Without customers, businesses could not succeed. The term “customer centric” has, therefore, become
synonymous with proactive business strategy worldwide. Primarily due to advances in technology, we are
experiencing a fundamental shift in marketing – from a previous focus on companies to a spotlight on
consumers. This gives customers a much stronger voice in both the business-to-business (B2B) and
business-to-consumer (B2C) markets.
This core reading discusses how customer centricity fits into an organization in three ways:
As part of a knowledge management system (understanding the customer);
As part of developing strategic competence as a learning organization (building a customer-centric
culture); and as a foundation for corporate strategy development and execution (serving the customer).