2010 – The Year of Empathy?

2009 Has been a great year. It was the year that we were able to support our clients in many different ways. Co-creation has been one of the major project pillars in 2009 and definitely something that we will continue to work on/with in the future. Our Co-creation’ 5 Guiding Principles white paper has been downloaded tens of thousands of times already. Expert co-creation has proven to be a tool for clients to tackle the toughest strategic challenges and work with the smartest people around.

What’s next? Empathy. We at Fronteer feel that brands that are interested in the world that they’re in and understand another’s situation, feelings, and motives are the ones that will thrive in the future. I was able to deliver a presentation in december 2009 in Amsterdam on empathy. What struck me was the honest and happy reactions of the people around. It seemed to be spot on. Also, our research on the relationship between open-ness of brands and attractiveness was an eye-opener to people (as it was for us last year).

So what will we do? We will focus part of this year’s efforts on developing our knowledge on empathy. Firstly, we are launching the ‘Empathy Monitor’; 30-40 major Dutch brands will be researched quantitatively and qualitatively to understand what brands are perceived to be empathic and why. Brands are invited to be a partner in this research: get the full details and be part of a workshop on empathy. We will do this with Ruigrok Netpanel.

Secondly, we will try to put an element of Empathy and Touchpoints in all of our projects. We want to understand what it means and what it does. Also, part of our team training efforts will focus on empathy.

And thirdly, we will be publishing on the matter. Here is a Slideshare doc as a stater..

Enjoy 2010 and talk to you soon.

The Fronteer team