The team project was for me the opportunity to better understand the purpose of this class : what is customer insights ? This was for me a quite obscure concept at the beginning, especially because English is not my mother tongue. When I looked in the dictionary during the course selection process, I saw it was dealing with “apprehending the true nature of a thing through intuitive understanding or penetrating mental vision or discernment”. Even if it was enough to make me want to follow the class, it did not help a lot to understand. But during the group project, we had chosen a very particular segment: the supermom. We had to find out her needs, her feelings, her psychology, and for this it was not enough to read the interviews we had gathered. I realized it was a really deep work to do: we tried to do a little role-play, in order to really go in the supermom’s shoes. This is to my mind a very interesting work. In the course conclusion, the teacher talked about two aspects of the marketing: the marketer has to think as a professional, and also as a customer. “Customer insights” is in my opinion the link between these two roles: trying to express what happens in the customer’s mind with a professional point of view.
The second thing I learnt from this project is the complexity of creativity. At the end of the project we had to create a product for our segment. To find an idea, we had to organize two meetings; between them, we were supposed to think about the ideas that we had during the first one. The most difficult task was to try to stick to the two sides of innovation, which were evoked by Michael Luchs in class: we had to find a product which was both original and useful. But curiously, all the ideas that we had were either original, or useful, but rarely both! I think the solution was to privilege one of these aspects, without abandoning the second one. We came with a product which was maybe more useful than original (the RFID tag-system already exists in some stores like the Prada Store in New York). Thus, we were responding above all to the lack of organization of the supermom; however, we give customers the possibility to have “an organized disorder”, which is to my mind something rather original.
I think that in this project we had a very “conceptualist” approach, because we tried to base our brainstorming upon the main needs that we found for our supermom. There were two major needs, the functional need for organization, and the emotional need for recognition and happiness. It was extremely difficult, in the context of the home office, to find an item which would answer these two needs. So we found a set of objects which answered one or the other need. Then we had to decide which need was pre-eminent. This was a very thoughtful process.
My reflection about this group project is extremely positive.
First, I think we were a very efficient team. Each meeting was quite short and all the objectives of the session were fulfilled. I was very happy to see that everybody was speaking as much as the others, even the two foreign exchange students. Even if English is not the mother tongue, it can be very enriching to have different cultures in a same group. The example of the name of our product is particularly relevant: the Spanish member of our group said about the item we were looking for “We have to find something really demotic”. Nobody knew what was the meaning of this word, even the Americans members! We thought that it was a perfect name for our product. It illustrates also for me the instinctive side of innovation: we can spend hours looking for an idea, the right one will maybe arise when it was really not expected.
Globally, I had a very good experience working with this group; each member had complementary skills and was eager to bring his help to the others, even if it was not his assigned task. Everybody was also quite flexible: for example, if someone had difficulties with a particular part of the process, he could easily switch with someone else.
This project was therefore very interesting for me and hopefully for my team mates.
The second thing I learnt from this project is the complexity of creativity. At the end of the project we had to create a product for our segment. To find an idea, we had to organize two meetings; between them, we were supposed to think about the ideas that we had during the first one. The most difficult task was to try to stick to the two sides of innovation, which were evoked by Michael Luchs in class: we had to find a product which was both original and useful. But curiously, all the ideas that we had were either original, or useful, but rarely both! I think the solution was to privilege one of these aspects, without abandoning the second one. We came with a product which was maybe more useful than original (the RFID tag-system already exists in some stores like the Prada Store in New York). Thus, we were responding above all to the lack of organization of the supermom; however, we give customers the possibility to have “an organized disorder”, which is to my mind something rather original.
I think that in this project we had a very “conceptualist” approach, because we tried to base our brainstorming upon the main needs that we found for our supermom. There were two major needs, the functional need for organization, and the emotional need for recognition and happiness. It was extremely difficult, in the context of the home office, to find an item which would answer these two needs. So we found a set of objects which answered one or the other need. Then we had to decide which need was pre-eminent. This was a very thoughtful process.
My reflection about this group project is extremely positive.
First, I think we were a very efficient team. Each meeting was quite short and all the objectives of the session were fulfilled. I was very happy to see that everybody was speaking as much as the others, even the two foreign exchange students. Even if English is not the mother tongue, it can be very enriching to have different cultures in a same group. The example of the name of our product is particularly relevant: the Spanish member of our group said about the item we were looking for “We have to find something really demotic”. Nobody knew what was the meaning of this word, even the Americans members! We thought that it was a perfect name for our product. It illustrates also for me the instinctive side of innovation: we can spend hours looking for an idea, the right one will maybe arise when it was really not expected.
Globally, I had a very good experience working with this group; each member had complementary skills and was eager to bring his help to the others, even if it was not his assigned task. Everybody was also quite flexible: for example, if someone had difficulties with a particular part of the process, he could easily switch with someone else.
This project was therefore very interesting for me and hopefully for my team mates.
