The Power of the Customer and Its Implications for Business and IT Integration

Abstract

This article discusses the current status and future developments for IT departments in terms of customer interaction: We define customer interaction as a key process for enterprises—and therefore as much as a chance as also a risk for the success of the business. We see IT departments engaged in large IT transformation programs for the mantra of customer orientation and over this risking the agility and responsiveness to business needs. Business departments have taken over the role of bringing agile, innovative IT solutions into the enterprise, yet cannot integrate these solutions into the big picture of enterprise processes and IT. We think that an approach called Interaction Support Systems could help IT departments to organize the large IT programs and still include agile IT solutions for the business departments. Especially mobile technology will shape the customer experience. And as the “smart customer” arises, enterprises will have to put even more focus on the customer experience: Customers will not only interact with the enterprise about a product or service, but also and probably much more with other customers. We show different scenarios of shaping a new customer experience at the point-of-sale with the help of IT.