Global Brand Transformation

Bringing a Purpose-Led Brand to Market

Challenge
Johnson & Johnson needed more than a logo refresh. The iconic company was moving from a holding company structure to a purpose-led brand. Its identity had to unify corporate, consumer, MedTech, and Pharma divisions into a single system that could work across 200+ properties, cultures, and channels, while telling one clear enterprise narrative that connected purpose to performance.

Role
As Senior Manager of Brand Experience Design, I was responsible for turning J&J’s strategic narrative into a global brand system and campaign activations across TV, social, web, and experiential platforms. I built toolkits, training, and guidelines that enabled teams to bring the story to life consistently, and directed the performance of narratives by optimizing and learning from what resonated across global markets. I managed design teams and agencies, delivered monthly global updates to leadership, and governed brand performance to keep the brand consistent and adaptable at scale.

Approach
We began with semiotic analysis, mapping the meaning and imagery systems of health globally, decoding what was fading, and identifying what was emerging in culture. These insights framed the brand around heart, science, and ingenuity. From there, we built a master enterprise narrative that blended Our Credo, Our Purpose, and Growth Drivers into a unified story. This narrative guided both design and marketing, informing how the brand showed up in digital, motion, content, and experiential campaigns worldwide.

The Work

Unified corporate, consumer, MedTech, and Pharma into a cohesive identity
Advanced corporate innovation storytelling, connecting brand, science, and culture across the enterprise
Activated the brand through campaigns, recruiting programs, enterprise events, and digital content series
Built guidelines, motion standards, and toolkits adopted across global teams
Delivered Figma-based workflows and asset libraries for speed and compliance with J&J Technology
Enabled scale with training, governance, and cross-division adoption

Impact
The transformation modernized J&J’s identity and revealed it as more than a healthcare company, a purpose-led CARE company. The system reinforced cultural relevance, provided global consistency, and equipped teams to activate the vision everywhere. Enterprise narratives and marketing activations made the brand resonate with employees, partners, and the public, creating a platform that drives both trust and growth.

Metrics

23%
higher engagement on purpose-led campaigns, highlighting J&J as innovative and human-centered

200+
designers and marketers trained, enabling 40% faster creative delivery

12M+
people reached through social and website plaform initiatives, strengthening trust

82%
adoption of the new brand system across global divisions in 18 months

A Brand Without a Center

The J&J enterprise operated as a decentralized structure, creating silos and fragmentation. To bring its companies, brands, and units together, we needed a unifying narrative and a philosophy of imagery broad enough to span the entire world of health. The challenge was to identify the cultural codes that resonate across consumers and families, as well as clinicians, surgeons, and medical professionals. The solution was imagery that told stories of Care: Heart, Science, and Ingenuity—human enough to connect with everyday life, precise enough for clinical trust, and innovative enough to signal progress.

How Cultural Codes Shaped J&J’s Brand

We began by studying the cultural codes of health, looking at how imagery, language, and symbols of care and innovation are understood around the world. This research revealed which metaphors were fading, which carried trust, and which signaled progress. From these insights we built a narrative operating system, a clear story of purpose and well-being that guided both visual identity and messaging. It gave J&J a way to unify its businesses under one idea, avoid clichés, and connect with people through modern, human-centered storytelling.

Enterprise Narrative

Our Origins

Johnson & Johnson has shaped health and wellness for more than 130 years.
We are a family of people driven to create a healthier world. We put our whole selves into everything we do. We connect our know-how across more than 250 companies to care in ways nobody else can. We have an unrelenting drive to chase after the unimaginable and achieve what was thought to be impossible.

Our Reality

Meeting the needs of future generations requires all of us to be at our best.
Our breadth gives us a unique view into the health challenges facing individuals, families, communities and countries. We work every day to uncover the future of health care. We move health forward, faster for all the people who depend on us:" Putting people at the center of our imaginations
Bringing together people from diverse backgrounds to solve problems. Acting with measured boldness and using our scale to put solutions in the hands of those who need them most

Our Purpose

We blend heart, science and ingenuity to profoundly change the trajectory of health for humanity. We pursue Our Purpose tirelessly with open hearts, open minds and open arms.
Because health is first and everything else follows.

Our Commitment

United by common goals, we hold ourselves accountable to the people who entrust their lives to us. Fulfilling our promise to the world takes the commitment of every person, every team and every company across our business. Together, we will change the course of human health for the better by:

Remaining true to Our Credo and the principles we’ve had since the beginning
Being broadly based in health care
Continuing to use our reach and size for good
Investing in areas that will have enduring, long-term impact
Creating life-enhancing innovations and coming up with solutions others don’t think of
Delivering excellence in execution
Generating value through partnerships

Our Destination

Together, we will pave the way to a healthier future for everyone, everywhere.
We will ensure strength and stability when they’re needed most. We believe humanity’s best days are ahead of us, not behind us. We will shape the health of future generations by:

Striving to put a healthy mind, body and environment within reach of all people
Enhancing life at every stage with innovative solutions, from skin care to surgical solutions to treatments for cancer
Raising public health standards in communities large and small
Ensuring Johnson & Johnson is a company you can count on for your whole life

Working Side by Side

Bringing the narrative to life required deep collaboration across the organization. We worked with corporate, functional, and regional groups to co-create sub-stories that all laddered up to the master brand narrative. Through workshops and prototyping, we explored different story structures to make the message resonate in intuitive and accessible ways. The design team then translated this into a unified visual system and guidelines that carried strategic brand stories across every medium and touchpoint. A cross-functional council aligned divisions and corporate teams around a single 360° identity, ensuring consistency while allowing flexibility to reflect diverse audiences.

360º Experience Design

Building the Corporate Foundation

We anchored the corporate brand in a clear strategic narrative of purpose and well-being, expressed through the “world of well” platform. Building on this foundation, we defined the brand architecture, redesigned the global website, and created a unified system for corporate communications. From the Health for Humanity report to executive events, every touchpoint reinforced a single, purpose-led identity.

Launch Campaigns TV, Social, Web

:30 second spot introducing J&J as a healthcare company. (With agency Wunderman Thompson, Initiated by J&J Corporate Equity )

Johnson & Johnson Website

Digital experience design

Report system

Corporate Communications & Events

Investor Presentations

Signature/Initial motion assets

Enterprise wide wordmark system

Equity Programs and Initiatives

Living as a purpose-led brand meant moving from words to action. Partnering with a leading design agency, I directed the creation of platforms that connected Johnson & Johnson’s values to real-world impact. We built engagement programs for Health Equity, including health workers, mothers, children, environmental health, and access to essential care. We also developed Wisdom by Kids, an AI-powered donation app that transformed children’s drawings into art, using creativity to inspire generosity. In parallel, our COVID-19 response included social campaigns and a web series documenting vaccine development and educational content that reached millions and built trust in a critical moment.

Platforms & Programs

See Project

Adapting for Consumers to Clinicians

Extended the Johnson & Johnson brand narrative across Consumer, Pharma, and MedTech divisions by developing distinct personas and design systems tailored to each audience. For consumers, the tone was playful and empathetic; for clinicians, precise and professional. Led MedTech branding for portfolio companies and robotics platforms such as Velys, creating a flexible design framework that unified packaging, digital interfaces, and clinical tools. This approach balanced human warmth with scientific rigor, connecting diverse audiences across the global health ecosystem.

J&J Consumer Health

J&J Medical Devices

VELYS (Subbrand)

Worked with creative teams and guided the design of Velys, Johnson & Johnson’s MedTech robotics sub-brand. Developed a distinct identity that stood independently for strategic market positioning while staying connected to the broader J&J brand family. Applied shared design principles in typography, motion, and tone to maintain coherence across the MedTech portfolio, balancing innovation and trust within a unified system.

Events & Experiences

Building Culture Through Recruiting and Experience

Inside J&J, the brand had to resonate just as strongly as it did in the marketplace. We began by mapping the new employee experience journey, which informed the design strategy for internal activations worldwide. This work spanned the employer brand and recruiting platforms, global learning initiatives, and wellness programs. We also created systems for awards and recognition milestones, while supporting diversity and inclusion groups that celebrate belonging across the enterprise. Together these efforts aligned culture with brand, making purpose tangible for employees in every region.