Sound Bites from 4/18 VOC Innovation Forum Event - Presenter: Gerry Katz

Commentary from Jeff Thompson - PDMA Pittsburgh Chapter President, Director Innovation Programs at McKesson Automation

Thanks to all who came out last night. We had great attendance - about 40 people - for the recent PDMA Pittsburgh Innovation Forum: “Hijacking the Voice of the Customer”. 

In addition to being a great presenter Gerry Katz brought significant personal hands on experience to the table.   He certainly made me ponder many items I see us doing (or I do) and asking why? why not? and just considering the limits. A few of the notes I scratched for myself, sound bites if you will, were:

“Products inspired by customers” 

      What a neat quote and clearly a well executed VOC effort can lead to this.  But that quote makes me pause when I use it to evaluate the products around me.  Are those products truly inspired by customers or are the inspired by us?   I think this quote could provide some great focus for development teams.  I’m wondering just how to use it.

“Understand the needs (jobs to be done) in the VOC execution”    

      It sure sounds simple and I think most of us would agree with it, but would reviewing VOC results demonstrate this was accomplished?   It seems like a good test to me.  I’m using this!

“Frequent mentions (during VOC) don’t define priority or importance; they simply represent top of mind”  

      I could not agree more but this is a easy trap to fall into.  It might be good to keep this awareness in sight as we evaluate the VOC results; it seems an especially easy trap to fall into when using QFD

  

What did you takeaway from the presentation?