$5.$ The customer$-$centric organization $($Connect$,$ Perform$)$

Imagine that you are a manager and your boss has asked you to improve the organizational design of your company to make it more customer$-$centric. The following table lists five examples of actions you could take to create an organization that is more responsive to customers. Match each action to the principle it represents by typing the letter of the action in the answer box next to the corresponding principle.

Answer

Principle

Action

Coordination A To cultivate your organization$$s informal structure, you establish a Friday afternoon happy hour, bringing together employees who normally wouldn$$t communicate with one another to talk about customers.

Cooperation B You are concerned that the company has too many silos. Therefore, you create a new customer communication department that is charged with bringing information about customer desires to every department in the company.

Capability development C After talking to people throughout the company, you realize that sometimes R&D invests a lot of resources in developing products that customers don$$t actually want. You establish a policy that before product development proceeds past a certain point, R&D needs to present the concept to sales and marketing and gain that department$$s approval.

Clout D It is important for employees to be able to work across multiple product lines and to work effectively with other teams while doing so$.$ You create career paths that allow employees to transfer from department to department within the company. An employee might work for engineering on one product but then work for sales on another.

Connection E You realize that servicing the company$$s computers is not one of your company$$s competitive strengths. You decide to outsource that task to another company and devote more resources to manufacturing and selling the exercise equipment that is your company$$s main product.