Konosuke Matsushita had extraordinary passion for both manufacturing and the products his company made. "The goods we make here every day," he would tell his employees, "are like children we raise with tender care. Selling them is like seeing those children grow up and go out into the world. It is only natural, then, that we should be concerned about how they are getting on in their lives, and so go and see for ourselves."

Matsushita believed that maintaining this concern for what you produce is the first step toward building an ordinary supplier-client relationship into a stronger link based on mutual trust.

Complaints Strengthen Ties

Far from being an attack, a complaint should be treated as a valuable opportunity to strengthen ties. "Naturally I'm delighted when a buyer expresses compliments," Konosuke Matsushita would say, "but I'm just as pleased to get a letter of complaint." His reasoning was that if customers didn't bother to complain, that meant they had already decided not to buy any more products from your company. If, on the other hand, they expressed their dissatisfaction, even to the point of seriously considering going elsewhere for their needs, they were still interested.