During class we have discussed the concept of ‘Mass Customization’ a lot and after the article group 7 posted I am always curious about why many companies fail to implement this concept.
The following article that I found actually explains what steps you have to take to implement mass customization.
It gives insights in how you should reorganize your business to be able to benefit from mass customization. First of all the authors of the article explain that you should not see mass customization as an exotic approach but a strategic mechanism that can be applicable to most businesses as long as it is properly understood. You should see mass customization as a process within your business that you should align with your customer needs. To be able to do this you should implement three organizational capabilities:
- The ability to identify the product attributes along which customers needs diverge.
- The ability to reuse and recombine existing organizational and value-chain resources.
- The ability to help customers identify or build solutions to their own needs.
The authors explain how to develop these capabilities with examples of failure and success stories of companies like Dell, Deere & Co, Fiat, Adidas and more.
Later they will also identify other aspects of a business that can be obstacles for the proper use of mass customization.
I really liked this article as it is really well structured and sheds lights on many aspects of the business. I hope you will enjoy it too.
See you tomorrow! Cheers, Olivia van Gerrevink
