brandeins september
the german readers might know the “brandeins magazin”, a very interesting format that is published once a month. this month (09.2008) the main topic is (human) performance; how to gain good performance, how to measure it and how to compensate it.
Wolf Lotter wrote a very interesting article on performance vs. drudge, you can find it in the new brandeins magazin or online.
currently i am working for adidas in “marketing IT innovations”, a sub department of CC marketing IT. as the name already states: our goal is to provide the company with innovations from an IT perspective. for example: RFID, web 2.0 technology, 3D visuals of our products and so on.
we have the privilege to play with ideas and to come up with new stuff. but we face serious opposition when implementing those nice gimmix and technologies. people refuse to work together with us because they see their work in dager, see work coming or just do not understand what we are doing. the last reason is actually the most dangerous but the most common one. new technology is complicated and often it is a hard job even for techies to understand, business people dont understand jack.
but the business people are the customer and the customer is the one who pays your bill. the way it works in the real world it works at adidas too. so, what to do if the customer does not understand what you try to sell him but you know he will profit or even need it? force him to happyness? i discovered that it is important to take a step back. sounds easy but is really hard. step back, get the whole picture and start all over again explaining. make sure the customer understands and sees the advantages.
customers tend to just see the disadvantages and do not concentrate on improvements than on possible setbacks. understand their needs and doubts. ensure them to take away the brunt of work they are bearing. and they will start listening. and after a while they will start to understand the basics. this might take a time, but they will. they will never understand everything but they dont need to and sometimes shouldnt. but they will start trusting – and this is the most important step. because from that moment the customer allows you to work much more flexible, he will bolster you and on top he will give you money.
the problems we face in adidas are the same problems companies face in the market. companies that do not listen to customers and force them to accept the product (even they are good an innovative) get into serious troubles. companies have to get customers in the same boat, talk to them and grow with them.
microsoft, ebay, google are just that popular because they understand the customers and permanently adopt and reinvent themselves – together with the customer. i am sure they have tons of innovative ideas for new products – they just wait for the customer to be ready to invest. as we do at adidas.
stay tuned – but most of all stay flexible!
hello out there,
its been quite some time since i had a blog on danielputz.de. i hope some of you still remember.
well, because I will move to asia for the following four month and because it will be hard to keep everyone in the loop on what is going on in my life, i decided to open a new blog. most articles will deal with asia, the places i discover and the impressions i gather. some articles will be about eMarketing and maybe i will even write something about myself…
stay tuned – tgifriday
Blog Bed
