It’s been a while since I’ve written or shared an insight. Like for most things that happen, there were many reasons for this gap but the most profound one was that I had let life-as-usual interrupt my routine of penning down management insights that I live and learn each day. What this post talk about is probably the most simple and effective key to dramatically increase the possibility of success in any task that one would want to put his or her mind to.
I have read cases on exceptional companies, I've worked with organizations and grappled with the nuts and bolts of execution, I've seen movies that worked and I saw people who have clicked. All these seemed to me like different scenarios with different winning set of strategies and formulas. There was a struggle to understand each separate story as I ripped them apart looking for what made them work. But then after all these years a pattern started to emerge. Suddenly there was something common between all these seemingly disparate successes. The pattern I noticed is this: Every successful undertaking appeared to shock the hell out of its lead consumer at each level of evident or invisible contact and they all spent their time worrying about the process. Let me explain. ( and yes there is a very good reason why I used ‘evident’ and ‘invisible’ instead of ‘direct’ or ‘indirect’!)
This is a blog on management and strategic thinking and unfortunately we can’t keep away from jargon forever. A project can be seen as a combo of two value chains. First the steps that a company must take to arrive at a product or a service. These steps lend the final output a character that it displays under ideal conditions of use. Second, are the steps that a consumer takes to reach out to product or the service and then consume it, either immediately or over time. Successful (we can always debate what success means but let’s just stick to a definition that ‘something can be known as successful when the person offering it and the one consuming it are both happy’) companies have a knack to first anticipate the positive consumption shock that its product should have and develop a supporting ‘first value chain’ and then finally makes sure that the second value chain piggybacks on the first one and actually works to deliver those shocks.
What I mean by this is that, internal company processes and daily rituals are set in order to polarize the results towards achieving an optimal perceived reaction from the consumers. Then the company moves onto provide an experience with genius levels of delivery where each interaction with the company, either evident (e.g. Customer Service) or invisible (e.g. advertising, HR) are different and shocking. Take any example of an outstanding product from GE, P&G, 3M, Southwest Airlines or even famous movies like Toy Story, Shawshank Redemption or Finding Nemo...the same pattern emerges. Every time the product is touched or used, one is shocked. Every scene one watches, either makes one laugh or cry or left the viewer deep in thought. Internal processes make sure the product is competitively good; HR makes sure people are always happy; the leader makes sure he never sulks and is always radiant with infectious energy and all this translates into a shocking experience for the consumer. It’s the many small strategic plays that add up and leads to something that is inimitable and sustainable.
But the main point is that this seemingly simple and effective formula seems to elude many companies. Some sequences are good but there are boring parts to a movie, the drinks are great but the wall is chipped, the product is great but the service IVR loves to chat! A sincere look at the distinct parts of an offering and an equally sincere effort to make them all delightfully shocking in their own little way will mostly pay off. Back an offering with consumer research to know what knocks them out, set-up a system that can deliver it and then actually deliver it!
Just make sure you shock more than your competitors do and can sustain it over time.
