Ahead of the Liberal leadership announcement, the NDP look to re-brand

If you can't beat them, join them.

That seems to be the strategy of the New Democrats who, over the next couple of days, will partake in a re-branding exercise.

The NDP are holding a policy convention this weekend in Montreal. One of the hot-topic agenda items is a resolution that would change the party's constitutional preamble to exclude overt references to 'socialism.' Essentially, the party is attempting to creep towards the centre of the political spectrum.

[ Related: Tories, New Democrats in row over leftist NDP policy resolutions ]

"I’m more of a Layton-ite. Jack was pretty good at emphasizing pragmatism over ideology. You’ve got to be practical to get results," NDP leader Thomas Mulcair told the National Post on Thursday.

"Social democracy was always about removing inequality in our society – but today, one of the biggest inequalities is between generations. The environment and sustainability are now front and centre, which is different from an era where the main battle was on the economic front."

The other area of focus this weekend is on Mulcair himself.

According to reports, on Friday night, the NDP will showcase a video of Thomas Mulcair showing him as an experienced politician and as a family man in an attempt to soften his public persona.

"People got to know Jack (Layton) over 10 years. We don’t have as much time to introduce Tom to Canada before the next election — and the stakes are too high this time for us," Nathan Rotman, the party's national directo told the Huffington Post.

"We have two years, so we will be highlighting his depth, highlighting his experience, highlighting some of the things that make him tick."

[ Related: Thomas Mulcair's so so first year as NDP leader ]

Why are they really doing this? Two words: Justin Trudeau.

By Sunday evening, the Liberal Party of Canada will have their new leader in place.

According to Nanos Research, the new chief — most likely Justin Trudeau — will have the advantage of being the front runner heading into the 2015 election.

"The latest Nanos tracking numbers reveal that national support for the Liberal Party is at 35.4 per cent, just ahead of the Conservatives at 31.3 per cent," notes their latest survey report, released on Friday.

"Liberal support has been slowly increasing since the last federal election, but has not seen similar numbers since 2009. Ballot support for the NDP is currently at 23.6 per cent, while the Bloc and the Greens have 4.8 per cent and 4.2 per cent, respectively."

The big losers in the survey — and in other recent surveys — are the New Democrats who have fallen by 3.2 per cent since February and are back to pre-2011 numbers.

Earlier this week, Nanos Research CEO Nik Nanos was on CBC News saying that now is the time for the NDP to re-brand Mulcair.

"[Mulcair's] got to work on his personal brand. He has to assert himself," Nanos said.

"He is very aggressive, he is very forthright, he's a capable campaigner, but he's got to build his personal brand. Because right now on the personality front he's trailing both Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau."

[ Related: The secret to Justin Trudeau's popularity: Thomas Mulcair ]

In a recent email exchange with Yahoo! Canada News, political consultant Gerry Nicholls quipped that Mulcair should shave off his beard.

At this point, maybe that's not such a bad idea.