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What’s the Number One Number Thing Today’s CEO’s Must Do? Do the OODA Loop Faster and More Innovatively

June 4, 2017 By Leave a Comment

What’s the Newest Requirement for a CEO? Do the OODA Loop Faster and Better!

You would think it would to generate revenue, profits and reduce costs. Think again. It’s all about iterating and pivoting like a start-up. And who better than a former fighter pilot to teach CEO’s a thing or two about making quick. So I want you to meet John Boyd, who was among many things, a military strategist, colonel and fighter pilot whose theories are highly influential in the military, sports and business.

So why bring up Colonel Boyd in the context of CEO’s and their need to be nimble? Because investors and boards have transitioned from desiring quarterly profits (something that has driven Wall Street and corporations for many years) to searching for leaders to those who have the ability to disrupt their industry or die. What did the fighter pilot, Colonel Boyd used to make those decisions to do something out of the ordinary? He created a framework known as the OODA Loop:

  • Observe (M—ake the best use of the information and other intelligence resources available right now)
  • Orient (Quickly put the new observations into a context with the old)
  • Decide (Make quick decisions and take the “next actions” based on a combination of observations, current knowledge and intuition), and then
  • Act on those decisions to carry out the selected action(s), ideally— while the competitor is still observing your last action so you beat them to the punch!

OODA Loop

                                         Photo Source: Larry Paul

Above is a video from Ralph Mroz on the OODA Loop as applied to business if you want more information!

Observe, Orient, Decide and Act Is Known as John Boyd’s OODA Loop

As a fighter pilot, John had to make decisions in nano-seconds. With this framework of observe, orient, decide and act he way able to describe a way to iterate and pivot, very quickly, and decide if the object in front of them is friend or foe. Not doing so could mean life or death. It could also mean the end to a critical mission.  What does the OODA Loop mean to a CEO? Iterating and pivoting is also mission critical. Just ask the CEO of Ford Motor Company, Chief Executive Mark Fields. He was a 28 year old veteran of the business and was replaced by someone the business thought would be able to disrupt the automotive industry very quickly!

The Message is Simple: Do the OODA Loop Faster or Die

While Mr. Field’s did what most board’s used to expect of a CEO’s, i.e., he returned consistent profits, he did’t make enough changes fast enough. His OODA loop was too slow. But he didn’t know what he didn’t know. He, as many other CEO’s don’t realize that the winds of change are changing all around us. Like in most any industry, the car market has entered into the era of transportation.

It’s no longer just about building and selling a car. It’s about car-as-a-service. Think: ride-sharing (think Lyft, Tesla and ReachNow (by BMW.) It’s also about taking the traditional gasoline engine and transforming it’s power source to be an electric vehicle. And it doesn’t stop there. Some companies are disrupting the industry by experimenting with self-driving technology, making investments in connected cities (think BMW and Santa Monica, CA.) And at the same time Ford’s stock sank. 

How Fast Does Your CEO do The OODA Loop?

How fast do decisions get made? How fast can the ship be turned? Today, with the need to act quickly, the message is simple. We are in an age of rapid disruption by the software and tech industries. A leader of any company has to pick up the tempo and make riskier bets sooner… or die. While it was Mr. Field’s intention to set Ford on a path to be part of the new, emerging auto industry, he just didn’t do it fast enough.

Since Mr. Field’s took over three years ago, the share price of Ford is down 40%. As a CEO, as yourself, “Are you disrupting yourself, your company and your products fast enough? Are you really changing anything or are you just doing the old stuff just faster?” These are not easy questions, but ones that we all need to contend with. Consider you are one company and your are disrupting yourself faster than your competitor. What happens to the competitor?

ooda loop faster to drive innovation @drnatalie

                                                             Photo Source: Larry Paul

As a CEO, Are You On Track?

In military operations, OODA loops takes place in nano-seconds. In corporations, its decisions are often slower. In the old days, strategy was rigidly followed till next years’ planning cycle. But today, that’s no longer an acceptable mindset. And it’s critical to validate we’re on track and if not, correct it. Using a model like the OODA Loop, along with design-thinking which requires to you go and talk to your customers, your employees, customer’s of your competitors, to industries that are similar to your and industries that have nothing to do with yours.

It’s where the kernel of the seeds of innovation are hatched, born and grown into a full idea. The results of your actions become the observations to re-orient you to make your next decision. Quickly repeating the OODA loop equals success. And as you are doing this, you want to make sure you are making real-time changes that are just changes to make changes, but change to create a “Blue Ocean Strategy.” As defined by the author’s of the book, Blue Ocean Strategy, CEO’s need to quickly create an uncontested marketplace, where the competition is irrelevant.

Who’s Slow to the OODA Loop?

According to the article by Christopher Mims of the Wall Street Journal, Ronald Boire of Barnes & Noble, GNC Holdings’ Mike Archbold and top executives at three of the six major Hollywood studios making changes faster is very important. Where to look for inspiration? According to Mr. Mims, unlike large corporations, startups don’t need decades to make the changes the businesses need to succeed in the new world. They are nimble, they are always iterating, pivoting, changing, trying new things, not being afraid of conflict…

What does this mean for established companies? They will need to take drastic measures to do the OODA loop faster. What kind of drastic measures? According to the article, these CEO’s must be willing to tell their stakeholders they may have to lose money and cannibalize existing products and services, while scaling up new technologies and methods. Not the same old dog chow most CEO’s having been dishing out.

How Can a CEO Get On Track?

It used to be that you could acquire the start-up that was trying to put you out of business. But in today’s market it takes more than that. Companies that are disrupting the marketplace are growing so quickly, capturing so much market share, they don’t want or need to be acquired. And they can become too valuable to buy or are unwilling to sell. So the questions for you, as a CEO, “Is do you have systems to monitor/measure what employees know, think & feel about what is going on in the business?”

They are often the ones on the front line that really know what is going on and what needs to be done, or at least what isn’t working. “Do you really know what your customers know, think & feel? Or do you have a cordial relationship where the “real deal” is not really discussed?” Honest, conscious conversation is where it all starts. Many people have made careers by learning how to manage-up well. That’s not a bad thing, except when you aren’t telling the CEO the truth about what the troops think, feel and know. But there has to be a cultural environment that always you to be able to safely say the things. That’s not always the case.

And, as a CEO, “Do you take that information that you have gathered from your employees, your customers, all kinds of sources and integrate it into your company?” One of the best ways to stay on top of the game is to monitor social and digital media. If you have a digital / social media command center, where all the top news and information is brought into one central place, you can begin to digest a new picture of the quickly changing landscape very easily. You’ll also want to keep your ear closely attuned to what is happening in the start-up world, regardless of whether it is Silicon Valley or Silicon Beach or Silicon Edge or…

The More Things Change, The More They Stay The Same

To me, all of this sounds like something very familiar to those of us who came from the voice of the customer or quality. Remember Deming, the father of Quality who was pushed out of the American Auto Industry? And then only to be invited to Japan and make their automative industry soar? What was his secret sauce? To listen to their customers and the employees. To make really changes to their products and services based on that feedback!

Start Incubating Innovation

Today, companies must incubate disruptive ideas within their own corporate cultures. And this is not easy, because often it means supporting them as they grow into something truly disruptive. The company might have to absorb their losses. For example, for its first 20 years Amazon made almost no profit. But iterating, pivoting and incubating is not enough. A CEO must maintain the existing business at the same time as they innovate. This is a new and rare skill.

So where best to learn how to think like an OODA Loop CEO? Find a group that help take you through thinking differently, through a design-thinking process where you never know what will come out of it, but it always spurs innovation. You have to cross the chasm, from how you normally do things, to how things have never been done before. That’s a lot of change, so it’s also important to develop those ideas and new innovations in the culture where change and honestly is accepted and appreciated.

@drnatalie

VP, Program Executive, in the Innovation and Transformation Center 
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Capgemini Acquires Innovation and Design Consultancy Fahrenheit 212 to Drive Digital Innovation Offerings

February 23, 2016 By Leave a Comment

Capgemini Turns Up the Heat: Based in New York City and London, Fahrenheit 212 will contribute its specialized capabilities for innovation strategy and consumer-centric design to the broader offerings of Capgemini Consulting. The move opens growth opportunities for both companies through their combined capabilities. It will accelerate Capgemini Consulting’s ability to define new products, services and experiences for clients, while Fahrenheit 212 gains access to international implementation strengths and the Group’s global network of Applied Innovation Exchanges.

Who is Fahrenheit 212? It was founded on the premise that innovation – as a systematized capability – can be both a learned discipline and a predictable driver of growth. Highly entrepreneurial and outcome-driven, Fahrenheit 212 has spent the last 12 years developing growth opportunities for clients such as The Coca-Cola Company, Marriott, and Citi.

A Note from the Executives: Todd Rovak, Managing Partner and Chief Executive Officer of Fahrenheit 212, said, “At Fahrenheit 212, we have built an effective and unique model for developing new products and services, and now with our Consulting we can again leap frog our competitive set. The ability to combine innovation strategy and transformational thinking with enterprise-level implementation on a global scale is now a client mandate. Capgemini’s deep technology capabilities, resources and client relationships will steepen our trajectory and accelerate our pace in ways that would take us years on our own. Our people are excited to strengthen and broaden our approach to innovation consulting in dynamic new ways, helping us continue to attract and develop innovation’s top practitioners.”

Cyril Garcia, CEO of Capgemini Consulting and Member of the Group Executive Committee, statement, “Our shared view of the future of innovation and the inclusion of digital is the impetus behind the combination of our complementary approaches as we step-change the way consulting is defined and delivered. Together with Fahrenheit 212, we’ll bring additional value and innovation to our clients and expand our innovation solutions into new industries that are undergoing digital disruption.”

MY POV: It takes the know how of both a management consulting firm and system integrator and a speciality firm are a great combination to drive innovation from both a strategic and tactical point of view.

@DrNatalie, VP and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research

Covering the Latest in Digital Transformation, using IOT and the Cloud to make Awesome Customer Experiences

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Teradata Influencer Summit Highlights

June 4, 2015 By Leave a Comment

Herman Wimmer, Co-President kicks off the event. Herman says that the guiding priorities of Teradata are:

Key Principle #1: Analytic ecosystem: Teradata, DB, UDA, Real-time, Fabric Architecture

Key Principle #2: Big Data Technologies: Aster, Hadoop, Big Data Apps, Apps Center, Open Source Contribution and leverage

Key Principle#3: Cloud for Analytics

Key Principle #4: Enterprise Class Production Analytics, Hybrid Implementations (Pubic/ Private), Broader Market Penetration

Key Principle #5: Consulting, Big Data Consulting, Analytics Consulting, Managed Services

Key Principle #6: Future Markets: Healthcare, Government, Innovation, People, Passion….

In a digital world, where business models are changing very fast (note not everyone agrees with this or sees it) business will need real-time data to make better decisions to make the customer experience the best it can be. Companies that used to compete on selling cars are really COMPETING ON THE “experience or what it feels like to drive/ own the car.” Engineers, marketers, Customer Service Professionals can guess what is making the customer happy- DRIVING THAT CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE or they can use these technologies available to drive better business. It is not easy, but Teradata is definitely simplifying it. But it takes investment of people, process, time, and the technology and PASSION at a brand to take this conversation, strategy and tactics on and turn it into a reality. Hype doesn’t get you very far. We are out of the hype cycle and need to get down to business using data to make the best customer experiences.

My POV: Where is your company with respect to going beyond the conversations of “big data” for “big data” sake and are truly embracing the data in the business, where it can make a difference. Who should lead this? CEO’s that “get the value of data” are looking to someone in their organization to do it – CIO, CTO, CMO, Customer Service Professional to lead data revelations. And if one of those “titles” doesn’t step-up and lead or co-lead with other executives, CEOs will find and hire a Chief Digital Officers or Chief Customer Officers to make it happen. It is an opportunity, but it is not without risk. Done well, it bring huge financial rewards to the company that master it. And probably most likely help that person’s career. If you are in a position that isn’t data-centric – then it’s up to you to turn it into that.

@drnatalie, VP and Principal Analyst, Covering Marketing, Sales, Marketing and Customer Service using Big Data Analytics to Deliver Amazing Customer Experiences

 

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Coverage on First Day: Analyst Day at Lithium’s LiNC15 Conference

June 1, 2015 By Leave a Comment

Analyst Day Review of Lithium 

On this first day, we heard from not only the executives at Lithium but also customers. One study Lithium engaged in showed that while 49% executives thought that bad customer experience would drive customers away, the actual number is 89%. Perhaps the value of customer experience and customer service has finally come into it’s own. For someone who have covered this area for over 20 years, it’s great to see. One of the key issues with respect to this is that CEO’s are realizing that because customers will leave, they are expecting someone in their organization to step up to the plate and lead customer experience. Sometimes it’s the CMO, sometimes its the Customer Service Professionals, sometimes it’s the CIO and sometimes, when it’s not happening, the CEO will hire a Chief Digital Officer or Chief Experience Officer to make sure the customer experience is changing and the company will be around long-term. It’s an opportunity that someone inside a company needs to stand up and take on. But it is not without risk.

Rob Tarkoff (@rtarkoff) CEO of Lithium talked about why Lithium exits and why it’s so key to brands. The reason? Customers have extreme expectations. Buyers have forever changed and they want more, want it now and want it easy and enjoyable. Customers trust their peers; not brands. iGen doesn’t want to hear from brands; they want to hear from their peers they trust. They are ok hearing from and working with experts from brands but they prefer peers. The stats keep showing the same thing: 78% trust their peers, yet 14 trust advertising. Yet there is still a ton more money spent in advertising than customer experience. I hope that changes and soon.

Four Main Problems that Get Resolved in Branded Online Communities

Rob explained that Lithium exits to build trust between brands and people by solving 4 main problems:

  1. Helping brands with conversations happening on multiple digital channels –that many the brands don’t own or control
  2. Brands don’t know “who is who” –they need the identity of who a customer is and their passion and problems that the customer needs addressing. That’s why Klout was acquired and is integrated and it’s not just about one’s influence, but also scored by what people are passionate about
  3. Brands have found it difficult to scale to tame the beast of social media; volume of social customer care is escalating and increasing a preference as a channel – it’s no wonder – the contact center is necessary, but not where you will always get the best service
  4. Brands are wondering where the ROI of social is. Most software companies aren’t proving out the impact of social and digital transformation effectively. They are not answering where’s the ROI and the business impact. Lithium feels it is not about likes and impressions – it’s about dollars saved and dollars earned. What’s exciting is how many brands are making money—becoming a revenue engine- using online, branded communities.

More details on the study conducted:

  • 93% of brands believe they are adapting to digital disruption and transformation. But do those solutions really have scale and lasting impact? That’s what is really needed and more difficult to do without a platform.
  • 82% customer have higher expectations compared to just 3 years ago
  • 65% of brands have unbelievable expectations to innovate
  • 58% of brands feel increased competition from competitors.

So what’s the bottom-line?  Lithium feels customer experience is in the power of the platform –a platform that’s build to deal with the customer experience in the digital world. Lithium feels there are 3 parts to this:

  1. Connect on social channels
  2. Engage with branded communities
  3. Understand your most valuable prospects and customers

And customer answers questions and share experiences and brand thus can grow revenue , reduce costs and improve NPS.

What about the acquisition of Klout? Klout provides customer insights that are bases on what people say about themselves and what others say about them. What is important is the people with passion and express that online- it’s what is key to brands and brands need to prioritize customer’s expectations and experiences and the Klout product helps them to do this. Lithium has more than 700 M profiles. Brands need to get to know these folks.

Why Does Lithium Win Deals? Lithium deals with the complete set of stakeholders who participate in a company- everyone who delivers products or service and helps deliver a better overall customer experience. What this means is that customer service is the new marketing and the customer experience and vice versa. The key to creating better customer experiences is a community – peer to peer interactions where internal experts inside a company help customers; external experts (outside a company) also help a customer as well as people inside a brand. This is the total community – branded communities, social networks and third party social networks and what Lithium offers. It’s true that brands that have their own branded communities great better customer experiences.

It’s been a great first day. Looking forward to the actual conference, starting tomorrow! Look for the tweets at #LiNC15

@drnatalie, VP and Principal Analyst, Constellation Research Covering Marketing, Sales and Customer Service to Deliver Great Customer Experiences

 

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ThinkBig and Teradata Partner for Data Consulting

April 15, 2015 By Leave a Comment

With all the data and all the opportunity, it’s really necessary to have someone focus on getting most out of that data. Otherwise, as other’s have coined, you end up with a data lake – a bunch of data but not in context and not useable in providing great, continuos customer experiences. And at the end of the day, what companies need is to have the data actually to help them run their business better. So the announcement today solves some of these issues, i.e.,  Think Big, a Teradata (NYSE: TDC) company, announced the immediate expansion of its big data consulting business.

They have announced a dashboard engine to be able to have drill down capability and get to the insights using ingestion patterns and infrastructure. Think Big embraces a range of vendor-neutral, open source options and recommends the best combination to complement existing, proven technologies based on each customer’s unique business needs.

Think Big assists clients, across industries, to gain measurable business value from big data through implementation and integration of open-source technologies such as Apache™ Hadoop®, Apache Spark™, and NoSQL databases (i.e. Apache HBase™, Apache Cassandra™, and MongoDB).

“Hadoop and its fast growing ecosystem of open source projects have quickly become first-class technology assets, regardless of the organization’s size or geography,” said Rick Farnell, co-founder and senior vice president International, Think Big, a Teradata company. “Think Big’s international expansion will allow us to effectively share our expertise and support our customers. To support its growth, Think Big is aggressively recruiting talented individuals to fill a variety of positions in sales, data engineering, data science and project management.”

Will be very interesting to see how the partnership evolves and the case studies that result. Remember – send your clients to the enter into the Super Nova Awards to be considered. It’s a great honor and Constellation Research is looking for innovators who are disrupting business models and using data to do that. Especially in click-stream data.

@drnatalie

VP and Principle Analyst, Constellation Research

Covering Marketing, Sales and Customer Service to Provide Great Customer Experiences

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Live Webcast: Can Brands Keep Their Promises?

November 12, 2014 By Leave a Comment

Companies like Apple, REI, Amazon, and Zappos are known for providing exceptional customer experiences. They’ve set the standard, and yet there are still upstarts like Everlane, Birchbox, One King’s Lane, and Zulily, to name just a few that are setting new standards. Since we’re headed into the holiday high season for retailers, I thought it was only fitting to mention a line of businesses clamoring to delight you. What brands come to your mind?

What you’ll learn in our Webcast on: Can Brands Keep Their Promises? 

1. Why it’s important for brands to keep their promise
2. How organizational change is affecting the ability to deliver true transformation digital customer experiences
3. How technology must be integrated with people and process to deliver what customers expect

One of the issues is the whether the CXO level truly understands the digital disruption that is happening. The digital division between businesses that get the value of the digital transformation era and those that don’t is getting bigger and bigger. Those that do get it, will thrive in this new economy. And those that don’t, may just disappear. Many, many businesses have gone out of business for this very reason. Will you be one of them? Please join us to discuss what CXO level professions need to know to be successful in 2015.

By the way, if you were able to join us at Connected Enterprise 2014 in Half Moon Bay this year, you may have heard Bryan MacDonald or Dr. Presser speak, so this is a chance to continue the conversations.  And if you were not there, it will be a great opportunity to hear these two wonderful speakers talk about what its going to take to make a business thrive in 2015.

Here’s who will be on the panel:

Bryan MacDonald, executive recruiter & founder of The Digital Board
Dr. Janice Presser, behavioral scientist and CEO of The Gabriel Institute

and myself, Dr. Natalie Petouhoff, VP & Principal Analyst at Constellation Research

When: Thursday, November 20, 2014 @ 10:00a.m. PT / 1:00 p.m. ET

You can register to join this webcast dialogue in just 30 seconds. 

@drnatalie

Covering Marketings, Sales, Customer Service to great better customer experiences!

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Who Should Be the Digital Disruptors? Marketing, Sales, Customer Service or CEOs?

September 22, 2014 By Leave a Comment

In thinking about the value of the information companies can obtain about their customers, their products and services, etc… from structured and unstructured data, who do you think should lead this effort in an organization? Each department – Marketing, Sales, Customer Service / Contact Center professionals can all do their part, but often are not high enough in the organization to drive widespread change that is required to get the results from digital disruption. I had a really great conversation with some of the best thinkers in the world at IBM who are working on Watson and it got me to thinking more about the issue of getting companies started down this path and who really should lead it. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Do you think CEO’s or CFO’s or COO’s really understand the value that can be obtained by this data? Do they see the opportunity to use it to become a company that lives in an ecosystem where their are no other competitors, i.e., the competition is irrelevant?

Some of the best ways to take advantage of the digital disruption is to:

1. Change your business model to include using the structured and unstructured data to make better products and services and deliver better customer experiences and make a better workplace

2. Change how your functional departments work together using the structured and unstructured data so that the customer experience is not disconnected and actually becomes enjoyable and drives advocacy, loyalty and referrals — and long-term customer lifetime value

3. And in the end the data will change your business model and how your functional departments collaborate and your products and services will be get better from all this structured and unstructured data if it is turned into actionable insights so that you can create a blue ocean strategy where your company is in an uncontested marketplace where the competition is irrelevant.

But for that to happen, it has to be driven by folks who are not too low in the totem pole, but rather by those who have the positional power to really drive this digital disruption change.  And I believe, unless and until the CEO, CFO and COO change the metrics the functional departments get measured on, people will keep doing what they are doing.

Yes, there are some companies where marketing, sales and service work together; but those are the innovators and early adopters. The majority of the marketplace is the early majority and they are thinking about things the way they have always been thinking about things…

Who is going to be the instigators in this new digital disruption? Come join us at our Connected Enterprise Conference to hear how other leaders are dealing with the questions.

@drnatalie
VP and Principle Analyst, Covering Marketing, Sales and Customer Service to Drive Brilliant and Lastly Customer Experiences.

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How to Improve Customer Service by Dr. Natalie (Part 13) & Increase Revenue & Decrease Costs

December 28, 2012 By Leave a Comment

The Socially-Enabled Customer Service Increases Revenue and Reduces Costs

For the whole story on how to use the OODA Loop as a unique way to use Social Media to improve Customer Service, download the white paper here. Or read on…

I’ve been writing about many force multipliers that are currently present within Customer Service organizations using social media. Socially-enabled Customer Service can affect every aspect of your business when leveraged as a force multiplier.

There are multiple benefits from social throughout the buyer-seller relationship. It can be used to generate leads and build customer interest. It can be used in the sales and marketing process. It can be used to monitor customer satisfaction. It can be used to ensure that customers have their support issues addressed and new product functionality requested. It can help PR by helping to protect the brand. And it can be used to understand when an existing customer is influencing potential new customers.

However, if you pull the socially-enabled service aspect out, the force multiplier effect does not exist. A break in the process leaves an opportunity for social media (or the failure to use it) to broadcast your shortcomings in the relationship with your customer. It is important you understand the force multiplier advantages— starting with the Customer Service aspects of your business.

Take a note from a famous pilot, John Boyd and his OODA process and make sure to use social media to observe, orient yourself to the new information you observed, make decisions on that real-time social media data and take the actions that will forward your business, exponentially!

For the whole story on OODA Loop and How to Use Social Media For Business download the white paper here.

Learn. Share. Grow!
@DrNatalie L. Petouhoff

For more info on my work:
Ebook:Social Media ROI

Social Media ROI YouTube Videos:
Video 1: Building the Business Case for Social Media
Video 2: How to Measure the ROI of Social Media
Video 3: How Social Media Benefits the Whole Company

Book on Monetizing Facebook: Like My Stuff: How To Monetize Your Facebook Fans

Let’s Connect here:
Twitter: @drnatalie
LinkedIn: DrNataliePetouhoff
G+ : Google Plus posts

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How to Improve Customer Service by Dr. Natalie (Part 12) & Become an Agile & Customer Focused

December 21, 2012 By Leave a Comment

How Do You Know If Your Company Is Agile and Customer-Focused? For the whole story on how to use the OODA Loop as a unique way to use Social Media to improve Customer Service, download the white paper here. Or read on…  If we use the OODA Loop as our basis, here’s some questions to ask yourself and your organization:

Question 1: Do you have systems to monitor/measure what employees and customers know, think and feel about how customer service is provided and how the rest of the business operates? And do you take that information and integrate it into your company and make improvements that deliver better products, services and, in particular, better customer service?

If you think about it, this is very similar to what W. Edward Deming was suggesting when he provided business advice to companies. The fact is some companies collect feedback, but that information rarely gets to the right department or person who could make use of it. And then if it does get to the right person, there are not systems or a process to use that insight to make improvements. And even fewer companies tell customers and employees when they have taken the feedback into consideration and made the right changes. One of the most powerful things companies can do is to let customers know that they care by not only making changes, but to let customers know their voice was heard and taken seriously.

Question 2: If you do listen and act on customer/employee feedback, do you do it faster than your competitors? If you do, you’ll have a decided time advantage over their competitor.

Question 3: Are we on track? In military operations, OODA takes place in seconds. In corporations, it’s much slower. In fact, the current year’s strategy is rigidly followed till next year’s planning cycle. What companies need to consider is that with the real-time web, waiting a year to make a change is too slow. In fact, waiting a month or a week may take a customer service issue, spread by social channels, into a PR nightmare. Consider stories like United Breaks Guitars as one way that customers are fighting back against what they perceive is poor customer interactions. It’s critical to validate we’re on track or correct it. Especially in the Age of Social Business.

Question 4: Do you take feedback, fix what is not working and then repeat that process over and over?  In OODA theory, its It not just about going through the OODA loop once. It’s about seeing the OODA Loop as a continuously, on-going process. And then the result of your actions provides the observations to reorient what you decide to do next.

Most companies think of Customer Service as a cost center. But what if Customer Service was a way to preserve and generate revenue? Customers are at the boiling point. They no longer want to take what’s handed to them, especially when it comes to Customer Service. And with social media they have a way to make their voice heard. If we go back in time, people were predicting there would be a technology that would allow customers to talk to each other. And to talk back to companies online when they are dissatisfied and that everyone would be able to see that negative interaction. That prediction was written about in the book The Cluetrain Manifesto.

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