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Operational Excellence, Meet Customer Intimacy

Harvard Business Review

Most organizations continuously strive to achieve operational excellence, but they spend less effort understanding customer needs — and few marry these two sources of customer value effectively. In 1996 Tesco adopted Toyota Production System approaches to take its supply chain operations to an even higher level.

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Customer Intimacy, Meet Operational Excellence

Harvard Business Review

What is more important to company success, a strong external focus on customer experiences or an internal focus on effective and efficient operations? Bean have had lots of information about customers for many years that they have used to tailor offerings and services. As a direct marketer we have been good at customer intimacy.

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Make Your Organization Anti-Fragile

Harvard Business Review

retailer, spent the last three decades improving its supply chain processes, and designing and launching a series of services, including smaller local convenience stores and online shopping. having sacrificed customer intimacy for increased operational excellence gains through widespread cost cutting, are well documented.

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Understanding Customers Is Everyone's Job

Harvard Business Review

retailer Tesco built detailed profiles of customers and then used these insights and a flexible supply chain to customize their products and offers. Creating products and services for market segments of one (" mass customization ") isn''t easy. Collaboration Marketing Operations'

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Invest in Proprietary Data for Competitive Advantage

Harvard Business Review

Further, they can combine John Smith's transaction with others to better understand buying patterns, improve their supply chains, lay stores out more effectively, and so forth. One retailer develops an insight into customer behavior and others follow suit.

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What Apple, Lending Club, and AirBnB Know About Collaborating with Customers

Harvard Business Review

Improved customer insight : The increased customer intimacy that comes with co-creation deepens your understanding of your market, enabling you to serve it better. When customers co-create and have a vested interest in its success, they are more willing to share personal data and other assets with it.

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Standard Operating Procedures Can Make You More Flexible

Harvard Business Review

Most people think standard operating procedures are a strait jacket that limits their flexibility. They can actually make it easier to tailor customer experiences at low cost. The Cleveland Clinic cleverly uses standards to deliver operational consistency, reliability, and low cost. Customers Health Operations'