“We worked furiously to realize our goals. Because we didn’t have fear, we could do something drastic.”
- Masaru Ibuka, Founder, Sony Corporation, 1991.
A good BHAG appears to border between plausible and simply outrageous. Successful companies however, don’t think that way. They achieve their audacious goals because it simply never occurs to them that they can’t do what they set out to do. They bring a mind-set change, make radical moves and fire up a sense of urgency. Why should we be any different? Here are some of the key elements, which if addressed aggressively, can make BHAGs happen.
Deep customer awareness: Customer business intimacy and awareness of their business ecosystem is of utmost importance for any vendor to develop deep-rooted relationships. Our ability to answer a few questions on behalf of the customer will provide valuable insights. What is our customer’s business? Who are their end-customers? Who are their competitors? How can they increase market share? What is their business vision, goals and priorities? Figuring out how we can help achieve that goal and translate possibility to reality is solely our responsibility. The journey to becoming our customer’s Trusted Partner starts by asking, “How do we make our influence so pronounced that the customer always considers us before embarking on new strategic initiatives?” The ability to shape our customer’s agenda, and earn the “seat at the table” when the most important strategies and plans are worked out should be our urgent priority. It takes commitment, effort, sincerity of purpose and patience but the fruits are worth the pain.
Strengthening our value proposition: Our value proposition will seldom stand critical review if we do not know the customer. Deep customer awareness helps building unique value propositions. How much of our work positively influences the customer’s core business? How far does our value proposition go beyond cost savings and performance gains? Customers are demanding different value propositions now and that is reshaping the way we compete. The stronger we get on creating value propositions; faster will be our move towards executing strategic projects that influence business outcomes. With more of our services directly influencing customer’s business outcomes, our presence is fortified. Such services then invite a fair discussion of premium pricing proven by delivered metrics and data points.
Creating the unique client experience: This should become one of our key differentiators. Ideally, even before we start responding to a hot new prospect, we need to devote time to figure out how we will create a unique experience as we engage the customer. The right moves will ensure that the customer senses this refreshing change in the way we do business. Across multiple touch points key factors like access to talent, access to leadership, candid dialogue around risk assessment and risk sharing, transparency of processes, attention to details and above all quality of communication play strongly. Over time, customers value predictability of service just as much as quality of service.
Branding - personal and Organizational: A brand is a promise of what the customer can expect. Our brand must be distinctive and command a certain respect when discussions of a particular nature of services come up. Most importantly, markets we operate in must know and understand our brand. Sustained effort is required to achieve this. Have you asked yourself What is your personal brand? Go ahead and try. It reveals some secrets that apply to our Company’s branding as well. Each of us is a brand ambassador, we build our brand and we build our organization’s.
People: People are our greatest strength. To meet leadership demands as we grow we have to build leaders from within to preserve our core values. Research shows that it is not quality of leadership, but the continuity of quality leadership that matters most. However, there is a premium to pay – retention. Retaining our best talent is a collective responsibility, more often in ways beyond common imagination. The Trusted Partner stage takes years to build; it grows only through many-to-many relationships at multiple levels and needs consistency of our customer facing people over time.
Finally, there is a strong co-relation between employees and our brand. Not only does our employer brand support our business strategy, it defines for our employees what our customers should experience.
Chetan Manjarekar
Chetan.manjarekar@gmail.com
