Next in Queue

I may be biased, but this scene from Ted Lasso may be one of the best scenes in recent television history. Aside from reminding us how food can transport us back in time, it more importantly reminds us to always be curious. Asking questions is a skill we learn very early in childhood – particularly ones that begin with “Why?” But that curiosity is often stifled by the desire to appear informed, smart, and competent, particularly in the workplace.

Ashna Patel refuses to abandon that curiosity because she knows that asking questions is the most critical skill on the journey to success. That curiosity has led her to be recognized multiple times as a top influencer in Customer Success and she’s determined to help others develop their own sense of curiosity.

We discuss:

Follow Ashna on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashnapatel92/

CS Insider – https://www.csinsider.co/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

2500 years ago, before Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, the Greek philosopher Heraclitus observed the ever-present state of flux in everything. His philosophy on how everything flows is often paraphrased (or misquoted) as, “The only constant in life is change.”

On this episode of Jump the Queue, we’re exploring transitions.

Emma Lo started out as a cancer researcher in Taipei, Taiwan, moved to Canada, and then discovered what she really liked was interacting with people going through transitions rather than cells going through transitions.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-hanks-52b30768/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

Being an agent in a contact center can sometimes feel like Groundhog Day. You take call after call every shift and most of them sound like the calls you took the day before that, and the day before that, and the day before that. Of course, not everyone can thrive in that kind of environment. I mean, Bill Murray spent 12,395 days repeating the same day over and over, but he had no choice in the matter! Contact Center agents most certainly have a choice, so it’s critical to hire people who appreciate stability and predictability at work.

We discuss:

Follow EJ on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/ejkritz/

ath Power Consulting – https://www.athpower.com/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

If you’ve never seen it, watch footage of Jimi Hendrix at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967.  Then you’ll understand why his band was called The Jimi Hendrix Experience.  Their debut album – Are You Experienced? – was an immediate success, both critically and commercially.  But it was Jimi’s stagecraft, a revelation to

Dan Gingiss recognized a long time ago that all customers appreciate an experience and today, he teaches individuals, teams, and audiences around the world how to become The Experience Maker at their organization and elevate their brand to a customer-centric experience leader. 

We discuss:  

·        The skills he learned from direct mail marketing

·        The tightrope that is influencer marketing and how to do it right

·        Functions social media excel at for brands and functions to avoid

·        The value of “complainers” to brands

·        Personalization mistakes brands make and how to fix them

·        How ChatGPT will impact Customer Experience

·        Voice of Customer and Actions of Customer

·        Why Customer Experience Transformation projects fail

Follow Dan on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/dangingiss/

Dan Gingiss The Experience Maker™ – https://dangingiss.com/

Jimi Hendrix Guitar Sacrifice – https://youtu.be/_-7toYWFEyk

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

While the Princess Bride featured more famous quotes, Iñigo Montoya questioning Vizzini’s use of “Inconceivable” is not only memorable, but relatable in the business world when we hear terms used over and over in ways that may not be appropriate.   

While it’s not “inconceivable,” Neal Topf, President of Callzilla, has his own industry term that makes him feel like Iñigo Montoya every time he hears it in the wrong context.  But our conversation isn’t about semantics – it’s about the realities of CX when applied in the real world. 

We discuss:  

·        A tremendous weakness in the CX industry

·   A distinction between “client” and “customer”

·        Why he prefers “Servant Leaders” over “Thought Leaders”

·        Surprising places to find CX insights

·        The biggest challenges for companies to become profitable

·       The value of contrarians

·        Advice to entry level CX and/or Contact Center employees

Connect with Neal on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/nealtopfcustomerexperience/

Callzilla – https://www.callzilla.cx

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

We’re still a long way from learning Kung Fu in seconds like Neo did in The Matrix, but learning technology has come a long way over the past decade.  With the impending launch of Apple Vision Pro, and the recent impressive advances in Generative AI, is learning on the cusp of something completely different from what’s come before it?

David Wentworth, spent nearly 2 decades as a learning technology analyst before recently joining Schoox, a workplace learning platform.

We discuss:  

·        Why learning professionals have been slow to adopt new technologies

·        How YouTube changed learning

·        The simplest change organizations can easily make to supercharge learning

·        How virtual reality and the metaverse will impact learning

·        How Generative AI will impact learning

·        Tips on selecting an LMS for your organization

Connect with David on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmwentworth/

Schoox – http://www.schoox.com

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

Daily Affirmations with Stuart Smalley mocked the self-help industry, but there have been numerous studies affirming a wide array of benefits of both self-affirmations and words of encouragement from others.   

Casey Klein isn’t a self-help guru, but he is thinking about ways to make life in the contact center better for agents.  Among those ideas is using data to intervene and provide encouragement when agents have emotionally difficult calls.   

We discuss:  

·        Why contact centers experience staffing challenges

·        Virtual Agents pros and cons

·        Real-Time Guidance / Agent Scripting pros and cons

·        Robotic Process Automation (RPA)

·       AI’s role in Contact Centers going forward

·        Innovative ways to improve Employee Experience

Connect with Casey on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/casey-klein-961a98a/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

While the disdain Parks and Recreation’s Ron Swanson has for government is played for laughs, his view of government being inefficient and a lousy place to work is shared by many Americans.  But what if government inefficiency and employee dissatisfaction are, in part, because the software tools available to government employees haven’t kept up with the private sector?  What if Ron Swanson experienced government tools the same way he experienced bacon and eggs?

These are the kinds of questions Marketing professionals may be asking themselves after hearing what Mary Drumond has to say.  She’s focused on being customer centric in her marketing efforts, but her new market, local government, is often ignored.  You’ll be surprised to hear what happens when they’re not ignored. 

We discuss:  

·        What it means to be customer-centric in marketing

·        The importance of Voice of the Customer Data

·        The most cost-effective method of marketing today

·        Astounding misconceptions about government workers

·        The unexpected cost of not investing in technology

·        Mary issues a challenge to marketers

Connect with Mary on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/marydrumond/

The Customer Value Alignment (formerly Voices of CX) podcast – https://voicesofcx.com/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

In 1995’s Tommy Boy, Tommy Callahan used a story (rather unsuccessfully) to paint a customer experience, in this case, a B2B2C (Business

After cutting his teeth in CX at Best Buy, he fell in love with B2B CX and eventually wrote a book on the subject titled Do B2B Better: Drive Growth Through Game-Changing Customer Experience.  I asked him to join Next in Queue to talk about B2B CX and I didn’t take no for an answer! 

We discuss:  

·       The differences between B2C, B2B, and B2B2C

·       The most critical customer emotions to measure

·       How AI will be incorporated differently in B2B CX

·       What separates “CX Changemakers” from “CX Hopefuls”

·       The potential future of customer surveys

·       One piece of advice regarding presenting to executives

Connect with Jim on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/jimtincher/

Books by Jim Tincher – https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B07SNVH1DD?ingress=0&visitId=09a00189-8c45-4425-8a29-8f575cc5548d&store_ref=ap_rdr&ref_=ap_rdr

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/

Creed II was the 2018 installment of the Rocky “legacyquel” and in this moment, Rocky is about to take Adonis Creed to the middle of nowhere to begin training for his rematch against Viktor Drago.  Because the variables have changed, Rocky knows that Adonis needs to make big changes to achieve the success he’s grown accustomed to.

Kristi Faltorusso is an award-winning Customer Success Executive, and she has watched Client and Customer Success teams around the world (and on her own team) shrink – yet the needs of customers remain as high as ever.  It led her to ask, “How do you do the work you need to do differently with the resources you have?”

She’s decided it’s about making big changes in how CSMs operate.

We discuss:  

·        The role of Customer Success in an organization

·        Why she hates the phrase “Do more with less”

·        3 strategies for supporting customers with a smaller team

o   Customer Community / Education

o   Incorporating Automation / Creative Thinking

o   Reassessing Roles and Skills of Existing Team Members

·       The biggest skill CSMs (Customer Success Managers) need to master

·        A shocking admission from Kristi and what she plans to do about it

Connect with Kristi on LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/kristiserrano/

Keeping CS Simple – https://www.keepingcssimple.com/

Music courtesy of Big Red Horse – https://bigredhorseband.com/

Brought to you by Happitu – https://happitu.com/