Category: Recommended Reading | Page 8

June 26, 2014 / Book Reviews

Book Review | Design Thinking for Strategic Innovation

Design Thinking for Strategic Innovation: What They Can’t Teach You at Business or Design School
By Idris Mootee

Head: (5 out of 5)
Heart: (3 out of 5)
Leadership Applicability: (5 out of 5)

Executives today will agree that the complexities of doing business have grown exponentially. Our global world is smaller due to technology that connects us all at the speed of light, driving customer expectations high. The world’s population consumes natural resources faster than we can replace them, if at all. Competition in the market is fierce. Despite all this, most executives have been operating with an outdated management model, one designed for an outdated world. That’s why this book is a timely and important read for leaders.

Design thinking can be used to make sense of all of this complexity. It connects the dots and drives innovation by allowing us to experiment in the midst of chaos and complexity. Creative solutions can emerge for complex problems.

This book, written by management guru Idris Mootee, defines design thinking and introduces readers to the applications of it. As a framework, the author links the application of design thinking tools to eight key challenges most businesses encounter: growth, predictability, change, relevance, extreme competition, standardization, creative culture and strategy and organization. Each chapter offers tips and thinking points.

Executives interested in a guide for applying design thinking will want to read this book. Buy it now.

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June 26th, 2014|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: book review, customer experience, design thinking, IDEO, idris mootee, innovation, Mariposa Leadership|

May 29, 2014 / Articles We Like

On: "Use 'Design Thinking' to Reach Customers"

Would you rather: chase market share to grab revenue – at any cost – or offer value to your customers which returns respectable margins? If profit margins are important, this article by Andrew King and Jeanne Liedtka will resonate with you. Many businesses today get stuck in a rut because they can’t think outside the box about reaching their customers and adding value to their lives. This article shares an example of how design thinking can infuse fresh thinking into ongoing business challenges.

The Washington Post article “Use ‘Design Thinking’ to Reach Customers” highlights how Intuit used design thinking to turn ideas into innovation.

Read it now.

What business successes have you had with design thinking?

Comment below! Or pose a question via Ask Mariposa.

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May 29th, 2014|Categories: Articles We Like|Tags: customer experience, design thinking, innovation, Jeanne Liedtka|

/ Book Reviews

Book Review | The Necessity of Strangers

The Necessity of Strangers: The Intriguing Truth of Insight, Innovation and Success

By: Dr. Alan Gregerman

Head: (3 out of 5)
Heart: (4 out of 5)
Leadership Applicability: (5 out of 5)

Growing up, many of us were told not to talk to strangers. We were taught to fear or avoid people we didn’t know. Early on, we were conditioned to believe people who were different than we were could pose a threat to our beliefs, knowledge and habits by taking us out of our comfort zone. The author of this book, Dr. Alan Gregerman, proposes a counterintuitive challenge to this conditioning.

Strangers, Dr. Gregerman contends, should be seen as an opportunity, not a threat. They – not the people we know and are familiar with – are the key to our success. Strangers are a necessity because of their differences, what they know that we don’t know, and their objectivity and ability to be honest about what matters. This challenges us to think differently about ourselves, our problems and to see more possibilities. Learning from strangers, and engaging and collaborating with people different from us enable us to find breakthroughs, delight customers, grow businesses and lead the life we were meant to.

Some of the concepts explored in this book include:

How to develop a stranger-centric mindset
How strangers can offer fresh insights that lead to innovation
How to leverage the differences of strangers, while bringing out the best of ourselves to collaborate and become more effective leaders
How connecting with and learning from the right strangers can help a business grow
Practical tools to use right away to unlock the potential of strangers

Leaders interested in pursuing consumer-led innovation strategies to deliver more value to their customers will want to read this book. Buy it now.

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May 29th, 2014|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: alan gregerman, customer experience, innovation|

April 29, 2014 / Book Reviews

Article Review | 2014: A Time to Revisit the Five C’s of Loyalty!

2014: A Time to Revisit the Five C’s of Loyalty

By: Mark Johnson, CEO and CMO of Loyalty 360

Head: (5 out of 5)
Heart: (2 out of 5)
Leadership Applicability: (3 out of 5)

In this article, written by our May Wise Talk guest, Mark Johnson, CEO and CMO of Loyalty 360, Mark reflects on the drivers of Loyalty that brands need to pay attention to. The “Five C’s of Loyalty” (content, community, collaboration, commitment, and commerce) are simple in concept, yet given the complexities in understanding today’s customer combined with an increasing complex marketing ecosphere, can be challenging to implement.

For each “C”, Mark lays out the associated challenges brands face and offers new thinking on each concept. For Content, readers learn many definitions exist thus muddying what used to be a clear path. Community implies a need to create unique messages for every potential customer, but Mark contends this is not always possible. For Collaboration, he foresees paradigm shifts that need to happen in order to strengthen relationships with customers. Commitment is about leadership, the tension inherent in long term vs. short term thinking and what really works to drive loyalty.

Leaders interested in new thinking on the discipline of customer loyalty should read this article. Read it now.

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April 29th, 2014|Categories: Book Reviews|

/ Articles We Like

How to Know When It's Time to Quit Your Job

Have you been craving a change in your professional life?

If so, sometimes the best way is to take a drastic step…and resign from your job.

But how do you know when it’s time?

The answer is different for everyone, certainly, and it depends on your personal situation. For financial or other reasons, you may need to secure a new position before tendering your resignation.

And, there are some common themes that can indicate that it is time to dust off that résumé, pack up, and move on.

A clue as to where to start: look at your top three to five values—are they being honored? Click here to read more.

About the author:

Merideth Mehlberg is a Strategic Partner with Mariposa Leadership, Inc. and the Principal at Merideth Mehlberg International LLC. For more posts by Merideth, visit her blog.

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April 29th, 2014|Categories: Articles We Like|

April 25, 2014 / Articles We Like

On: Beyond Customer Loyalty Programs – 7 Ways to Build Lasting Relationships

Are companies approaching customer loyalty in the wrong way? Article author, Mikkel Svane, founder and CEO of Zendesk, seems to think so. Programs – like buy ten, get one free – make it difficult to discern if a customer is drawn to the free item, or is truly loyal to your product. So what does it really take to drive loyalty?

In the Fast Company article, “Beyond Customer Loyalty Programs – 7 Ways to Build Lasting Relationships”, Mikkel contends establishing a human connection and developing empathy lies at the heart of customer loyalty. He outlines seven fundamental principles companies should adopt, which are based on how relationships work and are built.

Read it now.

How does your company build lasting relationships with customers?

Comment below! Or pose a question via Ask Mariposa.

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April 25th, 2014|Categories: Articles We Like|Tags: business, customer experience, customer loyalty, customer relationships, Fast Company, loyalty programs, Mariposa Leadership, zendesk|

March 31, 2014 / Articles We Like

On: ‘Customer Experience’ is Today’s Business Benchmark

The latest business trend is a focus on the ‘customer experience’, and with good reason. Evidence exists that companies with the highest customer experience typically grow at more than double the rate of their competitors. We share the Forbes article, ‘Customer Experience’ is Today’s Business Benchmark, by Martin Zwilling because it offers a clear definition of and tips for improving and measuring your company’s customer experience. Measurement is key because without it, companies can focus on the wrong things which detract from growth.

Read it now.

How do you measure customer loyalty?

Comment below! Or pose a question via Ask Mariposa.

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March 31st, 2014|Categories: Articles We Like|Tags: customer experience, customer loyalty, Forbes|

March 28, 2014 / Book Reviews

Book Review | Interviewing Users

Interviewing Users: How to Uncover Compelling Insights
By: Steve Portigal

Head: (3 out of 5)
Heart: (4 out of 5)
Leadership Applicability: (4 out of 5)

In the innovation race, companies that gather insights from their customers and end users to inform the design of products and services are sure to beat the competition. But gathering quality information that yields insights is not as simple as chatting with a customer over a cup of coffee. Conducting a user research study is a skill, and the author, Steve Portigal, explains how to successfully plan and execute one so that the data yields insights which are compelling and actionable.

In this easy-to-digest book, readers will learn best practices for studying people, including:

Why interviewing over other methods yields rich insights
A framework for interviewing
How to identify a problem, find participants and prepare questions
Methods to enhance your interviews
How to manage the stages of an interview
The art of asking questions
How to document data
Interview variations and techniques to manage them
Bringing the data back to your organization

Leaders who want to do a better job of making products or designing services for their customers will want to read this book. Buy it now.

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March 28th, 2014|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: consumer research, customer experience, customer research, innovation, Mariposa Leadership, product design, service design, steve portigal|

February 28, 2014 / Book Reviews

Book Review | Customers Included: How to Transform Products, Companies, and the World – With a Single Step

Customers Included: How to Transform Products, Companies, and the World – With a Single Step
By Mark Hurst and Phil Terry

Head: (4 out of 5)
Heart: (3 out of 5)
Leadership Applicability: (5 out of 5)

The book’s title, Customers Included, states the obvious: a customer-inclusive approach to innovation is essential to improving the odds of success. While many companies aspire to become customer-centric, others fail to include customers altogether, due to beliefs about the role of customers in innovation, a lack of time, or know how, among others.

Though the process of including customers is challenging, authors Mark Hurst and Phil Terry, pioneers in the field of customer experience, aim to change that with easy-to-read content organized around the three basic steps for including them:

Observe customers directly.
Discover customers’ key unmet needs.
Build consensus across the organization to meet those needs.

Peppered with real stories of product failures to illustrate key points associated with omitting customers from innovation (and product successes due to including them), the authors provide practical tips for a strategic, customer-inclusive approach to innovation.

Leaders who want to create a better product, service or experience for their customers – whether or not the customer is a shopper, a user, a student, a patient, a citizen, an employee – will want to read this book. Buy it now.

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February 28th, 2014|Categories: Book Reviews|Tags: customer experience, customers included, innovation, Mariposa Leadership, product development|

February 27, 2014 / Articles We Like

On: "Eight Essentials for Scaling Up Without Screwing Up"

From product development to HR, do you know of a leader that isn’t trying to identify and spread excellence within their organizations? We don’t (everyone is!), and that’s why this article by Robert I. Sutton resonates with us.

Meeting – and exceeding – customer needs is a top priority for most executives interested in building a customer-focused organization. Yet success requires scaling up the key beliefs, skills and actions that demonstrate excellence. This is no easy feat and if not managed well, can be a barrier to any corporate initiative, not just those that are customer-focused. The Harvard Business Review article, Eight Essentials for Scaling Up Without Screwing Up, is based on extensive research and outlines the key principles and actions for effective scaling.

Read it now.

What barriers do you encounter when trying to scale up?

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February 27th, 2014|Categories: Articles We Like|Tags: customer focus, HBR, product development, robert sutton, scaling|