Thinking Outside the Fish?

As an Outside-the-Box Leader, contribution towards Profitability and Long-term Growth is brought about in several unique value propositions to an organization due to a Vision on Customer Success and Operations Excellence. Here are some keys for you to take away that have been a part of my success in automotive parts manufacturing industry for the past 20 years:

1. Innovative Solutions: These leaders often have a knack for thinking creatively and devising innovative solutions to longstanding problems. They can introduce new processes, technologies, or strategies that drive operational excellence and enhance customer success.

2. Fresh Perspective: Outside-the-box leaders offer a fresh perspective on challenges and opportunities. They can see issues that may have been overlooked internally and bring novel ideas to the table.

3. Change Management: Implementing operational improvements and ensuring customer success often requires organizational change. Outside-the-box leaders excel at change management, helping employees adapt to new ways of working and fostering a culture of continuous improvement.

4. Risk-Taking: They are more willing to take calculated risks. While ensuring customer satisfaction and operational excellence, they may be open to trying unconventional approaches that can lead to breakthrough results.

5. Customer-Centric Focus: Outside-the-box leaders understand the importance of a customer-centric approach. They can guide the organization in better understanding customer needs, enhancing the customer experience, and driving customer loyalty.

6. Adaptability: These leaders are often adaptable and quick to respond to changing market dynamics. They can help the organization pivot when necessary, ensuring that operations remain efficient and customer needs are met even in turbulent times.

7. Cross-Functional Collaboration: They excel in bringing together teams from different parts of the organization to work collaboratively on common goals. This can be particularly valuable for initiatives that require input and cooperation from various departments.

8. Strategic Thinking: Outside-the-box leaders tend to be strategic thinkers who can align customer success and operational excellence efforts with the overall strategic goals of the organization. They ensure that initiatives have a clear purpose and contribute to the organization's success.

9. Data-Driven Decision-Making: They leverage data and analytics to inform decisions and drive improvements. This can result in more informed strategies for both customer success and operations.

10. Continuous Learning: These leaders often promote a culture of continuous learning and experimentation within the organization, encouraging employees to seek new knowledge, skills, and approaches that can contribute to excellence in customer service and operations.

11. Customer Feedback: They actively seek and act upon customer feedback, using it as a valuable resource for making improvements and adjustments to operations and customer success strategies.

In summary, outside-the-box leaders can inject innovation, fresh perspectives, and effective change management into an organization's approach to customer success and operations excellence, ultimately driving improved performance and competitive advantage. Unfortunately, more often than not, these principles are lost on selected leaders within key roles of a struggling organization more often than not. They are blindsided by what is familiar, instead of setting a clear vision of what can be and employing those that can exceed this.