Mark Ritson on branding: Goldman's is an unwitting exemplar.

I am teaching the brand management elective at London Business School this week.

A healthy proportion of my class is made up of MBA students who have opted almost exclusively for finance modules as preparation for careers in investment banking. Many choose brand management as their only non-finance course because branding is an area of almost total ignorance for them.

This may sound odd to marketers, many of whom may not understand exactly what investment banks do. Meanwhile, bankers peer into the world of brand equity with the same glazed look of bewilderment with which we peer back at them.

There is, however, common ground. In fact, one investment bank provides us with a …