>>>I would just like to add a farthing's worth in relation to IBM. Big
Blue's original mission was to maximize market share in the "big iron"
computer business. When it redefined itself in terms of meeting
*customers'* business needs instead of its own, it turned itself around.
I'd suggest applying the same thinking - whatever the sales force is
"selling", it should be trained to spot customer needs and feed back that
information to the product development, marketing and engineering parts of
the company. What they're selling may not be the best way for them to tap
into what the customer wants, ....<<<<
Being in the Human Services, I think that this is a mistake that we almost
always make....thinking that we, as professionals, know what is best for
the customer. Doctors think their patients want a cure when what they
really want is to be listened to. Malpractice litigation research
validates this notion. Do teachers listen to what their students want to
learn or do they teach what is imposed on them by the State Education
Department mandated curriculum that says that this is what 10th graders
are supposed to learn? As a therapist do I believe that all patients
should have psychoanalysis because that is what I am trained to do, when
really what the patient may need and want is marriage counseling?
The professions have historically had a we know best attitude toward their
customers. As one wag said, "When the only tool in your tool kit is a
hammer, everything starts looking like a nail." This attitude can makes a
lot of money for the self serving professional or the monopolistic
business. However, when competition comes in and customers have choices,
they get to control the market and some arrogant providers will go out of
business if they cannot adapt.
Educational reform cannot happen in this country in my opinion unless
parents and students have choices of educational provider. Deficit funded
public education is a monopoly. Is it any wonder the NEA does not want any
competition and fights voucher and other consumer choice plans?
I don't mean to divert this discussion into politics and yet I agree that
in all sectors whether public or private, profit or nonprofit, for the
most part the customer should be king and queen. And sales people and
customer service people have a pivotal role to play in the needs
assessment and product development area. Unfortunately in human services
the customer most often is not funding the service and therefore does not
call the shots and often is a captive audience. The provider then is
responding to the colonial masters who have decided what is best for whom
and how it should be done to them and exempt themselves from their own
bidding, as the Clinton's did when they sent Chelsea to a private school,
and have their private doctors and don't go to the clinic, and hire their
own attorneys and would never use a public defender. They don't even have
to follow the airline schedule if they want a haircut.
-- David Markham DavidM1225@aol.com