Want To Learn About Customer-Centricity?

Want to learn about customer-centricity? Then go back to school. At least go to Instituto Impresa Business School's Building the Customer Centric Organization executive education course next week in Madrid.

It is great to see customer-centricity being brought under the spotlight at business school. It means that it is finally being taken seriously enough to be worth teaching, that there is now a market for learning about customer-centricity and probably more important, that there is a proper body of knowledge behind customer-centricity to make it worthwhile teaching at business school. Customer-centricity is finally coming of age.

The syllabus is interesting too. It is based upon three core foundations. Firstly, upon a complementary capabilities view of customer strategy. As I have written previously , this is the only way to do serious customer strategy today. If you aren't taking a capabilities approach to customer strategy then you aren't taking customer startegy seriously.

Secondly, upon a customer-driven innovation approach to understanding how companies can build value propositions that fit exactly with what customers are looking for. As I have also written previously, getting customers involved in innnovation, marketing, sales and self-service through customer co-creation is rapidly turning into the next evolutionary wave after CRM (what's that?) and CEM. If customers aren't intimately involved in your business, what is your business for?

Finally, upon an individually customised approach to going to markets of one with winning value propositions. In particular, value propositions tailored to the highest value customers. This marks an abrupt change from the fluffier type of customer strategy in the past that focused more on the antecedents of customer value like satisfaction and loyalty. As I have also written about recently, going to market to tens of thousands of constantly changing customer segments is now within many industries' grasp. If you aren't managing individual customers for value, then you are leaving money on the table.

I find it interesting that for the business school, Customer-Centricity = Complementary Capabilities + Customer Co-creation + Customer Value Management.

If it wasn't for client work next week, I would be getting myself down to the course in Madrid. If by chance one of you is going, perhaps you could let us know what it was like.

What do you think? Is this a sign of customer-centricity finally becoming a serious subject? Or is recognition long overdue?

Post a comment and get the conversation going.

Graham Hill
Independent CRM Consultant
Interim CRM Manager