Subject areaProcess and organisation
Also known aszona di comfort
The comfort zone is the condition in which a person, a group or a company operates with familiar habits and without anxiety, because everything is predictable.
The expression entered management vocabulary with Judith M. Bardwick, whose book «Danger in the Comfort Zone» (1991) describes organisations in which security lowers commitment; behind it lies the Yerkes-Dodson law (1908), according to which performance grows with a moderate level of tension and falls when tension is missing or excessive.
For marketing the concept works in two directions. A smooth buying experience creates a comfort zone for the customer that brings them back; a department that stays in its own stops seeing market changes.
Source: Judith M. Bardwick, Danger in the Comfort Zone, 1991.
An example
A sales network that renews the same contracts with the same customers every year hits its targets effortlessly, until a competitor takes away the three largest customers with an offer nobody had foreseen.
Enrico Giubertoni. Licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0: you may quote, translate and adapt this entry with the author’s name and a link, stating any changes. For commercial use, write to info@enricogiubertoni.com
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