Browsing by Author "Hellman, Maija"

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  • Customer Orientation: Analysis of Present Status and Measurement of Progress in Big Finnish Companies - A Case Study
    (2006) Hellman, Maija
     Helsinki University of Technology | Master's thesis
    Customers are today seen as an increasingly valuable asset and source of competitive advantage in companies. The purpose of this study is to better understand how big companies in Finland see their customers and how customer oriented their strategies, operations and decision making processes are. The main emphasis in this study is placed on identifying those factors that have affected the level of customer orientation in the case companies. A model of the involved factors is built step by step based on case analysis and as a result, a saturated model of factors affecting customer orientation level and their relationship is presented. This study aims also at developing a framework for customer orientation level measurement within companies. In order to find out how managers with different managerial positions and responsibilities see customers and what their perceptions on customer orientation are, all managers from the 10 case companies were interviewed, i.e. the chief executive officer (CEO), chief financial officer (CFO) and chief marketing officer (CMO). Four important reasons affecting customer orientation level were identified. These were (1) perception of the ability to utilize customer information, (2) competition, (3) customer information level and (4) customer relationship value. All case companies' customer orientation level was determined by using the measurement model derived from the case study results. It showed that customer orientation level in case companies varies a lot. None of them was purely customer oriented. Mainly due to the lack of organization wide customer oriented activities, most companies can be described as market oriented in the middle or in the beginning of customer orientation development process. One of the most interesting findings of the study was the diverse views on customer orientation within management. CEOs understood and recognized the importance of customer orientation best whereas CFOs on average had a very limited perception it. For CMOs it was characteristic to approach customer orientation from operative instead of strategic point of view.
  • Role of customer information in financial analysis performed by analysts and fund managers.
    (2008) Hellman, Maija
     School of Business | Master's thesis