For years, service leaders have focused on optimizing their own operations. Improve response times. Increase first-time fix rates. Drive technician productivity. Improve customer satisfaction scores.

Yes, those priorities remain important—essential, in fact. The challenge is that they are no longer enough.

Not long ago, operational excellence was a competitive differentiator. Today, it's table stakes. Customers expect providers to deliver efficient, reliable service. They expect organizations to leverage technology, improve productivity, and continuously enhance performance.

Businesses who are leading the way in service today and that will excel in the years ahead understand that success doesn’t hinge on who can optimize their own businesses best but is won by those that help their customers optimize theirs.

This topic was the focus of a recent conversation I had with Brad Haeberle, EVP of Services for Smart Infrastructure Buildings at Siemens. Throughout our discussion, Brad shared a perspective that I believe represents an important evolution in how service leaders think about growth, innovation, and value creation.

The Shift from Internal Service Metrics to Delivering Customer Outcomes

One of the most impactful observations Brad shared was how his perspective has evolved over time. Like many service leaders, he spent years focused on optimizing service delivery. But a defining moment during the 2008 financial crisis changed the way he thought about customer value.

As organizations faced budget pressures, customers began asking difficult questions. "What am I actually getting from this contract?" The answers, Brad recognized, often centered on tasks being performed rather than outcomes being achieved.

That experience fundamentally changed his approach.

Today, he believes service organizations need to begin with a different question entirely: "What is the KPI that your customer is using to run their business? And how is that affecting the mission of their business?"

We’ve all heard “outside-in” countless times, and it sounds simple. But many service organizations still spend the majority of their time discussing internal metrics. Utilization. First-time fix. SLA compliance. Cost reduction. Productivity.

Again, these metrics matter. But customers don't wake up each morning thinking about your utilization rate. They wake up thinking about their own objectives.

They think about reducing costs, improving efficiency, managing workforce challenges, minimizing risk, achieving sustainability goals, or driving revenue growth. The more closely service organizations align their offerings to those priorities, the more indispensable they become.

Customer Centricity Requires Curiosity—And Aligned Action

Another point from our discussion challenged a common assumption about customer-centricity. Organizations often talk about listening to customers, gathering feedback, and responding to requests. Those activities are important. But Brad made an important distinction.

"Customers can't tell you what they want,” he said. “They can tell you their problems."

When you think about the most transformative innovations in any industry, customers rarely design the solution themselves. What they articulate is the challenge.

It’s the responsibility of the service organization to understand those challenges deeply enough to envision new possibilities.

This requires more than surveys or quarterly business reviews. It requires observation. It requires curiosity. And it requires combining customer insight with domain expertise and emerging technological capabilities.

And Brad offered an important reminder as he described how some of the most meaningful innovations emerge from frontline interactions—a technician solving a customer problem in a unique way or a salesperson recognizing an unmet need.

Those moments may not immediately appear groundbreaking. But when organizations create mechanisms to capture, scale, and refine those ideas, they often become the foundation for entirely new service offerings.

The Difference Between a Service Organization and a Service Business

While I often use the terms service organization and service business interchangeably, Brad’s insights illustrate the clear difference between the two.

A service organization focuses on delivering services efficiently.

A service business focuses on creating growth through services.

The difference is significant, first in mindset and then in the results that follow.

Organizations focused solely on operational delivery often spend most of their energy improving existing offerings.

Service businesses are constantly looking beyond what exists today.

They ask questions such as:

• What customer challenges remain unsolved?
• What adjacent opportunities exist?
• How can we create entirely new sources of value?
• What markets could we serve differently?

As Brad explained, sustainable growth requires organizations to continuously place calculated bets on new ideas and opportunities. Growth doesn't happen by maintaining the status quo.

It comes from identifying opportunities that competitors haven't recognized yet and creating solutions that help customers achieve better outcomes. That mindset becomes increasingly important as technology accelerates and customer expectations continue to evolve.

Digital Is Most Powerful When It Multiplies Human Expertise

No conversation about the future of service would be complete without discussing digital transformation. And for service businesses, the next era of digital intelligence offers an expanded opportunity to scale customer outcomes.

Brad views digital as a multiplier. At Siemens, significant effort has gone into building digital capabilities that allow teams to monitor systems remotely, analyze performance, identify issues proactively, and generate recommendations before a technician ever arrives onsite.

Instead of spending valuable time gathering information and diagnosing issues, technicians can focus on solving problems and creating value. As Brad described it, technicians increasingly arrive onsite already knowing where issues exist and what actions are most likely to resolve them.

The result is faster outcomes for customers and more impactful work for employees.

Staying Relevant Requires Constant Learning

Perhaps my favorite part of the conversation came toward the end when we discussed change fatigue.

Every organization is navigating tremendous transformation right now. AI is evolving rapidly. Customer expectations continue to rise. Business models are shifting. And leaders are under pressure to keep moving forward.

Brad acknowledged that maintaining momentum isn't always easy. But he also shared a perspective that I believe is critical for service leaders: Organizations that continue learning are organizations that continue growing.

That learning doesn't happen exclusively through formal programs or strategic planning sessions. It happens through customer conversations. It happens through peer discussions. It happens through industry events. It happens through experimentation. And sometimes it happens by simply paying attention to ideas that originate outside your own industry.

Throughout our conversation, one theme remained consistent: curiosity creates opportunity. Organizations that stay curious are more likely to spot emerging trends, identify unmet customer needs, and recognize new paths for growth.

The organizations that will thrive in the years ahead will be those that combine operational excellence with deep customer understanding.

They will move beyond optimizing their own businesses and focus on helping customers optimize theirs.

Because in a world where operational excellence is increasingly expected, creating customer outcomes—not simply delivering service—becomes the true competitive advantage.