Two stories in today’s New York Times struck me as bellwether examples of why customers — in the long run — ALWAYS win.
And, why it does little good to try to “fight” them, if you are a finance or technology manager.
Story one — Leo Apothaker is out, Meg Whitman is in at HP.
Obviously, there are multiple reasons why this occurred. However, note this important part of the story, “The uncertainty about the future of the PC business also created uneasiness among the company’s big corporate customers, causing concern among H.P.’s board that it could contribute to weakness in its PC sales.”
When customers are uneasy and uncertain about you and your future, they will naturally seek alternatives. And, what happens to ANY business — from a behemoth like HP to a corner grocery store — when customers go someplace else?
Story two — More offices are now letting workers choose their devices
Over the years, I have had many people tell me…as I am hooking up my MacBook before a speech, or even years ago when I was using a PowerBook…that they, too, would switch to Apple, if only the corporate IT office would let them.
As the Times’ article states, “Throughout the information age, the corporate I.T. department has stood at the chokepoint of office technology with a firm hand on what equipment and software employees use in the workplace.”
However…eventually…the customer ALWAYS wins, whether he or she is an external — or internal — customer.
(You may be saying an internal customer doesn’t always win — there’s lots of times you have to put up with something on your job you dislike. My point is that you can win — you either are less productive, because you think you aren’t receiving compelling leadership (which means the company loses) — or, you can choose to quit and work elsewhere (which means the company has lost productivity in training your replacement, and incurs the costs associated with such a change) — either way, you, the internal customer, has control.)
Kraft Foods, for example, is now providing stipends to employees, and THEY get to choose whatever laptop they desire from an Apple Store, BestBuy…or wherever!
Now, here’s where it gets REALLY interesting. What this means is companies that have connectivity with regular people — typical consumers — are selling more devices. Those companies focused on B-to-B sales with IT departments and less on the individuals who would actually be USING their devices — think RIM’s BlackBerry or Dell — are losing sales.
At a Cisco meeting I was addressing a couple years ago, CEO John Chambers held up his iPad and said, “This is the first Apple product I’ve ever used at work.” Ted Schadler, an analyst with Forrester Research, agrees in the Times’ article, saying, “What broke the camel’s back was the iPad, because executives brought it into the company and said ‘Hey, you’ve got to support this.’”
At every presentation, and in my books, I ALWAYS try to convey that it is much, much easier to talk and write about an Ultimate Customer Experience ® than it is to actually create and deliver one — internally AND externally — at your organization.
However, to fail to do so — over the long run — is infinitely more painful.
Because…sooner or later…the customer ALWAYS wins.
Are you a customer-focused leader, or customer-focused follower?
Given the late Steve Jobs’ (and it’s still strange to write that) famous statement it’s not the customer’s job to know what they want — does that, on its face, mean Apple rejects the theory of customer focus?
Of course not. Apple knows what many confuse:
FIrst, organizations must make the decision to be customer/client focused. This is a critical choice, one many professionals and organizations refuse or — because of inaction — decline to make.
It’s the financial advisor who chooses the practice will be about the client, not about investment tools. It’s the airline that decides it’s all about getting passengers to their destinations, not the planes.
It’s important to note, “focus” does not mean you eliminate all other aspects. Advisors had still better know the investment tools, and airlines have to darn sure understand how to fly and maintain the aircraft. Focus is best defined as “the act of concentrating interest or activity on something; of paying particular interest to stimulate thought and action.” (from Dictionary.com)
Customer focus means you concentrate your interests and thoughts chiefly on your customers. You do this in order to stimulate you to take action on their behalf that will, in turn, enhance your ability to profitably obtain and retain their business over an extended period of time.
Sony, Dell, HP, and others probably held focus groups with laptop customers. They asked them what they wanted in future products. Most likely, the responses were, “lighter, thinner, easier to carry, more battery life, more memory, bigger hard drive.”
“Ah ha!” they exclaimed while patting themselves on the back for being so customer focused. “Now we know what our customers really want!” And, they set about engineering lighter, thinner, more powerful versions of products they had already created.
That’s being a focused follower — we learn what our customers want, take what we already have, and modify it to give them what they have told us they desire.
Apple on the other hand took the same information — and, come on, do you really have to assemble a focus group to figure that one out? — and said, “What if our customers are saying they want a lighter, thinner, more powerful device? Why does that device have to be a laptop? What if we created something insanely great unlike what they’ve used before?” Hence, the iPad.
It’s not that Apple wasn’t customer focused — it is that they weren’t focused followers. It’s just inherently wrong to suggest that having a “customer focus” means you’ll respond to whims for what customers may momentarily have the hots to have.
More to come on this in the next few days…and I would love to hear what you think!
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