P2 The Blog

Extraordinary changes have occurred in the customer experience landscape over the last few decades. The notion of standardized products and services for in inter-connected world has given way to the imperative for  personalization as the key driver for marketing success . The Problem : Customers expect  to be recognized on every channel. Customers assume  that any experience they initiate on one channel or device can be picked up right where they left off when they switch to another channel or device. Customers expect  to be able to interact with a company  24/7  – whenever and wherever it is most convenient for them. The Challenge : Organizations find it  exponentially difficult  to  execute a personalized marketing strategy  across channels and devices, because of the increasing number of technologies and the resulting complexity. The Solution : Organizations need to learn  (and learn fast) how to  declutter  the marketing technology stack (please see  BCG ’s illustration b

Intelligence Quotient (IQ) is one of the most hyped characteristics while determining the potential effectiveness of an individual. Fanciful figures of 175 or more are associated with certain categories of people – Nobel laureates, chess prodigies, and corporate titans – among others. The truth is quite different. The “ average ” IQ is supposed to be 100 and a score of 120 is considered adequate for success in any field. Strangely, there is a consensus among experts that beyond a certain level, IQ by itself means nothing although the level is not fixed. Now, Emotional Intelligence (EI) guru Daniel Goleman argues that while there is a correlation between intelligence and leadership performance for leaders up to an IQ of around 120, there is none for an IQ above 120 – what is more, there is a negative impact on leadership effectiveness for an IQ above 128 ! This surprising research finding from the University of Lausanne surmises that the super-high-IQ leaders may not know how to

Nobel laureate Paul Krugman wrote in The Age of Diminished Expectations that “a country’s ability to improve its standard of living depends almost entirely on its ability to raise its output per worker.” At the peak of its economic prosperity, Japan had the highest human productivity in the world. Today it is in the 7 th position – even though the average Japanese works 80 hours a week and 100 hours a week is not uncommon. Japan ranks at the bottom among countries on the vacation dimension. Unfortunately, there is no relationship between hours worked and performance. In a desperate attempt to encourage people to spend a little time away from work, Japan introduced a “ Friday Premium ” program under which employees were required to leave their workplace at 3 PM on the last Friday of every month. The result? Nothing. In a culture that places the welfare of the group far ahead of the individual, no one wanted to be the first to leave.  Contrast this with countries that literally fo