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You are here: Home / 2 - Professional Skills / b Hard Skills / Innovation / Don't Follow the Customer

Don't Follow the Customer

July 30, 2009 by Matt Perman

Good companies should be close to the customer and fanatical about customer service. But this doesn’t mean that they should let the customer lead. Joseph Morone, President of Bentley College, notes that if you only follow the voice of the customer, “you’ll get only incremental advances.”

Doug Atkin, a partner at Merkley Newman Harty, rightly puts it this way:

These days, you can’t succeed as a company if you’re consumer-led — because, in a world so full of so much constant change, consumers can’t anticipate the next big thing. Companies should be idea-led and consumer-informed.” (Quoted in Re-Imagine!: Business Excellence in a Disruptive Age, 297).

That is an excellent insight:

Be consumer-informed, but idea-led.

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What’s Best Next exists to help you achieve greater impact with your time and energy — and in a gospel-centered way.

We help you do work that changes the world. We believe this is possible when you reflect the gospel in your work. So here you’ll find resources and training to help you lead, create, and get things done. To do work that matters, and do it better — for the glory of God and flourishing of society.

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About Matt Perman

Matt Perman started What’s Best Next in 2008 as a blog on God-centered productivity. It has now become an organization dedicated to helping you do work that matters.

Matt is the author of What’s Best Next: How the Gospel Transforms the Way You Get Things Done and a frequent speaker on leadership and productivity from a gospel-driven perspective. He has led the website teams at Desiring God and Made to Flourish, and is now director of career development at The King’s College NYC. He lives in Manhattan.

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