Punk CX: Customer Experience Insights with Adrian Swinscoe

Today’s interview is with Annette Franz, an author, speaker and founder and CEO of CX Journey Inc. She is also an old friend of the podcast and appeared back in 2019. She joins me today to talk about her new book: Employee Understanding: A Three-Pillar Framework for Designing a Great Experience and Driving Business Success, the difference between employee engagement and employee experience, the time that Annette was working at JD Power & Assocs and W. Earl Sasser, Jr. and Leonard Schlesinger (both from Harvard and two of the authors of Putting the Service Profit Chain to Work) came to their office and what leaders should do first if they want to design and deliver a great employee experience. This interview follows on from my recent interview – Without context, an insight is worth nothing – Interview with Jochem van der Veer of TheyDo – and is number 546 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Jochem van der Veer, Co-Founder and CEO of TheyDo, dives into the world of journey management, emphasizing its role in crafting seamless customer experiences. He discusses the pitfalls of data overload and the lack of collaboration among departments in decision-making. They explore the necessity of engaging leaders directly with customers to foster satisfaction and a customer-centric culture. The conversation highlights the evolving significance of journey mapping, revealing how it can drive business success when approached thoughtfully.

Today’s interview is with Nikola Mrkšić, Co-founder & CEO of PolyAI, a leading supplier of Conversational AI for automated customer service. We talk about some recent research of theirs that finds that the phone still reigns in customer service, making the contact center into a ‘command center,’ why voice channels aren’t relics of the past but are, in fact, essential infrastructure, that customer service interactions are becoming increasingly contentious and what their AI capabilities are doing to help with that. This interview follows on from my recent interview – The future of CX and agentic CX – Interview with Sid Banerjee of Medallia – and is number 544 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Sid Banerjee, Chief Strategy Officer at Medallia and former CEO of Clarabridge, joins the discussion on the evolving landscape of customer experience. He shares insights on balancing AI and human touch in CX, the impact of large language models on service delivery, and the challenges brands face amid technological advancements. Banerjee also highlights innovative strategies from companies like Jaguar Land Rover. With humor and anecdotes, he emphasizes the importance of laughter and community in navigating tough times.

Marcelo Calbucci, an entrepreneur and author of 'The PRFAQ Framework', shares insights on leveraging Amazon's innovative techniques for businesses. He elaborates on the PRFAQ framework, stressing its role in defining product vision and enhancing communication over traditional methods. Marcelo addresses overcoming writing fear and the importance of understanding human behavior for improving customer experiences. He also discusses the positive impact of AI on innovation and job creation, highlighting companies renowned for exceptional customer service.

Today’s interview is with Naomi Rankin, the Manager of Global Customer Care at Lush, the British cosmetics retailer. I spoke to Naomi when I attended Zendesk’s recent Relate event, which took place in Las Vegas on March 25th-27th. We talk about her highlights from the event, what customer care means to Lush, their approach to AI and her journey with Lush from starting work in one of their shops to now managing the global customer care team that covers 24 markets, 15 different languages, and another 20 partner markets. This interview follows on from my recent interview – Omnichannel was a myth – Interview with Gaurav Passi of Zingly – and is number 541 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Today’s interview is with Gaurav Passi, Founder & CEO of Zingly. He joins me today to talk about some research that they have recently conducted about FORO (the Fear of Reaching Out), the Great CX Paradox, why Omnichannel was a myth and how ‘Rooms’ could be the answer. This interview follows on from my recent interview – Why businesses need to invest in both brand and customer experience – Interview with Martin Gill of Forrester – and is number 540 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Today’s interview is with Martin Gill, VP, Research Director at Forrester. Martin joins me today to talk about their upcoming CX Summit EMEA that will be taking place in London (and digitally) from June 2–4, 2025. We explore the major themes of the event, including why businesses need to invest in both brand and customer experience to maximise growth, what practitioners should be keeping in mind when thinking about design for the future of experiences and the role of organisational culture and leadership in all of that. You can find out more about the event here. Also, if you use the discount code CXEMEAPUNK, you’ll get 10% off the ticket price. This interview follows on from my recent interview – Legacy transformation, agentic AI and how to get it right – Interview with Don Schuerman of Pega – and is number 539 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Today’s interview is with Don Schuerman, the CTO at Pegasystems, an industry-leading low-code platform for AI-powered decisioning and workflow automation. Don joins me today to talk about the upcoming PegaWorld 2025 (PegaWorld is taking place at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas from June 1st to the 3rd), Agentic AI (obvs.), how some organizations are implementing agentic solutions and it is causing chaos, a better way to do it, Pega Blueprint, legacy transformation and how to get it right. This podcast is sponsored by Pega. This interview follows on from my recent interview – Starting a resolution revolution – Interview with Tom Eggemeier, Adrian McDermott and Matthias Göhler of Zendesk – and is number 538 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.

Today’s podcast is a two-parter and features interviews with Tom Eggemeier, Adrian McDermott and Matthias Göhler, which took place at Zendesk’s recent Relate event, which took place in Las Vegas on March 25th-27th. Tom Eggemeier is the Chief Executive Officer of Zendesk, Adrian McDermott is the Chief Technology Officer at Zendesk, and Matthias Göhler is EMEA Chief Technology Officer at Zendesk. We talk about all of the latest developments at Zendesk, some of the big product announcements, starting another revolution and how knowledge is the coal in this latest industrial revolution. This interview follows on from my recent interview – AI-driven search volumes are exploding and what brands should be doing about it – Interview with Vivek Pandya of Adobe – and is number 537 in the series of interviews with authors and business leaders who are doing great things, providing valuable insights, helping businesses innovate and delivering great service and experience to both their customers and their employees.