CX Pulse Check - April/May 2024

Jeannie Walters: 0:10

It's the Experience Action Podcast. This is CX Pulse Check. I'm Jeannie Walters, and today I'm going to share with you what experts have to say about what you should keep your finger on the pulse of when it comes to customer experience.

Karen Lynch: 0:23

Hi, I'm Karen Lynch. I'm the Head of Content at Greenbook.

Jeannie Walters: 0:27

And today I want to know what should we have our finger on the pulse of when it comes to customer experience today?

Karen Lynch: 0:34

I have heard in the last two days lots of conversation around where CX sits in an organization and right now there seems to be a trend towards sitting and reporting to an office of transformation next to some consumer insight professionals or UX professionals people who are doing Voice of the Customer research. I think that's a trend we should be watching.

Jeannie Walters: 0:54

So it's all about where it sits in the organization and what they do together.

Karen Lynch: 0:59

Pretty exciting. Transformative, some may say. [Jeannie Walters] Ah, nicely done.

Alpa Vyas: 1:03

Hi, I'm Alpa Vyas. I'm the Senior Vice President and Chief Patient Experience Officer at Stanford Health Care.

Jeannie Walters: 1:12

And we are talking about CX Pulse Check. So what do you think people should have their finger on the pulse of when it comes to customer experience and patient experience?

Alpa Vyas: 1:18

I think one of the biggest things to really keep in mind is that improving around experience, and patient experience in particular, it's a journey, it's culture change, it's transformational, and just keep focused in that kind of cultural transformation journey and that you will see bring results.

Suraj 'SUV' Venkitachalam: 1:41

Hi everybody. I'm SUV Senior Director of Customer Voice Strategy and Execution at Cisco

Jeannie Walters: 1:49

And, we are here for CX Pulse Check. So, SUV, tell us what should we have our finger on the pulse of for CX.

Suraj 'SUV' Venkitachalam: 1:54

I mean, AI and predictive analytics are sort of the topics du jour these days, but I would also say that, as organizations, we probably already have a whole lot of data that should tell us a lot about our customers if we are able to effectively bring it together and stitch it together, and so AI will help us obviously do that in a very effective way. But how do we continue to keep the customer at the center and the focus of everything and personalize that? Personalization. [Jeannie Walters] Personalization! [SUV] Personalization is it.

Jignesh Shah: 2:32

I am Jignesh Shah, a VP of Product at the Blackhawk Network, or VHN. We are one of the largest gift card and rewards company in the world. I'm here chatting with Jeannie and I think you know one of my takeaways from from this conference here is you know, how are we taking the opportunity to make every feedback moment count? I think the customer expectations around us collecting feedback and what we do with that feedback, I think keep going up. All of us receive requests for feedback, requests for surveys and so on, and the question now is what are we doing with that feedback and how are we earning our customers' trust to continue giving us feedback?

Jeannie Walters: 3:15

And one of the things you said that I love was we have to make it meaningful. We have to make feedback meaningful, so that's a great thing to keep your finger on the pulse of for CX Pulse Check. [Jignesh Shah] Absolutely. [Jeannie Walters] So, Lorraine. We are here at CXPA, CX Leaders Advance. I want to know what should we keep our finger on the pulse of for customer experience today?

Lorraine Schumacher: 3:36

Today. Well everybody is talking about AI and technology, and how it's the newest greatest thing. It's gonna take over the world. I say, keep your finger on the pulse of the standards, of the basics. Focus on that and you'll do great. [Karyn Furstman] I'm Karyn Furstman. I am the CEO and Chief Experience Officer of CustomersFurst, where I coach customer experience executives.

Jeannie Walters: 4:00

What should we have our finger on the pulse of for customer experience today?

Karyn Furstman: 4:05

Oh gosh, it's a great question. I think I would say two things, but primarily the first is tying CX to value. I think that it is so important to show not just how you're driving loyalty and how you're driving CX. I think it's really important to drive and show the connection between the customer experience metrics and whatever your organization is doing, because that's going to infuse the value for what you're actually trying to drive with the work.

Karyn Furstman: 4:41

So many times it's like well, what's a five-point improvement in NPS? Well, how is that actually driving retention? Is it driving referrals? Is it driving any other bottom line metrics that the company's interested in? So I think that's primarily one. I think the second thing I would just say is the culture aspect of what customer experience leaders need to be doing to drive: How do you build customer-centric cultures into an organization? And that's really my passion as well. It's been something that has been going on for a while, but I see a lot of times leaders coming in and not showing the cultural impact and trying to unite the organization, so truly breaking down those silos and trying to get the organization to understand what they're trying to drive and tying it back to that value that I was mentioning.

Jeannie Walters: 5:32

There you go, tying back to value. It's always in style.

Maggie Gentry: 5:35

Hi, I'm Maggie Gentry. I am the Director of Experience Analytics at Community Health Network in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Jeannie Walters: 5:42

So what should we have our finger on the pulse of when it comes to patient experience, customer experience, in this changing world?

Maggie Gentry: 5:47

Yeah, great question. So I'm always interested in what's next, what's around the corner. Healthcare is an interesting space because there's all these folks that want to get in healthcare but they end up, you know, maybe changing their mind or taking a different approach. Walmart, for example, announced that they wanted to get into healthcare, but they just backed out. So what are consumers looking for? What makes a differentiated experience? What kind of AI can we leverage to make things personal and unique and more human? I think in healthcare

Maggie Gentry: 6:20

really personalizing and humanizing the experience is what folks want at the end of the day.

Lorraine Schumacher: 6:26

[Tabitha Dunn] I'm Tabitha Dunn, Head of Global Customer Experience and Sales Technology for Hitachi.

Jeannie Walters: 6:31

What should we have our finger on the pulse of for customer experience right now, today?

Lorraine Schumacher: 6:36

[Tabitha Dunn] Most companies are worried about their growth. Where's it going to come from? Where is that next big opportunity? I'm telling you right now customers are your next big opportunity. Customer-centered growth is what you need to pursue, and if you do that, you do that through building a much better and more competitive customer experience than anyone else has in your marketplace. That's how you win. That's how you grow.

Jeannie Walters: 7:01

I hope you enjoyed this special episode of Experience Action's CX Pulse Check. I can't wait to answer your questions. So don't forget you can leave me a voicemail at askjeannie. vip. Until next time.