Be Customer Led

https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulteshima/ (Paul Teshima) is the Chief Client Experience Officer and Head of Wealthsimple Invest. https://www.wealthsimple.com/en-ca/ (Wealthsimple) is a financial technology company that gives their clients powerful financial tools and human advice to help them grow and manage their money.

Paul and I sat down to talk about:

🎙 His journey through Product and Strategy roles into Experience

🎙 The evolution of Customer Experience from his lens

🎙 The evolution of the Chief Experience Officer role and its proliferation across industry

🎙 Advice for people on the Product side looking to move over to Experience

🎙 How he influences culture from his seat

An amazing conversation with significant product and operational perspective, who is bringing all of that to bear to create great experiences for Wealthsimple's customers.

I had to burn my mic after this show. Seriously. https://www.linkedin.com/in/matt-watkinson/ (Matt Watkinson), CEO and Co-Founder of https://www.methodical.io/ (Methodical), an experience design agency, is just awesome.

There are three books that I've read on customer experience (CX) over the last +20 years that have shifted my view on the discipline: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joepine/ (Joe Pine)'s 'https://www.amazon.com/Experience-Economy-New-Preface-Authors/dp/1633697975/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1andkeywords=the+experience+economyandqid=1629292651andsr=8-1 (The Experience Economy)', https://www.linkedin.com/in/lukewilliamscx/ (Luke Williams)' 'https://www.amazon.com/Wallet-Allocation-Rule-Winning-Battle/dp/B00ZAM9HFM/ref=sr_1_1?crid=29T6HTRU0H6DUanddchild=1andkeywords=wallet+allocation+ruleandqid=1629292705andsprefix=the+wallet+allocation+%2Caps%2C165andsr=8-1 (The Wallet Allocation Rule)', and Matt Watkinson's 'https://www.amazon.com/Grid-Decision-making-Every-Business-Including-ebook/dp/B01M01HPWC/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1andkeywords=the+grid%2C+matt+watkinsonandqid=1629292748ands=audibleandsr=1-1-catcorr (The Grid)'. (And this is Matt's second book).

On this show, we cover a range of topics, including:

🎙 How the best designers are designing to elicit emotion

🎙 A principle from his first book, 'Not Leaving Anything to Chance'

🎙 The importance and use of systems thinking in customer experience

🎙 Why CX, as a discipline, is failing today

🎙 The 'Law of Double Jeopardy' in CX

🎙 Why many CX practitioners are tying their work to real business outcomes

I learn from Matt all the time, and he's on my personal Top 10 CX Leaders list. If you're not familiar with him, I would hit up his LinkedIn profile today and check out Methodical's work.

{insert burning mic emoji here}

https://www.linkedin.com/in/picciano/ (Skip Picciano) is the Managing Partner of https://www.team-ecx.com/ (Effortless CX Consulting), a business focused on contact center leadership teams helping them identify technology requirements and discover practical industry solutions.

Skip and I first met in California pre-pandemic, so it was great to catch up and talk about a topic we're both passionate about - contact centers. I know it's geeky, but it's an important topic and it's a great conversation.

Skip and I cover a ton in our 30 mins together:

🎙 Why you need to start viewing your Contact Center like a profit center

🎙 The evolving role of tech in customer support

🎙 Skip's view on where the Contact Center tech stack is going in the next 3-5 years

🎙 Agent tools and how that's helping employees be better at their jobs

🎙 Skips advice to Contact Center leads on how to assess and select the right tech partner

An awesome show with a contact center veteran dedicating his professional career to helping businesses make better, more informed decisions around a key function in the business.

This is a must listen!

https://www.linkedin.com/in/mattmanners/ (Matt Manners) is the CEO and Founder of https://www.inspiring-workplaces.com/ (Inspiring Workplaces), an organization dedicated to changing the world through the world of work. How do they do this? Matt and his team are building a community of individuals and companies dedicated to inspire, hold regular https://www.inspiring-workplaces.com/our-events/ (events) and https://www.inspiring-workplaces.com/awards/ (awards) to shine a light on those inspiring, and have developed an https://www.inspiring-workplaces.com/academy/ (Academy) around the work.

In this episode, Matt speaks with Be Customer Led about:

🎙 What differentiates those organizations that get it and are creating winning cultures vs. those that don't

🎙 What differentiates the individual vs. the broader environment in contributing to engagement

🎙 How we can move away from the jargon and stop conflating employee experience, employee engagement, and culture

🎙 We wrap up with what Inspiring Workplaces is trying to achieve in the marketplace

A great interview with a truly inspiring individual dedicated to making every company a place where employees are engaged, motivated, and bringing their whole selves to work.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/marc-brackett-10a563/ (Marc Brackett) is the Founding Director for the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence (EI), and Professor at the Child Study Center at Yale's School of Medicine. Marc is also the author of https://www.amazon.com/s?k=permission+to+feel+marc+brackettandgclid=CjwKCAjwgISIBhBfEiwALE19SULJVp9rZ4th8RFuutLJ4QvO4fsua64dPmO6UcU7QGk-Z-gA_GWY_hoCtj8QAvD_BwEandhvadid=323489388229andhvdev=candhvlocphy=9002094andhvnetw=gandhvqmt=eandhvrand=5506376428573208186andhvtargid=kwd-678212132142andhydadcr=20176_10155513andtag=googhydr-20andref=pd_sl_5zw48lbv0t_e (Permission to Feel), which is one of the best books of read in the past year.

Marc and I talked about EI, why he's dedicated his life's work to the topic and how we can develop this skill as people and professionals. Specifically, I wanted to understand if there is EI at the team level and company level, and how that affects team or company performance.

Marc and I also discuss how technology is impacting our ability to exhibit higher levels of EI. Given the rapid digitalization due to COVID, this is a topic that has fascinated me for a while now.

Finally, Marc puts me "in the chair" and I share some personal stories - something that has happened on the show before, but definitely gets me thinking and wondering about where I can improve.

Such a pleasure to have Marc on the show and an incredible amount of learning during out time together!

Sonia Mooney worked for major brands like https://www.rolls-royce.com/ (Rolls Royce) and Aviva in senior-level HR and Talent roles before blazing her own path and starting Signature Solutions. Sonia is also a Contributor for UNLEASH, an interesting platform for HR professionals.

I am a huge fan of Sonia's and her thought leadership around the future of HR and the need for Agile, Tech Transformation, and Data for the function to be successful over the long-term. When it comes to Employee Experience and HR's role, there is no better thought leader out there.

Sonia and I cover some super important topics that many organizations are trying to tackle as we speak:

🎙 How the global pandemic has sharpened focus on Employee Experience broadly and why

🎙 Where HR is or is not having an impact on Employee Experience

🎙 Why technology is the question, and not the answer

🎙 How the future of HR is Agile

🎙 How Agile and Digital Transformation plays a role in bringing together Employee and Customer Experience

🎙 The importance of data in accelerating your Employee Experience efforts

🎙 Why HR is still relevant

An amazing show with someone who not only has deep domain expertise in HR, but is truly leading new thinking in this space.

A must listen!

The traditional questionnaire survey is dead. Don't think so? Read and listen on...

https://www.linkedin.com/in/davecarruthers/ (Dave Carruthers) is Founder and CEO of https://site.voxpopme.com/video-surveys/ (Voxpopme), a video survey platform that enables you to uncover powerful human insights that inspire and engage, to drive smart decisions, and company growth. Oh, did I mention it also includes advanced analytical capabilities?

We cover super important topics today, including:

Why video is better and how it's scalable

Why companies need to get over the fear of video

Benefits of video in driving empathy and awareness

Where the medium is headed in 3-5 years

How you can marry video through the customer journey

Using video on the employee experience (EX) side too

Such a cool conversation. If you're not capturing feedback via video today, you should really consider revisiting your insight strategy today.

Carolene Méli worked for major brands including https://shop.lululemon.com/ (lululemon) and https://www.cirquedusoleil.com/ (Cirque du Soleil) before blazing her own path and creating a platform called https://carolenemeli.com/ (The Experience Creators).

A world traveller, she saw first-hand the importance of leadership when it comes to developing memorable experiences. And to develop memorable experiences, you must first master yourself, before you can truly lead.

In this episode, Carolene gives us a sneak peak into The Experience Creators learning journey she created, including insight into the four modules:

Understanding Your Experience

Leading Yourself, incl. creating a leadership vision statement!

Leading Your Team, and a new take on leading the team

Leading Your Guest, and the six stages

Carolene's perspective is completely new, refreshing, and starts with the individual and the impact they can have as part of the team.

Recommend checking out this show if you are thinking about leadership's impact in your organization and where to start.

Dr. BehNaz Gholami is Executive Director at Dizen, an organization that focuses on research, design and innovation to transform organizational culture by enhancing the human experience.

Dr. Gholami is one of the only people I've met that brings together Change Management with Human Centered Design (HCD) - a truly powerful combination.

In this episode, Dr. Gholami and I cover:

Her definition of Human Experience (HX) and how that fits in with Customer (CX) and Employee Experience (EX)

Creating culture in a remote or hybrid environment

How Human Resources departments are leveraging HCD and how CX teams can help

How she brings together the two disciplines of Change Management and HCD in her work with clients

Super interesting guest, and a very thought-provoking episode.

A must listen!

Amy Shore is EVP, Chief Customer Officer for Nationwide, a large financial services company based in the US. Nationwide is focused on personal and commercial insurance, investment and retirement products, and banking.

Amy's background is super interesting: leading Sales, Operations, and Product functions before taking on the Chief Customer Officer (CCO) role. I personally love to see someone with varied experience across an organization before taking on a CCO/CXO role; it gives them a deeper appreciation for the customer, the product, and sets the business up for greater success.

Amy and I cover a number of topics, including:

Her favorite CX metrics and how to connect it with Business metrics

Culture change and change management as part of her role

Influencing across Nationwide and achieving Office of the Customer goals and objectives

What differentiates success in the seat and how being a CCO is different from other roles

Advice for other female leaders who aspire to become a CCO in the future

Advice for allies and those who promote female leadership in CX

This was originally recorded and streamed live over LinkedIn and Twitter, but just recently turned into a podcast for those who may have missed the livestream.

An excellent show with a seasoned and respected leader!