Many Hudson Valley organizations that lock themselves into long-term plans may not be around when the future arrives. What happens to planning when unexpected changes occur overnight? What happens to service when consumers expect to be satisfied the instant they decide what they want?

People expect to be able to withdraw cash from ATM’s, at any hour and in any location. A telephone connection is expected any place on the planet within seconds, from a car, airplane, or golf course. We now fax and e-mail to colleagues around the world instantly, rather than waiting for overnight delivery, and demand live coverage of news events from the other side of the globe. Credit is established in the moment it takes to slide a card through a slot.

Refined, high-powered databases increasingly allow marketers to tailor goods, services, and promotions precisely to customers’ individual preferences.

Today’s customers are never satisfied. They want it right here, right now, and they want it precisely tailored to their needs.

In all industries, the companies that will win the competition for customers will be those that invest in real time systems, information, and telecommunication technology that can respond to changes in customer expectations in the shortest time.

Technology is both the cause of this problem, and the solution. Technology has caused consumers to expect instant satisfaction and also provides a way to meet those expectations. For example, The Custom Foot shoe-store chain lets women design their own shoes with a three-dimensional foot scanner.

A national real estate franchise has been developing a Web-based listing service for property buyers. House hunters simply type the names of cities and neighborhoods that interest them, along with their target price range.

They receive information about schools and other community features, trends in real estate values, and photographs and detailed descriptions of houses that fit their budget. People are able to search for a house by day or night from anywhere they have access to a computer.

Today’s average consumer has less time to browse, down 25 percent from five years ago. One of the real needs is for fewer choices, not more. Procter & Gamble realized that its customers did not want 35 kinds of Bounce fabric softener and parents didn’t want separate Pampers for their male and female babies.

The line separating products from services is rapidly disappearing. To successfully market products, organizations have to build strong relationships with customers. These relationships are based on giving customers attentiveness, convenience, and comfort…in other words, service!

In the shift from products to services, specialized knowledge and human understanding rise to the forefront. Service has long been a person-to-person activity. Financial services, healthcare, consulting, dry cleaning, and auto repair all have one thing in common; they require specific expertise and an exchange of information.

When the future is unpredictable, long-term forecasts are of little value.

Winning Hudson Valley organizations will be flexible enough to respond to relentless shifts in the marketplace, in customers’ expectations, and in the behavior of competitors. More valuable than the most intricate research and planning will be a real time culture, founded on a relationship between companies and customers.

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