Executives are inclined to think of mass customization as a fascinating but impractical idea, executed in only a few extreme instances, for example Dell Inc. in the PC market. From that investigation, they discovered that mass customization is pertinent to most businesses, provided that it is suitably understood and deployed. The key is to view it simply as a process for aligning an organization through the development of a set of three organizational capabilities with its customers' needs.
Those three fundamental capacities are: (1) the skill to identify the merchandise attributes along which customer needs diverge, (2) the ability to reuse or recombine existing organizational and value chain resources, and (3) the skill to help customers identify or construct solutions to their own needs. True, organizational changes that are often challenging due to strong inertial forces in an organization are required by the development of these capabilities, but many barriers can be overcome by using many different tools and approaches, and even small improvements can reap large gains. The trick is always to remember that there is no one best way to mass customize: Managers must tailor their approach in ways that make the most sense for their particular business.
PUBLICATION DATE: April 01, 2009 PRODUCT #: SMR315-PDF-ENG
This is just an excerpt. This case is about SALES & MARKETING
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