Be Big On Purpose:
Bridging The Identity Gap
IDENTITY BASED LEADERSHIP
-behavior is the fruit, but identity is the root.
AI can deliver information. It cannot deliver identity. We build the identity that drives behavior, performance, and lasting results.
Ashley Johnson
Founder & Chief Strategist, The Big Consortium
Ashley Johnson began her career with Arkansas Rehabilitation Services, leading training and corporate relationship management for some of the state's largest employers — Walmart, J.B. Hunt, and Tyson Foods. That front-line work revealed a pattern: organizations kept training skills, yet performance still stalled. The missing piece wasn't ability. It was identity.
Today, as founder and CEO of The Big Consortium, Ashley helps colleges, workforce programs, and employers close that gap with Identity-Based Leadership™ and the Evolve Leadership Programs. Her approach is simple and proven: behavior is the fruit, but identity is the root. When you build the right identity, confidence, accountability, communication, adaptability, and professional presence follow — and they last.
Ashley is the author of "The Pimp of Potential," as well as a sought-after keynote speaker, and the creator of the Think. Talk. Do.™ method that turns crucial conversations into culture change.
The Identity Based Framework
Most programs work on the fruit — they train tasks and skills. Identity-Based Leadership™ works on the root. Because the way people see themselves is what they consistently do under pressure.
The sequence (show as 4 steps):
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Identity — who a person believes they are
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Behavior — what that identity makes them do
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Performance — the results that behavior produces
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Outcomes — the retention, completion, and growth you report on
The Identity Gap™: The distance between who your people are being and who their role requires. Most turnover, low accountability, and stalled performance live in that gap. We name it, measure it, and close it.
Why now: AI has made information instant and free. It cannot give anyone an identity. The organizations that win the AI era will be the ones whose people know who they are when the work gets hard.