Welcome And Book Thanks

Jeannie Walters 0:09

Welcome to Experience Action, where we really look at customer insights as a way to drive action. Now, I am so grateful to all of you who supported the book launch of Experience is Everything. It is available everywhere now. I would love for you to pick up your copy and let us know what you think. It's already achieved more than 50 reviews on Amazon and was a USA Today bestseller. So I really just want to say thank you for the support. I love hearing what you're getting out of it. So don't be shy. Reach out and let me know. Now, of course, I'm your host, Jeannie Walters, and today's episode is a little different, but in the best kind of way. Recently I had the chance to attend and participate and speak at the CX Leaders Advance, which is the annual event from the Customer Experience Professionals Association. That means I was surrounded by some of the brightest minds in customer experience. So while I was there, I took the opportunity to pull a few aside and ask them a simple but intriguing question to me. And essentially what I asked them is what's one thing we should be thinking about when it comes to the future of customer experience? So what you're about to hear and watch is a compilation of those answers. These are leaders from across different industries, each bringing their own perspective, challenges, and frankly, optimism for what's ahead. And just a heads up, this was recorded live in the moment, and that means there might be a few real life hiccups along the way. But that means everything you hear, that's as authentic as it gets. So let's get into it. I am here with my tall friend Sasha. So, Sasha, tell everybody who you are and what you do.

Sasha Fard 2:02

Hi, I'm Sasha Fard. I'm the director of Omnichannel Analytics at Assurant. So I'm really focused on customer journey analytics and orchestration across the enterprise.

Jeannie Walters 2:13

Excellent. We've heard a lot about orchestration and some other things. What is one thing that we need to consider for the future of customer experience?

Sasha Fard 2:22

I think we learned so much over the last two days. I think, you know, obviously AI is a big topic. Everyone's talking about it. And I think there's really two ways to use AI. One is how can we use AI from an insights and analysis perspective to speed up analysis and you know, understand what are the key recommendations. And then also from the implementation side, how could we leverage the data that we have to implement, you know, potentially real-time next best action, next best conversation or content to really personalize customer experience for everyone.

Future Ready CX Skill Building

Jeannie Walters 2:57

Excellent. Well, I love that you mentioned that it will help with personalization for everyone, because that really is the future. So thank you so much. Thank you for spending a minute with me.

Sasha Fard 3:06

Thank you.

Heidi Taylor 3:06

Hi everyone, I'm Heidi Taylor. I am a senior global project manager for Lenovo.

Jeannie Walters 3:12

Excellent. And so we've heard a lot about the future here. What are some of the things that, or what are what is one thing that you would consider for the future of CX?

Heidi Taylor 3:20

I think CX practitioners are really going to need to think about rounding out their skills, right? So we have a lot of people that know how to make a survey or they know how to do data analytics. But I think you really need to start rounding out both your technical and your soft skills. So thinking about presentation skills, thinking about being able to tell stories. And then on the hard skills side, things like AI.

Jeannie Walters 3:44

There we go. We heard the word again.

Heidi Taylor 3:46

Yes. But you don't need to be an expert, but you do need to understand it.

Jeannie Walters 3:50

I love it. And it's a great reminder to work on things like storytelling and other soft skills.

Heidi Taylor 3:53

Absolutely.

Jeannie Walters 3:54

Thank you for taking a minute with me today.

Heidi Taylor 3:55

Thank you.

Emma Winstead 3:56

Hello, Emma Winstead. I'm a customer experience business partner for Delaware North, their gaming division.

Jeannie Walters 4:02

Excellent. And as we talk about the future, as we look to the future, what is one thing you think we have to start thinking about and understanding?

Emma Winstead 4:09

I think we have to think about how to better measure our guest emotions and really tie that into all of the things that we do.

AI Anchored In Customer Value

Jeannie Walters 4:16

Excellent. Excellent. And emotions, we sometimes act like they're not important in business, but holy cow, are they? Thank you so much for spending a minute with me.

Emma Winstead 4:27

Thank you.

Nicole Aguilera 4:27

Hi, I'm Nicola Aguilera, I'm a CX consultant at Mutual of Omaha.

Jeannie Walters 4:31

And we have heard a lot about the future, of course. So, what do you think is one of the most important things for us to think about as customer experience professionals for the future?

Nicole Aguilera 4:41

Yeah, there's a lot that's going to be happening in the future, but I think today we need to be thinking about AI and how we're going to leverage it in the way that we work and operate. Well, more most importantly, being strategic and anchoring to the value that we're going to provide for our customers and for our companies.

Jeannie Walters 4:57

Yes, and stay strategic. I love that you mentioned that and anchor it in value, right?

Nicole Aguilera 5:02

Absolutely.

Jeannie Walters 5:02

Very, very important. So thanks for spending a minute with me.

Nicole Aguilera 5:04

Thank you. Good to see you.

Human Centered Design With AI

Scott Lee Holloway 5:06

My name's Scott Lee Holloway, CCXP. I'm a certified customer experience professional. I'm a CX leader for a bank in Europe in the Mediterranean, originally from London. And I'm also a board member and treasurer for the CXPA, the Customer Experience Professionals Association.

Jeannie Walters 5:21

Excellent. And so you bring a European perspective. And as we look to the future of CX, what is one thing that we need to consider moving forward?

Scott Lee Holloway 5:30

So I think, of course, the burning topic right now is AI, right? And I believe that CX plays a really important role in ensuring that as we continue to leverage these really impressive technologies, that we keep human-centered design at the heart of that. So as we're deploying the technology, as Steve Jobs famously said, we must start from the user experience and then design the processes, the tech stack back from that, rather than the other way around. So that's going to be crucial as we as we continue to evolve. And the landscape's going to be unrecognizable in the next 12, 18 months. So CX is going to play a core role in ensuring that everyone's needs are being considered in those changes.

Jeannie Walters 6:06

I love that you mentioned really considering everyone's needs. So thank you. And thanks for spending a minute with me.

Scott Lee Holloway 6:11

Thank you.

Lauren Wier 6:12

Hi there, I'm Lauren Weir, Customer Experience Business Partner working for Delaware North, a hospitality company.

Jeannie Walters 6:17

Excellent. And we've done some work together. So it's fun to see you here. And we've been hearing a lot about the future. So what would you say is one of the things to consider for the future for customer experience and customer experience professionals?

Lauren Wier 6:30

For the future, I think implementing change using some behavioral science techniques we've learned about looking at how employees approach change, how they start to take on new and uncertain things, and applying that will be really critical moving forward, especially with technology moving in a very fast direction.

Jeannie Walters 6:46

Excellent. I totally agree. And we need to think about the people, the process, the tools, and the technology, right?

Lauren Wier 6:51

Absolutely.

Jeannie Walters 6:52

Great. Thank you for spending a minute with me.

Key Takeaways And How To Connect

Lauren Wier 6:54

Thank you.

Jeannie Walters 6:55

I love hearing how these different leaders think about the future of customer experience. Because, you know, some of the challenges that we face may evolve, but there's always an opportunity to lead, to lead with intention and empathy and a clear strategic vision. All the things that we talk about here. Because when we have that, the technology, the tools, the resources, those all help us implement that vision that we have. So a huge thank you to all of these incredible leaders who took a minute with me at this event so that they could answer this question and share their thoughts. And you know what? These are the kinds of conversations we need to continue to have to help move the work forward. So I'll continue to bring these conversations to you. If you want to reach out, let us know. You can always ask me a question at askjeannie.vip so we can have further conversations here on the podcast. And if you're listening and thinking about how to take the next step in your customer experience journey, I would love to invite you to join us within the CXI membership. This hub has all sorts of on-demand learning and curriculum. We have all of our recorded webinars and things like that in there. And then we also have live events every month, things like coworking sessions to help you get that work done, as well as webinars. You have one-on-one time with me. It's a pretty incredible value for what it is. So check that out at cximembership.com. So until next time, keep investigating that customer experience, keep acting on it, and I can't wait to hear what you do next. So keep sharing with us too. I'll see you next time.