What do your customers hate about doing business with you?

Last summer on the highway near my home, there was a program called the Fast 14 that rebuilt 14 bridges in 8 weekends. The idea was this: instead of taking the traditional route of a 3-4 year construction project, the Fast14 used extensive planning and staging so that the actual work of replacing the bridges occurred between 8 PM on Friday and 5 AM on the following Monday.  The approach, called accelerated bridge construction* saves direct costs through efficiencies and significantly eliminates indirect costs in the form of lost time in traffic snarls and the cost of ensuring work zone safety.

I’ve been fascinated by this because it’s a great example of how the shift to the knowledge era has provided the tools to fundamentally change any business. Yes, the knowledge era brought entirely new businesses (Microsoft, Google, Facebook, etc) but it also brings the potential to change even a very hard-asset-driven business like road construction. The driving technologies supporting the Fast 14 were knowledge-era tools like spreadsheets, project planning software and real-time communication.

But I struggled with the lesson here for businesses. How do you “see” opportunities like this to radically change your business? I think the lesson is about design constraints. Past approaches to building bridges focused on the bridge. This approach focused on the effects of the construction process on the community. By setting a goal to minimize community disruption (among other factors), the whole approach to construction was changed.

That’s how I came up with the question in the title. If you asked the average motorist what they hate about road construction, the answer would surely include traffic jams. As happy as we are that the government is keeping bridges safe, the inconvenience of the process is much more immediate and painful.

Even if your customers are happy with the results (the bridge you build for them), there are probably other aspects of the process of doing business with your industry and your company that are painful, inconvenient or expensive.  Put yourself in their shoes. Think about what your customers most hate about doing business with you and fix it, even if it feels radically different from what you do today.

* I was reminded about this program by a report last week in the NY Times about an Instant Bridge completed by the Massachusetts Dept of Transportation. Like the Fast 14 programthat built 14 bridges in 8 weekends last summer, this was part of the Department’sAccelerated Bridge Program as well as the national trend explained here by the U.S. Department of Transportation.

Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-05-01

• The Role of the Expert in Intangible Capital – Can We Open Source ICManagement Practices? http://t.co/LA2GkH15 #
• Huge Opportunities for Innovation — Corporate intangible capital is ready and waiting http://t.co/qI8zfIsJ #
• I'm excited to be involved in the Academic-Industry Research Network – AIRnet http://t.co/uQytpVKq #
• Check out AIRnet's first ever newsletter http://t.co/q2dxYgO4 #
• RT @ACabassu: @maryadamsICA A French open source methodology on intangible Capital measurement on L'observatoire de l'Immatériel website! #
• The Dilemma (and Power) of Free http://t.co/M4d8kxBZ #
• The Holy Grail of the Knowledge Economy: Structural Capital http://t.co/2IpNFCWq #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-30

• Could Twitter Save the New York Times? http://t.co/XkyvXmyo #
• Intangible Cost, Not Value http://t.co/X6eX7G4z #
• It's about monetizing IC: 10 Top Business Models for New Ventures Today – Innovation America http://t.co/iBtlXsiz via @sharethis #
• Business Valuations and the Intangible Information Gap http://t.co/cxUtmksO #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-29

• Richard Florida on Homeownership and Our Economy http://t.co/YOYbxUFg #
• Three Ways to Look at IC http://t.co/73r54FSc #
• America's Continuing Failure to Innovate http://t.co/8cBloQUz #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-28

• Why visualization is so important for intangible capital http://t.co/KDoxU61c #
• The ABCs of Intangibles Assessment http://t.co/knAAFJqo #
• RT @dchatzoudes: "The impact of intellectual capital on firms’ market value and financial performance”, Journal of Intellectual Capital,… #
• Knowledge is a fundamentally different kind of economic asset http://t.co/HcAdWoNX #
• The doughnut hole in the corporate info universe http://t.co/hQP9nloM #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-27

• The missing link in understanding IC http://t.co/sHtDVujE #
• The New Accounting http://t.co/kEt4ukKF #
• Relationship Capital Risks http://t.co/qfpCT4Ci #
• Reputation Is the New Bottom Line http://t.co/TfLAWqrs #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-26

• How to Increase the Return on Your IT Investments NOW http://t.co/N1t09547 #
• http://t.co/T1U1poid You're right to focus on the business case. One thing that I always say about improving intangibles information is… #
• What's the Right Definition of Intellectual Property? http://t.co/RoISz5zd #
• Making the choice to become an intangible capitalist http://t.co/raDm8dj2 #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-25

• Why Do Your Customers Pay You for Your Knowledge? http://t.co/aCW7OMmP #
• RT @intangibleecon: “@robatkinsonitif: ITIF's Innovation Consensus 2013 conf: http://t.co/zrHkQcPM” Great event esp. discuss on intangibles #
• Disruptive innovation RT @intangibleecon: Virginia Tech computers teach math: http://t.co/4FXHjWid Is this the future? #
• http://t.co/Dj1cCrFc If you look at the macroeconomic research by The Conference Board, the magnitude is pretty significant:… #
• Outsourcing and the Networked Business http://t.co/dUW6QNXg #
• Networks: A Question of Control http://t.co/x6Lu1Tzc #
• Moneyball and Intangibles http://t.co/lk5cBx1J #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-24

• Reputation: beyond shareholder thinking to stakeholder thinking and back again http://t.co/GYlFcINa #
• http://t.co/J0MQirpb Oliver- There is room in accounting standards for capitalizing more intangible assets than companies usually… #
• Fighting Flu From the Bottom Up http://t.co/ewswsgD2 #
• Human Capital Risks http://t.co/2GB7xfGq #
• RepuStars and Beyond http://t.co/bomUbuHL #

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Intangible Capital Reading List on Twitter for 2012-04-23

• Thinking about your organization as a network http://t.co/u4Fi9EUH #
• Do we face a drop in living standards? http://t.co/07lrfydu #
• Just added a new event on ic knowledge center upcoming IC case study on May 8 http://t.co/M5ntFHT2 #
• ICKC:Loxton Very few people and/or firms are capable of innovation – they treat it like an error if they encounter it. http://t.co/gUCJQ03E #
• RT @intangibleecon: Classic case of building a new business on an intangible asset by selling what you know – NYTimes – Disney Institute:… #
• The Coloplast Experiment http://t.co/WzBVwOJL #
• Human Capital: The Temp vs. Full-time Employee http://t.co/usXWyvpd #

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