Week Six: Field Trip

Last week we visited one of our suppliers, a call center, as an office.  This was a great experience in many ways. 

More obviously, I learned a lot about this specific call center, the products they offer, what sets them apart, and I saw firsthand how they do what they do.  This was really interesting because it is easy to think that call centers are becoming a thing of the past with the internet revolution, but this trip taught me how call centers can harness the internet to improve their business, instead of eradicate it.  Understanding how to use innovations of others and new technologies to keep your business thriving is important in any industry, it is just incredibly pronounced in technology and communications.  Innovating and pivoting in business can never stop if you want to thrive, because the market that you are serving is constantly changing.  Large companies like Apple are constantly doing this, which is why we're at the iPhone 6S instead of still all the way back at the original iPod.

A second, perhaps less obvious, yet still very important, facet of learning on this trip was my being able to witness business to business client relationships from the side of the client.  I realized that in many B to B relationships it is more beneficial to have a partnership kind of relationship instead of a one-sided supplier/client relationship.  This allows both businesses to grow and it also allows both businesses to better serve their other clients. 

When I first started at Phoenix I wasn't sure how to apply market research to my Christian worldview, but I'm starting to better understand how to do that.  I originally thought that the only way would be to behave in a Christian manner, but I'm beginning to see market research as a way to serve others, as well.  Work is an integral part of life, as ordained by God, and working in market research puts you in a position to help others to better understand their own clients and customers in their own particular field.  This helps our client companies to better serve their own clients/consumers, which then helps those clients/consumers to help others and live a happier, better life.  Another way to apply it to a Christian worldview is when analyzing data that we collect, we are working to better understand the people who God created, which is a way of worshiping and glorifying Him.