The Internet allows a consumer from Brazil to buy a product from a company based in Norway. And that's only one small example. The global marketplace has quickly become a reality for all companies. A global marketplace means more products and company choices are available, so the company that can provide at the lowest cost has an advantage. Due to market competition, companies must provide a high level of service, and this support must be professional and friendly. This has forced many traditional company focused businesses to become customer focused companies.
This process does not occur easily. Not only must the culture and business practices of the sales and the technical support department change, but all departments (from production to management) must learn to become customer focused. Sales and marketing will need to communicate with technical support to find out what aspects of a product or service customers like in order to highlight that aspect. Management and production departments will also need to communicate with technology support in order to obtain valuable input on customer needs and complaints.
Customer focused organizations have several specific attributes that allow them to successfully interact and communicate with customers. This is based around creating a learning organization, in which all employees are driven by training, learning new tools, and implementing customer communication. The qualities of these types of organizations include:
- Ability to give and receive knowledge about the customer's needs
- Capacity to implement new systems and services according to customer demands
- Allowing other customers to get the necessary technical knowledge
- Training every employee on how to better communicate with and serve customers
- Activities and guides as to what is expected of employees when representing the company
- Strategic guidelines on how to move forward with more customer focus
Production and company focused businesses still exist. Management and production departments have a long history of concentrating only on business plans and technical specifications. It takes a paradigm shift to change this way of thinking. It also takes training and a revision of every aspect and culture of the company. This can only occur if upper management and business owners push and support these changes. Successful businesses transition to become customer focused while company focused businesses continue struggle to remain competitive. Although exceptional customer satisfaction is not always easy (especially for help desk technicians), working for a company that is not customer focused is not the best career move.
