Getting it right is not easy; our benchmark research shows that more than one-quarter of organizations have more than 10 sources of product information that they must integrate and manage efficiently.
Viewing data as an asset implies there are benefits to taking a supply chain approach to data management.
Data without the analytics is, well, just data. Analytics without the volume and variety means leaving insights on the table.
To paraphrase Thomas Nagel’s famous 1974 paper on consciousness, “What is it like to be a bat?”, I want to instead ask the question, “What is it like to be a customer?”
I know I’m going to hate myself in the morning…
The bigness of your data is likely not its most important characteristic. In fact, it probably doesn’t even rank among the Top 3 most important
One thing I do know is that like everything else, management has gotten more complex. First there’s the product technology, and then there’s the infrastructure technology. What we make has gotten more complex (computer controlled, fuel-injected engines, anyone, or microwave ovens?) and the information technology we use to keep track of our operations has gotten more complex as well. And now with more remote and telecommuting employees, basic supervision hasn’t gotten any easier either.
For the B2C business of the future, catering broadly to the middle class consumer, there will be nowhere to hide. Such a business will have to compete on all three Value Disciplines simultaneously: Customer intimacy, Low-cost producer, and Innovation. Or, perhaps not so much the single “business”, but the entire supply chain / value chain…
The promise of digital manufacturing is drawing closer to fulfillment as many of its separate components simultaneously evolve and mature. It’s not just about CAD/CAM or PLM any longer but now includes innovations in 3D printing, robotics, M2M sensor data and 3D simulation.
When did “customer centric” first become the clichéd buzzword it has turned into today?
Fifteen years ago, perhaps? “We’re CUSTOMER CENTRIC!” “The customer is always right; We put the customer first!” Yeah, yeah, yeah, blah, blah, blah … And then they trot out their customer-centric diagrams, typically something circular /radial with the CUSTOMER in the bulls-eye, depicted visually either as encircled like the Siege of Stalingrad, or else as being attacked like a parasite by assorted organizational macrophages. Over time these representations evolved into a pyramid structure, with the customer either at the BASE, purportedly demonstrating how everything at this organization emanates from the customer, or at the APEX, showing the customer as the ultimate goal of the organization’s functions and activities.