Splitting hairs to stay friends for longer

It’s now the end of January and we’re well and truly into the year even if I personally (and many others based on some informal conversations I have had) am still waiting for final confirmation of my objectives for 2013. I’ve spent a fair amount of this month looking at the Virtual Sales Kick Off (VSKO) videos from the different business units in our company. We are renowned in the market place for being a highly customer centric organization especially compared to the likes of other technology firms such as Oracle or NetApp, and this theme is reiterated in virtually every recording. To this end, I think our customer support organization is indeed living up to that billing. However when I reflect on the other parts of the organization, I start to feel the need to draw a fine line between being client focused and being focused on a specific client opportunity. Admittedly both are better than some other places I have seen that are only focused on increasing the number of bodies that are employed by any given client regardless of the bigger picture or final outcome, but I still think that customer centric or focused means that you should be trying to understand who the client is, and the specific challenges they are facing in their industry at that particular point in time. That is a wider topic that just working every hour God sends to complete a comprehensive response to a potentially lucrative RFP that was released four weeks earlier. I don’t necessarily say that one is inherently more profitable than the other – there is a lot to be said for a strong sales-driven culture. However I can’t help but think that one approach gives rise to stronger more sustainable and longer term relationships.