coercion or dominance.

- Ability to unite disparate viewpoints and create win-win relationships and partnerships

- Ability to “give to get” to conclude agreements without rancour.

- Ability to creatively partner with others on projects for brand implementation.

This mix of characteristics, skills, abilities and behaviours should be held in mind when looking for stewards.

In summary you should be looking for someone who exhibits a relevant mix of these desired stewardship characteristics and abilities.

Negative beliefs and behaviours to be avoided

In my work I have found that some potential stakeholders can have a damaging effect on a brand’s development because of their beliefs and behaviour.

Typical disruptive or negative behaviours include:

- Dominating discussions and relationships

- Unreasonable demand for prominence

- Unwilling to compromise

- Dismissive of community representatives’ worth and legitimacy

- Failure to address their “Scotomas” (blind spots)

- Lack experience of partnership working

- Limited/poor negotiating skills

- Limited/no curiosity about other’s ideas and proposals

You need to look out for these limiting or negative behaviours in considering candidates for brand partnerships and governance, brand management and brand stewardship regardless of their seniority.

The Role of Stewards in Place Brand Governance

Effective stewardship of a place brand strategy is a long-term challenge that requires aligning a location’s actual reality – what it offers, how it is developing, how it is governed and managed - with its communicated promise – the experience of the place and its vision for future development.

In my experience a place brand cannot be effectively managed by a single department of government or an agency in isolation. It requires a “networked” governance model as previously advocated in The Place Brand Observer.

.

For example, this can take the form of a Public-Private Partnership (PPP), a formal structure that includes government and a range of other entities which play an important role in place development and management, e.g. major employers, chambers of commerce, business sector organisations, cultural attractions, tourism boards, further and higher education institutions, transport providers, etc., whose mix will vary between places.

While a place brand strategy can be created by a group of key stakeholders coming together its implementation will be by many independent actors whose behaviour a traditional brand management team cannot control.

The major lesson for governance of place brands is that brands are governed through people, behaviours and decisions, not through rules, procedures, etc.

Consequently, place governance, including the brand, requires an implementation network of independent but cooperating actors whose relationship to the governance body and the brand and their dependence on it will vary, some of whom may be very effective stewards of their investments in the offer of the brand and some who will need to be helped to develop the skills of effective stewardship, which I discuss in the conclusions and recommendations below.

Stewardship is less about controlling or limiting the brand and more about enabling, coordinating and safeguarding it across a complex range of stakeholders, the providers and deliverers of brand offer and services, and bringing together the variety of professionals who typically work on the planning and development of places in shared conversations and action.

In my opinion brand governance should be a practical operating system that helps people actively involved in the ongoing development and delivery of the place and its brand offer, be they brand governors (e.g. key stakeholders and temporary elected politicians), brand team members and members of brand task forces or special initiatives, to make consistent decisions on brand positioning, on investments in the brand’s offer, on brand experiences, brand values, brand behaviours, brand communications and tone of voice, enabling them to deliver the offer consistently at scale; and with a constant eye on the implications for future benefits and potential risks.

Brand governance should not be designed as a set of controls and approval structures and should not feel like dealing with “Brand Police”; it should however provide clear and coherent “guardrails” that inform how the brand operates and is experienced and set out the role and responsibility of brand stewards to nurture it over time through the offer of the brand.

Effective brand governance requires clarity on the Brand Operational System:

• Who “owns” the brand and what the brand stands for, e.g. equality of opportunity, preservation of defining culture, diversity of beneficiaries, etc.

• Who is resourcing the brand, its governance, management, implementation and stewarding.

• How it creates value and benefits for the community rather than for limited interests.

• Who decides on the array of brand offers that will bring the strategy to life.

• Who stewards – manages, delivers and nurtures - those offers.

• Where there is room for innovation – responding to changed circumstances and new initiatives.

• What must never be compromised, e.g. the “Big Idea” or the “Central Idea” that drives the brand or the desired development of the place.

In my opinion shared stewardship creates the collective capability to make a place better, make the experience of it more coherent and valuable, build a stronger and accurate reputation, safeguarding the place for the future.

This is why I think stewardship provides a more effective longer-term proposition than governance alone.

If governance establishes who has authority and accountability for the brand, then stewardship can establish a culture and practice of responsibility for the delivery of the brand offer and for the continuing health of the place and its reputation.

A New Role for Brand Stewards

Current approaches to brand governance rarely encompass a major role for brand stewards.

They typically involve a non-executive advisory role for significant place stakeholders plus an executive brand management team, typically small due to budgetary constraints, often characterised by a sense of brand ownership and a desire to control.

What is now required is a shift from directive brand management to participatory brand stewardship – brand governance and management with a “stewardship mindset”.

A New Place Brand Governance Model?

The typical brand governance model of a part time or occasional board that govern the brand, part-time key stakeholders and a small team of full-time brand managers, often underfunded, is not the brand operating system that is now required.

What I am proposing for consideration is a new place brand governance model where full time Strategic Brand Stewards typically sit on the governing body and its management, and a “Stewardship Community” (as described earlier) at the heart of the

Operational Brand System where individual stakeholders, investors and offer developers appoint Operational Stewards to take active personal responsibility for the effective delivery and management of their own “On Brand” offers of services, events, etc. and empowered and encouraged to contribute to joint and collaborative development of offers and services.

This model envisages an approach to brand governance which encompasses a variety of roles and responsibilities for “Strategic” stewards and roles and responsibilities for “Operational” stewards.

Strategic Brand Stewards

Strategic stewards focus on the ongoing development, management and impact of their brand ensuring that it remains true to its shared vision, positioning, values and narrative over time. They need to be:

- Serious and ever-present but “Light-Touch” guardians of brand governance

- Custodians of brand purpose and identity

- Facilitators of stakeholder alignment

- Creators of criteria for the selection of “On-Brand” offers for brand implementation by effective stewards

- Champions and supporters of Operational Brand Stewardship by individual brand offer providers

- Providers of guidance and support to providers of its brand offers for the identification and training of effective Operational Brand Stewards

In summary, their principal responsibilities is to protect the integrity of the brand strategy, preventing short-term political or commercial interests from diluting the brand and alignment of brand operational delivery with its longer-term goals for the improvement and safety of the place – principally building resilience to withstand major threats – creating an asset for future generations.

Operational Brand Stewards

Operational stewards can act as the “connective tissue” that links strategy, governance, and stakeholder engagement to the development of multiple On-Brand offers, their implementation and evaluation of their contribution to the brand and its impact.

They can and should be:

- Creators of brand offer development proposals

- Managers of brand offer’s implementation

- Monitors of brand offer’s performance

- Builders of brand delivery capacity

The most effective operational place brand stewards do not ask how they can manage the brand; instead, they ask how they can, together, help everyone who shapes their place get actively involved in the shared creation and delivery of On-Brand offers and experiences.

They jointly develop effective practices for brand offers that deliver on the current brand strategy and make progress to achieve its longer - term promise through sharing development expertise and learning about who are effective brand stewards and how to train others in the skills and knowledge required for their roles at both strategic and tactical levels.

This stewardship mindset has the potential to become a “hallmark” of mature place brand governance and implementation.

Elements of what I am describing are already evident in places as varied as the Gold Coast in eastern Australia and in the cities of Amsterdam, Melbourne and Copenhagen, where the brand functions as a shared asset for city development through comprehensive partnerships and a stewardship mindset.

Conclusions and Recommendation

Stewardship has often been an AFTERTHOUGHT when it should be FORETHOUGHT

Effective stewardship requires rethinking accepted and current models of place brand governance and place governance itself.

Effective stewardship requires training to develop required skills and competencies.

The Benefits of Shared Place Brand Stewardship

- It improves coordination, credibility and, ultimately, the capacity of a place to deliver the offers that constitute a reality on which a true reputation can be based

- It creates a greater shared understanding of the place’s purpose, values, positioning and priorities

- It provides mechanisms for maintaining brand standards, brand architecture and quality assurance

- Instead of organisations independently undertaking overlapping promotional or reputation-building activities, it encourages collaboration and shared investment

- It reduces dependence on individual political leaders, takeholders, agencies, consultants and brand managers

- Stakeholders regard the brand as a shared asset that requires collective, ongoing TLC

For place brands the future lies in building communities of trained and empowered brand stewards who, in addition to work on their own projects, help align hundreds of potential independent companies and organisations around a long-term vision for the place and how it can be delivered for current and future benefit.

An Important Question

Remembering my earlier reference to the groundbreaking work of Bird Global Advisory and CITIFI, it’s now important for existing stakeholders and investors in place brand delivery to ascertain if their place brand governors are behaving like serious stewards of their Place Operating System, and, if not are they prepared to change or stand down?

My Recommendations for Place Brand Organisations

Conduct an Audit of Your Place Operating System

The purpose of which is to assess:

1.  The extent of your current operation - your brand’s governance, management and delivery – against the eight key considerations of effective operation set out in the Place Leadership Report Global Survey 2025-26 cited above.

2. The extent to which the operation of your brand is being effectively stewarded by people with the skills, competences and behaviours of effective stewards outlined above.

Create and Implement a Guide for the Development and Management of Effective Brand Stewardship

Places taking stewardship seriously, looking to embed it in their Brand Operating System, need to create a “Guide for Effective Brand Stewardship” . This should cover:

• What’s expected of brand stewards at different levels in the Operating System

• Description of their specific roles and responsibilities

• Resource requirements – principally finance and time

• Description of desired skills, experience, behaviours and competencies required

• The process for identifying, recruiting and funding stewards

• The process for managing and assessing the work of stewards

• Examples of effective practice in steward-based place operating systems.

• The training to be provided to upskill potential stewards

To do so places should seriously consider working with their further and higher education sectors and training providers to organize and deliver appropriate skills and competence development programmes for their potential stewards as a key investment in the current and future delivery of their brand.

Insights in how to do so can be found in the recently published handbook by the IPBA on how to teach place branding.