“The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you get even less than you settled for” Maureen Dowd
While achievement of excellence in every activity, creation and delivery of product or service is the goal of successful companies, they have a practical approach to delivery in their day-to-day work style.
The world's most admired ever technology company is undoubtedly, Apple Inc., under Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs has the reputation of having a strong penchant for excellence and would never settle for anything but the best. The creations of Apple like its proprietary operating system, 'ilife', its products like MacBook, iPod, iPhone, iPad are creations of breakthrough innovations when they were launched and continuously changed the fortunes of the company to make it one of the most valued technology companies in the world.
Lets examine the following news articles:
Apple, AT&T mum on iPhone 3G issues - ( http://goo.gl/dbF5q )
A month after the launch of the iPhone 3G, reception problems continue to plague owners with dropped calls, poor networking speeds, and frustrating customer service experiences.
by CNET News staff August 11, 2008 4:00 AM PDT.
"The phone was a disappointment from the standpoint that it couldn't maintain a consistent connection with the 3G network...All the other features were fantastic," said Shaw, a sales professional living in a Cleveland suburb. But those other features weren't enough to prevent him from returning to Verizon and the BlackBerry after deciding the hassle just wasn't worth it.
Apple's iPad Woes Continue, Users Now Reporting 3G Connectivity Problems ( http://goo.gl/YkjGf )
Brandon Hill (Blog) - April 6, 2012 11:34 AM
Apple announced its third generation iPad early last month, and customers began receiving their units soon after. Shortly after Apple's latest tablet was launched, there were complaints of the device getting much warmer than the iPad 2 during normal useand complaints that the larger internal battery resulted in much longer battery recharging times.
More recently, owners of Wi-Fi only iPadswere reporting on connectivity issues (weak Wi-Fi signals, slow download/upload speeds). Apple issued an internal AppleCare document instructing Apple team members to "capture" customer iPads that were brought in with this diagnosed problem.
What we notice by observing the above are:
a) Through the years 2008-2012, Apple launched new generation products which faced problems in the market place and hence were not as perfect as the company intended them to be. Yet Apple continued the practice of launching such products the shortcoming of which must have been surely known to its brilliant engineers and product creators.
b) Apple's team continued to listen to the market, unfazed by the negative reports and on every occasion came out stronger to continue their growth momentum in the market place.
c) In one of the above cases, some of the users shifted to a rival phone company, which is struggling to survive today while Apple continues its growth unabatedly.
We find similar situations exist when we study the new product launches of the most successful companies in the world like Microsoft with its successive launches of Windows Operating System, Google with its various products and services, Facebook's platform and even the world's most admired companies in many fields.
What makes these companies continue to be the most preferred companies in their respective field and be the darlings of their target audience and their users?
Pursuit of excellence, that is a habit in such companies is supported by an unquenchable attitude of having their users at the centre of their universe and continuously strive to give them their best.
Successful companies, believe in continuous innovation in the market place, making them either the pioneers due to their early-to-market effort or execution excellence that satisfies the needs of their audience in the most efficient manner. They have their eyes and ears firmly on the market place with their fingers on the customer pulse and commission instantaneous corrective actions. This leads to continuous improvements in their products' feature leading to launch of newer versions that take of the short-comings unearthed.
The way you step up your game is not to worry about the other guy in any situation, because you can't control the other guy. You only have control over yourself.—Oprah. http://goo.gl/FywSD
Pursuit of excellence is a habit that is firmly ingrained into the fabric of successful organizations who relentlessly push the limits of their own performance, even as they continue with their rapid strides in the market with not so perfect launches to start with.
It is the attitude to excel, appetite for better and better results, aptitude to figur out what stands out, that go to form the building blocks of the culture of excellence, that makes pursuit of excellence a routine act and thus a habit of great organizations.
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