The Experience Edge

Suchi Parikh, creative director and Director of Storytelling at PayPal who previously led global sales content at Apple, discusses clear persuasion in business communication. She covers why presentations fail, the power of a single-word anchor, structuring stories around purpose-problem-solution, designing for emotional shifts in journeys, and practical checks like anchoring, empathy, and rehearsal.

What if friction in customer experiences isn't always a bad thing? Discover how intentional friction can enhance memory and decision-making. Real-world examples like IKEA and Enterprise Rent-A-Car show that moments of pause can boost satisfaction. Learn about the ethical line between helpful and manipulative friction. Jochem explores how to design journeys that create meaningful moments rather than just removing effort. This thought-provoking discussion challenges the notion that speed is everything in customer experience.

Are journey maps just artifacts or operating systems in disguise?In this episode, Jochem reflects on his conversation with Dan Sullivan, Director of Journey Management at CHG Healthcare, to explore how journey management becomes true organizational design.Dan's team didn’t just improve customer journeys - they restructured how decisions get made across teams. From building a “Journey Atlas” as a shared schema, to using immersive experiences to rewire executive thinking, their work signals a deeper shift: journey management isn’t about prettier maps. It’s about embedding customer thinking into the operating model.In this video:Why journey management = organizational designHow CSG created a decision-making nervous systemThe role of schema, structure, and centralized governanceWhat 500 people experienced inside the “journey museum”Signs your journey maps are shaping strategy—not just workshopsFollow Jochem on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jochemvanderveerLearn more about Journey Management with TheyDo: https://www.theydo.com

Charissa Riddle, a seasoned leader in experience design and customer strategy, shares her insights from over 20 years at Electronic Arts, PayPal, and eBay. She reframes customer experience as a system rather than a mere department, emphasizing its intertwined functions. Charissa explains the importance of actionable objectives and opposes vague goals, advocating for tangible experience containers. The conversation also highlights how emotional interactions impact business outcomes and the necessity of governance in customer journey management.

Join Martha Cotton, Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase and seasoned design leader with a rich background in cultural anthropology. She delves into the critical role of empathy and collaboration in design leadership. Martha emphasizes the necessity for designers to speak business language and design for adoption, ensuring user experiences provide tangible business value. She also discusses the integration of data in design, the potential of AI as a creative partner, and how organizational change can be effectively achieved through collaborative efforts.

Unpacking the complexities of customer experience, Jochem van der Veer reveals that ROI isn't just a single number. He emphasizes measuring customer outcomes, operational efficiency, and strategic influence to demonstrate true impact. Through relatable examples like retail banking and airlines, he illustrates how improving these areas can reduce churn, enhance cash flow, and streamline operations. Jochem argues for a systems-level perspective, urging CX teams to shift their focus from dashboards to meaningful business outcomes.

Sam Stern, Service Design Lead at LinkedIn and longtime CX thinker, joins TheyDo’s Jochem van der Veer to explore how journeys, data, and behavioral science shape memorable experiences. With a background spanning Forrester, New Balance, and his own CX Patterns podcast, Sam reveals why perfection is overrated and why some friction, when engineered well, can actually deepen customer value.They dig into good friction, employee experience design, cross-silo collaboration, and how AI is reshaping research workflows. Sam challenges long held CX doctrines, offering a fresh lens on how to create experiences that customers remember and teams can deliver with confidence.Guest BioSam Stern is the Service Design Lead at LinkedIn, where he focuses on improving the employee and customer facing experiences that power the platform’s global ecosystem. Before LinkedIn, Sam spent nearly 16 years as a Principal Analyst at Forrester, shaping industry thinking on customer experience. He has also led CX at New Balance and is the creator of the CX Patterns podcast and newsletter. Sam is known for blending behavioral science, service design, and practical business insight to help organizations craft experiences that matter.Key TakeawaysGood friction can enhance memorability when intentionally designed, contrasted with the CX habit of removing all friction.Behavioral science principles like anticipation, contrast, and peak moments remain underused in customer experience design.Service design at LinkedIn prioritizes improving the employee experience for 12,000+ customer facing roles to strengthen customer outcomes.Journey readouts become dramatically more effective when grounded in video evidence from real users.AI accelerates research workflows but amplifies, rather than replaces, human judgment and context setting.Chapters00:00 Introduction to Sam Stern 02:00 Why another CX book 05:00 The concept of good friction 08:30 When friction helps and when it harms 12:00 Ethical considerations in engineered friction 16:00 How service design operates inside LinkedIn 21:00 Secrets to effective journey readouts 24:00 Helping product teams see beyond their scope 26:45 How prioritization works across product and CX 29:00 Journey atlas and cross org context 32:00 Blending CX, UX, and service design roles 35:00 Business impact and full stack builder 39:00 AI’s role in research and insight development 43:00 Can AI ever understand context 49:00 The future of service design and CX 58:00 Why silos aren’t going away 59:00 Where to find SamLinkedInFollow Sam Stern: Post on Good Friction Post on Book announcement Follow Jochem van der Veer:

After more than 20 years at Philips, Tina Lilje knows what it takes to make customer experience more than a metric. As former Global Head of Customer Experience, she built a CX strategy across 100+ countries and 75,000 employees—connecting the dots between service, design, and leadership.In this episode, Tina and TheyDo’s Jochem van der Veer explore how healthcare is embracing AI without losing its human touch. From fixing design flaws that cost millions to turning executives into customer sponsors, Tina shares why the most successful CX strategies start with root causes, not dashboards—and why humans will always be healthcare’s most valuable premium.Guest BioTina Lilje is the former Global Head of Customer Experience at Philips, where she led the company’s global CX transformation across healthcare and B2B markets. Over two decades, she moved from marketing and M&A to executive CX leadership, designing a customer-first strategy spanning more than 100 countries. Known for operationalizing CX and aligning global teams around root-cause improvement, Tina now advises organizations on embedding customer-centric thinking that actually sticks.Key TakeawaysFix root causes, not symptoms: Sustainable CX impact comes from addressing systemic design flaws, not surface-level issues.AI in healthcare needs humans: Technology should enhance, not replace, human care, especially in regulated, high-stakes industries.Customer voice is the strongest lever: Bringing real customer stories into leadership discussions drives alignment and urgency.KPIs must match behavior: Incentives shape culture, customer goals only work when bonuses, priorities, and structures reinforce them.Consistency beats perfection: True CX excellence lies in reliability, authenticity, and operational follow-through.Episode Chapters00:00 Welcome and introduction 03:00 Why humans are a premium in healthcare’s AI era 06:00 Balancing innovation with regulation in clinical settings 09:50 How small CX fixes drive major impact 14:30 Discovering the “detector” moment: fixing root causes 18:00 Turning CX from a program into a lasting function 25:00 Finding mentors and building CX leadership credibility 33:00 Creating partnerships, not transactions, with customers 41:00 Why NPS failed and what replaced it 48:20 Embedding CX across functions and KPIs 52:00 Aligning around customer realities, not silos 56:00 Incentives, ownership, and the human factor 01:04:00 When to go “all in” on CX, and when not to 01:06:30 Tina’s next chapter and closing thoughtsLinkedIn ProfilesFollow Tina Lilje: Follow Jochem van der Veer (TheyDo):

Can AI actually help you understand your customers - or is it just noise at scale?As teams lean into AI to handle discovery work, it’s tempting to treat all insights as equal. But not all research sources are created equal - and AI isn’t great at everything.In this episode, Jochem Van Der Veer breaks down where AI actually supports discovery... and where it silently sabotages it. This is a guide for anyone using AI to scale research, sift through feedback, or make sense of customer data.What You’ll Learn: • A side-by-side breakdown of 8 key research sources - and where AI helps (or fails) • Why AI performs well on written support data but fails to read tone, sarcasm, or urgency • How AI misses the intent behind interviews - and why that matters for product decisions • The danger of over-trusting CRM notes, sales transcripts, and survey sentiment without context • How to combine AI-assisted insights with human nuance to get to real customer truthFollow Jochem van der Veer on LinkedInLearn more about Journey Management with TheyDo

Dan Sullivan, Director of Journey Management at CHG Healthcare, revolutionizes customer experience by integrating data and insights to align customer needs with business outcomes. He explains how journey management goes beyond mere mapping to reshape decision-making across teams. Dan highlights the importance of storytelling for engagement, the creation of an immersive 'Journey Museum', and balancing customer focus with business goals. His innovative approaches demonstrate how organizations can foster lasting change and align their strategies with customer-centric thinking.