Enablers and barriers of transitioning product-led business model to being customer-centric in a selected financial institution

Abstract

Despite the popularity of customer-centricity as a business priority and a subject of academic discussions, extant literature focuses on the importance of customer-centricity. However, it does not provide guidelines for enabling organisations to transition business models from product-centricity into customer-centricity. Thus in this study, enablers and barriers of business model transformation from product-centricity to customer-centricity are explored. This qualitative study conducted semi-structured interviews with ten senior-level business unit functional heads at selected financial institutions in South Africa. The study found four enablers that can also be barriers to transforming an organisation to customer-centricity. This study contributes to the literature by providing guidelines and factors to be considered when transforming a business model from product-centricity to customer-centricity. A guideline framework is also provided to highlight business implications when transforming a business model.