Customer-centric thinking begins first with the customer and then moves, ultimately, to the assets and core competencies. Customer-centric thinking focuses on the customers’ needs and priorities and identifies options through which these needs and priorities can be met in the best way possible.

“The single biggest problem in business is staying with your previously successful business model . . . one year too long.”

(“Where will I be allowed to make a profit?”)

The first step for any business leader is to ask the crucial questions: • How does profitability happen in my business today? • How will it happen in the foreseeable future?

• Who will be my most valuable customers? • How will their critical priorities evolve? • How must I reinvent my business design to take advantage of the new paths to profitable customer-centric growth?

No-profit zones come in various forms. They can be a part of the value chain (e.g., distribution in computing); they can be a customer segment (e.g., the Medicaid segment in healthcare, or the grocery segment in carbonated beverages); they can be an entire industry (e.g., environmental remediation); they can be individual customers (e.g., Wal-Mart

Continuous customer interaction yields real-time insight and a glimpse into tomorrow.

In some businesses, there are several components of the production and selling system, and each component has radically different profit characteristics. Failure to maximize participation in the highest-profit components depresses the profitability of the entire system. On the other hand, full participation in the less profitable components is requ

key driver will be customer relevance, rather than a focus on what a company knows how to do. If a skill is relevant to the customer and is not currently offered, the company must develop it, or hire it, or acquire it, or license it, or find a business partner who will provide it.