I dunno why, but I love tough questions. Not because I can answer them, but because I can't. There's something really cool about the unanswerable question, and even cooler about the first person to answer it.
Anyway, tonight for some reason I'm trolling the Forrester Research site, browsing all of their upcoming seminars for 2007. Forrester is teeming with brainiacs. And they all get paid to address big, fat, hairy, Jeez-I'm-sorry-I-brought-it-up questions. Sort of the intellectual equivalent of Evel Knievel.
Here are some of the palm-drenching, sphincter-tightening issues Forrester will be examining in 2007 (souped-up by me to read as job interview questions):
- How can marketing lead the way toward customer centricity? What experience do you have to support your answer?
- What is a customer-centric marketing organization, and what five processes has your team implemented to make your entire company more customer-centric?
- If your current company is not yet customer-centric, what skills does your current marketing team require to lead your company through this change? What steps are you taking to close this skill gap?
- With whom should you partner to help support this shift to customer-centricity?
- How can you leverage new channels, tactics, and media to drive customer engagement and intimacy? What steps have you taken to link these divers to your team's compensation?
- How can you effectively integrate traditional, maturing, and new media, channels, and tactics?
- What technologies should you leverage to best reach your clients and integrate your activities?
- If your company markets through both B2B and B2C channels, describe any channel differences in approaching customer-centricity.
- What customer experience strategies are disrupting the status quo in your industry? Are these strategic disruptions customer driven? Or were they driven by your competitors? Why?
- Which of your competitors offer a superior customer experience? How do they do it? How did they preempt you? Did you see it coming? Name five things you are doing right now to address this problem.
- How could your firm change its organization, processes, and culture to compete more effectively?
- How can your company pinpoint weaknesses in your customers' experiences and make improvements that lead to increased profits?
- BONUS: What are your top three predictions about how integrated, multichannel marketing in your industry will evolve in 2007? Why?
If you are a hiring manager looking for a new marketing VP, why not trot out some of these babies during your next round of candidate panel interviews? And please: Let me know if there are any colossal wipe-outs.
