1. What have you done for your customer lately?
Presented by:
Susan Phillips Bari 1

2.
Participant
Workbook
Facilitator’s
Guide 2

3. Peter F. Drucker – The Father of Modern Management
Central to his philosophy is the view that PEOPLE are an organization’s MOST VALUABLE resource
and a manager’s job is to PREPARE and FREE people to perform.
(1909 – 2005) 3

4. The Social Sector
“It is not business, it is not government, it is the social sector that may yet save society.”
- Peter Drucker 4

5. Why Ask the Five Questions?
Appraise performance, anticipate change, and set direction.
Create a learning organization that values and fosters leadership development.
Manage limited resources
Strengthen strategic planning
Encourage constructive dissent
Validate assumptions against actual customer values, and
Learn to say “no”

6. Who Can Use the Five Questions?
The Five Questions can be used by all sectors, during any organizational phase: strategic planning, start-up, growth, etc.
Social Sector
Private sector
Public Sector

7. The Self Assessment Tool is used to:
Deepen understanding of the mission.
Conduct organization-wide strategic planning.
Purposely, listen to the customer.
Define results.
Clarify organizational goals.
Plan to achieve results. 7

8. Planning Process 8 PLANS INCLUDE:
MISSION
Why you do what you do; the organization’s reason for being, its purpose. Says what, in the end, you would like to be remembered for.
VISION
The vision statement envisions a future when the organization’s goals have been achieved.
A vision of desired results provides the framework for “measuring the right things.”
Knowing where we want to go tomorrow frames what we must do today.
A vision:
Outlines what the organization wants to be.
It concentrates on the future.
It is a source of inspiration.
It provides clear decision-making criteria.
GOALS
A set of three to five aims that set the organization’s fundamental, long-range direction.
Goals make it clear where an organization will concentrate resources for results.
Goals flow from mission, set the organization’s direction, build on strength, address opportunity, and outline an organization’s desired future Participant Workbook, p. 53.
OBJECTIVES
Specific and measurable levels of achievement that move an organization towards its goals.
ACTION STEPS
Detailed plans and activities directed toward meeting an organization’s objectives.
Establish accountability for objectives – who will do what by when.
Drucker states:
Action steps are developed by the people who will carry them out – everyone with a role has the opportunity to provide input.
The above helps: it seems slow, but when the plan is completed everyone understands it; more people will embrace change, are committed, ready to act.
BUDGET
The commitment of resources necessary to implement plans—the financial expression of a particular plan of work. 8

9. The Five Questions: What is our mission? Who is our customer?
What does the customer value?
What are our results?
What is our plan?
As an overview – the 5 Questions are?
We will focus on two today: Who is our customer? And What does the customer value?
You have to become accustomed to Drucker’s terminology and accept his definitions to get the most out of the process.

10. WHAT IS OUR MISSION? The FIVE Questions 10
We will briefly discuss mission so that you can understand the link between mission and the customer. I recently worked with the board of an association, the Airport Minority Advisory Council….
MISSION
Why you do what you do; the organization’s reason for being, its purpose. Says what, in the end, you would like to be remembered for.
Why is mission important?
THE MISSION KEEPS LEADERS FOCUSED ON PROGRAMS AND ACTIVITIES THAT LEAD TO RESULTS . . .
which are measured in the form of the changed life of the customer.
WHAT IS OUR MISSION? 10

11. Mission Defined
Mission: Why we do what we do; the organization’s reason for being, its purpose. Says what, in the end, you want to be remembered for.

12. Drucker on Mission
“The effective mission statement is short and sharply focused. It should fit on a T-shirt. The mission says why you do what you do, not the means by which you do it.”
- Peter Drucker, p. 14
So if we use my example from AMAC, the organization went from a two paragraph description of its activities to a single sentence: 12

13. Leader to Leader Institute
Mission Statement
Leader to Leader Institute
“Should fit on a t-shirt”
To Strengthen the
Leadership of the
Social Sector

14. To promote the full participation of minority-owned, women-owned,
Some require an XXL….
To promote the full participation
of minority-owned, women-owned,
and disadvantaged
business enterprises
(DBEs)
in airport contracts
and employment
opportunities.

15. Your Mission Defines Your Purpose
Why the organization exists.
What the organization would like to be remembered for.
Not prescriptive; not ‘How.’

16. Inspires Powerful. Compelling. Motivating.
Red Cross: To help the most vulnerable.

17. 2. WHO IS OUR CUSTOMER? The FIVE Questions Discussion:
Q: Why is the customer at the heart of Drucker’s Five Questions?
Points might include:
Who must be satisfied for the organization to achieve results?
Results are measured outside the organization in the form of how the organization changes the life of the customer.
But, who the customer is changes, as well as what the customer values.
Q: In what ways are customers changing in today’s economic environment?
Globalization is affecting who the customer is. Can anyone relate examples?
Might refer to Author’s work “Customers at the bottom of the Pyramid.”
Big change in banking industry, consumer credit, home loans, etc.
Organizations must anticipate how the customer is changing in order to impact the customers life.
Drucker says, “Change outside is an opportunity” for organizations to:
Reach new performance standards.
Achieve excellence.
Innovate. Managing the Nonprofit Organization. P. 67
2. WHO IS OUR CUSTOMER? 17

18. The customer is the heart of the matter for Drucker.
The Customer Is Key
The customer is the heart of the matter for Drucker.

19. Drucker on Customer
“Who must be satisfied for the organization to achieve results?”
“When you answer this question, you define your customer as one who values your service who wants what you offer, who feels it’s important to them.”
Peter Drucker

20. Customer Defined
Customer: The one who must be satisfied for the organization to achieve results.
Primary Customer: is the person whose life is changed through the organization’s work.
Supporting Customers: individuals and groups who, in addition to the primary customer, must be satisfied for the organization to achieve results.
So if I go back to my trade association model, the customer is the minority, woman or disadvantaged business owner. They are the primary customers. The airports and prime contractors that provide opportunity and support the organization through dues and sponsorships is a supporting customer. At the AMAC board meeting where this self assessment was conducted, the corporations were pleased to view themselves as “enablers”.

21. Customers Change
“Customers are never static. They will become more diverse. Their needs, wants, and aspirations will evolve.”
- Peter Drucker
You might not catch innovations if you are not paying attention to this. External factors change everything. The economy? New diseases – pandemics, epidemics. The impact of societal and political change on individuals… 21

22. Customers Change (Cont’d)
“There may be entirely new customers you must satisfy to achieve results—individuals who really need the service, want the service, but not in the way in which it is available today.”
- Peter Drucker
You might not catch innovations if you are not paying attention to this. 22

23. There is no budget large enough to be all things to all people…
According to marketing guru Seth Godin…
Marketers rarely think about choosing customers... like a sailor on shore leave, we're not so picky. Huge mistake.
Your customers define what you make, how you make it, where you sell it, what you charge, who you hire and even how you fund your organization. If your customer base changes over time but you fail to make changes in the rest of your organization, stress and failure will follow.

24. Choose your customers wisely
When you find great customers, they will eagerly co-create with you. They will engage and invent and spread the word.
It takes vision and guts to turn someone down and focus on a different segment, on people who might be more difficult to sell at first, but will lead you where you want to go over time.
Seth Godin

25. 3. WHAT DOES THE CUSTOMER VALUE?
The FIVE Questions
Once an organization has identified its customers, it is critical for it to understand what the customers value. Why?
A DIRECT RELATIONSHIP EXISTS BETWEEN WHAT THE CUSTOMER VALUES AND RESULTS.
Results must measure the impact the organization has on the life of the customer.
Drucker said “You cannot arrive at the right definition of results without significant input from your customers.” Monograph, p. 3.
Failure to recognize this point damages the organization leading to misallocation of resources and unsatisfied customers.
Inside what the customer values lies the organization’s opportunities to profoundly impact lives.
3. WHAT DOES THE CUSTOMER VALUE? 25

26. Drucker on Customer Value
“You cannot arrive at the right definition of results without significant input from your customers.”
- Peter Drucker
Story about Virginia Tech International Business Program. What does the customer value?

27. Value Defined Value: that which satisfies a customer’s:
Needs (physical and psychological well-being).
Wants (where, when, and how service is provided).
Aspirations (desired long-term results).
In the case of the students at Virginia Tech, their long term aspirations are to find meaningful work associated with their field of study. The assumption made by those of us on the committee, even before Tom Friedman wrote The World is Flat, was that the globalization of the business world would require changes to the curriculum and a concentration in global business. There was great resistance from the faculty. ….We went to the “customer” of our graduating business students, businesses in the State of Virginia and asked them what they valued in our graduates and what changes they would like to see.

28. Kouzes on Value
“Clearly customers value an organization that seeks their feedback and that is capable of solving their problems and meeting their needs.. . .”
- James Kouzes
Leadership should go directly to the customer and ask them what is of value based on their perspective. 28

29. Kouzes onValue
“But I would also venture to guess that customers value a leader and a team who have the ability to listen and the courage to challenge the ‘business-as-usual- environment.’”
- James Kouzes
Leadership should go directly to the customer and ask them what is of value based on their perspective. 29

30. What Does Our Customer Value?
So how do you find out what the customer values?
Ask.

31. Opportunities Mission
Competence
Commitment
What does the customer value? may be the most important question. Yet it is the one least often asked. People are so convinced they are doing the right things and so committed to their cause that they come to see the institution as an end in itself. But that’s a bureaucracy. Instead of asking, ‘Does it deliver value to our customers?’ they ask, ‘Does it fit our rules?’ And that not only inhibits performance but also destroys vision and dedication.”
- Peter Drucker
Once you

32. Methods for Understanding What Customers Value
Collect/analyze customer information.
Gather customer feedback (program evaluations).
Conduct customer research:
Pre-post program questionnaires.
One-on-one interviews.
On-line surveys.
Focus groups
Virginia Tech survey of Virginia businesses:

33. Has Your Customer Changed?
How?
Richer or poorer
Downsized – upsized
Older
Younger
Education level
Access to Services -local
New Customers?
Global
Remote Access to Services

34. What People Want
The same thing everyone else is having, but different.
A menu where the prices aren't all the same.
More attention than the person sitting next to them.
A slightly lower price than anyone else.
A new model, just moments before anyone else, but only if everyone else is really going to like it.
A seat at a sold out movie.
Access to the best customer service person in the shop, preferably the owner.
Being treated better, but not too much better.
Being noticed, but not too noticed.
Being right.

35. A Closing Word from Peter Drucker
“We have to have discipline rooted in our mission. We have to manage our limited resources of people and money for maximum effectiveness. And we have to think through very clearly what results are for our organization .”
- Peter Drucker

36. Susan Phillips Bari Contact me: susanbari@thesusanbaricompany.com
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