"Without Customers, You Don't Have a Business"

Here's some mental floss for you to ponder as we head into a long weekend.

This week as I met with clients, attended a CEO think tank session, sat in on a couple of advisory board meetings, I was struck by how much time we devote to discussions about governance, capital, and cash flow and yet how little time we devote to discussing customers -- getting them, learning from them, and keeping them.  Customers are the reason businesses exist - the worst mistake you can make is to forget this.

If we're going to build world class businesses, customers need to be a big part of the governance equation. 

Pick up a copy of July's Fast Company and read Peppers and Rogers' article "Customers Don't Grow on Trees".  It may spark a new metric for you to add to measure the health of your company.