A good crisis can be a blessing in disguise: it focuses the mind.

When the old strategy is failing to attract and retain the deep-pocket industrial buyers it once did, when the products are no longer differentiated, when the competition is pressing down on prices and margins, and when the bottom line is turning from pink to red – in other words, when everything seems to be heading in the wrong direction – it's time to break with the past. It's time to rethink the old and tired customer value proposition, the one that pays no dividends any longer.

Breaking with the past could well mean finding another angle to attract and keep customers. That implies refocusing the enterprise in ways that align the internal priorities with those of the industrial customers it aims to serve. It means getting intimate with customers.