Seeing through the Eyes of Your Customer

Having just finished my new book about Mercedes-Benz and given that I recently spent time with Mercedes-Benz dealers at their annual conference in Las Vegas, I took the liberty of modifying a popular children’s logic puzzle by inserting a Mercedes-Benz E class.  Can you solve this puzzle in 20 seconds?  What parking lot number is under the Mercedes-Benz?

Of course the answer is: ________________

If for some reason that answer isn’t obvious, you must not have turned the puzzle upside down.  Had you done that, the correct answer becomes abundantly clear.

The puzzle, like so many of its kind, requires a simple shift of perspective.  The same type of flip that makes the number 87 pop is esential to achieve sustained success in today’s customer-driven world.  Too often we look at our businesses from our side of the counter and not through the eyes of our customer.  It is through strategies like the “Customer Walk” at Starbucks (baristas take turns during each shift to walk from the parking lot looking at the experience from the customer’s vantage point) that businesses help their people develop a core competency around seeing customer pain points and creating solutions to produce customer delight.  What are you doing to flip perspective and see your business from your customer’s point of view?