In this episode of the Training Impact Podcast, Jeff Walter welcomes Matthew Reyes for one of the most human-centered conversations the show has hosted to date. What begins as a discussion about customer experience and training quickly becomes a deeper exploration of motivation, habit formation, and why many training programs struggle to create lasting behavior change.

Matthew brings more than two decades of experience leading large customer experience and support organizations at companies including Crunchyroll, Milestone, and eSignal. Throughout the conversation, he challenges a common assumption in learning and development. Training does not fail because people are unwilling to learn. It fails because organizations underestimate the role human needs play in performance, engagement, and consistency. Content alone does not create capability, and systems alone do not create commitment.

Jeff and Matthew unpack what customer experience really means beyond software or interfaces. Customer experience is the full journey someone has with a brand, shaped by human interactions, support conversations, AI agents, partners, and frontline employees. Because many of those people do not work directly for the organization, training becomes the primary lever for consistency, trust, and quality across distributed environments.

The conversation then shifts from traditional training design to motivation. Matthew explains why incentives and surface-level rewards miss the mark and why generational labels like “Gen Z challenges” often point to unmet needs rather than attitude problems. Short attention spans, desire for feedback, and emphasis on mental health are signals that traditional systems are no longer aligned with how people work.

At the center of the episode is Matthew’s framework of six core human needs: safety and familiarity, variety, significance, connection, growth, and contribution. These needs are not hierarchical. They coexist, and when at least three are met consistently within a process, behavior becomes repeatable and habit-forming. Matthew shares how this insight emerged from studying engagement patterns in gaming and subscription environments and how the same principles apply to workforce development.

Listeners will hear how these ideas translate into practical training design. From scaling teams rapidly to building train-the-trainer models, Matthew explains how effective programs focus on identity as much as skill. Learn-do-teach becomes a human system, where learning creates safety, doing drives growth, and teaching reinforces significance and contribution.

The episode also explores individual adaptation and inclusion through a powerful example of redesigning work for an underperforming agent with ADHD and dyslexia. By adjusting workflows instead of forcing conformity, performance improved dramatically in days, not months.

The conversation concludes with Matthew’s work mentoring men transitioning back into society after incarceration. The same framework applies. Before goals can be set, foundational skills like time management, self-measurement, and purpose must exist. By teaching personal KPIs and connecting actions to future identity, lasting change becomes possible.

This episode reinforces a simple but often overlooked truth. Training is not primarily about delivering content. It is about designing environments that meet human needs so the right behaviors become repeatable.

🎧 Listen to the full episode here: