Sometimes there are instances which one is reminded of suddenly out of the blue. More than often it usually is about something embarrassing, or something which you were never able to figure out at that time.
A few years back, just before I was going to join IMT, I had the opportunity to head over to Hyderabad for a school re-union. While there, I met a few old teachers, some people whom I really look up to even now. Well, I was all gung-ho about my work experience, and after a few pleasantries were exchanged, I launched into the work which I had done for the past few months. Very soon, I had lost them, and their interest was evidently somewhere else. At that time, I never could figure out why my teachers would not be interested in my work. I was there, showing off my new found presentation making skills, and business acumen, but no one seemed to be interested.
Cut to a few days back, and I had accompanied my mom to a bank nearby. Now this bank has the best policies which they offer to their customer base. And evidently, I thought that with such rates, I could also start banking at the same bank. But a thing which I was not able to figure out was why there were hardly any customers at the bank. Well, I soon found out the reason why.
These two experiences actually made me realise one of the most fundamental lessons learnt at B - School, and the one which needs to be absorbed by every professional --- Know thy Customer; or in B school parlance, Know the Target Group.
While at the bank, the manager and the employees servicing the client, were not aware of the background of the customer, my mom in this case. They had basically never bothered to know the potential of my mom in terms of financial worth. Hence, this led to an ordinary, rather a dismal customer service, and that alienated not only her, but a future customer as well. We had learned about a concept called the Moment of truth at B-school, and trust me, the principle became much more clearer to me that day.
On a similar note, at my school, I had not really understood that for every message communicated there has to be a target group. The group of teachers to whom I was talking about the latest Pre-Sales solutions in the market, was evidently not the right group. And the fault was clearly mine. I should have understood what my audience reacted to, what was their need, and then talked about the appropriate things.
Hence, in both the circumstances, knowing one's target group, or customer, would have actually helped in meaningful dialogue, where everyone would have been in a win-win situation.
I intend to put into practice this lesson ASAP, and I hope that these lessons and many more like these make me learn further.
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