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What the Customer Wants

What the Customer Wants There has been the occasional debate between two schools of thought: You need to ask the customer what he/she wants; and, The customer doesn’t know what he/she wants until we show them (remember ol Steve Jobs?) A bulk of the views I’ve come across so far lie on the side of…

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Design Thinking: What a Patient Wants

Design Thinking: What a Patient Wants Design Thinking is a relatively new concept in many countries including India. It is, however, already some decades old now. And having been practicing it for a few years now, I often get asked what it is about. And for examples of its applications. For starters, design thinking is…

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Microwave Idea – Return the Turntable to Original Position

Image (only used the LG image because I use one of their models at home): source I’m not exactly on top of the latest microwave oven features. Don’t think I even know most of the old ones. But if this feature doesn’t already exist, it would be great to have. I’m assuming this is how…

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Tata Sky

Image: source This is a heads-up for Tata Sky satellite television provider customers. Here’s something Tata Sky has been doing as standard procedure, that I find questionable. If you’re subscribed to an annual plan, and say  you cross your billing deadline by even a day, they automatically switch you to either a 6-month billing cycle, or worse,…

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Sharpen your Business Focus

Image: source When starting one’s business, a set of people will advice you to keep a sharp focus when it comes to offerings or purpose. Another group might suggest offering as many products or services as possible, to minimize risk. And both groups could defend their views till the cows come home. However, in most cases, it…

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Function, Form, and Overripe Apples

Image: source Over the decades, we have been seeing Apple grow at a blistering pace. Built on thinking different while staying hungry and foolish, it certainly created new sectors while killing redundant ones. With unwavering customer-focus, Apple maintained child-like curiosity, unbelievable innovation, and startup agility. The brand continues to enjoy a stronger following than even some religious cults. The iPhone surely…

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Startup Service Aggregators

Startup Service Aggregators Image: source Startups with business models revolving around aggregating services might have their days numbered. Unless they offer a significant additional benefit (than the underlying services they aggregate) to end consumers. Because without it, they’re just tech-backed middlemen looking for their share of the pie for connecting parties. This might be a…

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Think A-Team: For the Design & Strategy needs of Young Businesses

Think A-Team: For the Design & Strategy needs of Young Businesses Image: link Hi, all you enterprising entrepreneurs, I am pleased to give to you, ‘Think A-Team’, a growth partnering service for all your business strategy needs. The intention behind it, is to help you make your business challenges a little less challenging. And to…

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The Up Side of Consulting

The Up Side of Consulting Here’s a post I had drafted for submitting as a resource to MosaicHub, in response to their call to members for ‘the Top 5 things businesses need to know about your area of expertise’. Here are five top thoughts that we at the A-Team, believe would be beneficial for businesses who engage…

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NA-NObody

The Tata Nano, cheapest car in the world today, is arguably one of the biggest milestones in the auto industry in recent times, the world over. A close friend of mine, Sheshank Reddy shared an article which talked about how Mr. Ratan Tata, in hindsight, felt the Nano should not have been positioned as ‘the cheapest car’. Another close friend, Pradeep Shetty,…