Customer Experience Superheroes - Series 13 Episode 3 - Failing Forward: CX Lessons Learned - Friederike Niehoff & Aleksandra Pilniak

Several months ago I received a book in the post with a note which read, 'Dear Christopher, Enjoy reading our book and let us know what you think of it. We would be happy to become part your CX book club, kind regards Friederike and Aleksandra. And now it has happened!

Join me Christopher Brooks, your host for the CX Superheroes podcast series as we complete the 6th CX Book Review in our one off series with Friederike Niehoff and Alexsandra Pilniak. Combining our CX Book Club Q&A with some guest members, and our CX Superhero podcast, we have created an interesting mash up. 

Hear how having worked together at Kramp, Friederike and Aleksandra vowed to work again, and with encouragement set about to write a book which focussed on the  many reasons CX programmes fail. It acts as a safety manual helping others avoid the pitfalls our intrepid duo have encountered.

The book is full of their favourite inspirations; both frameworks and commentators. Throughout it becomes clear how important they believe  authenticity to achieve success from CX, and its a position we can all get behind. 

We also hear how the process worked in creating the book and how a partnership is needed when it comes to content.  

So tune in to the latest podcast, on the final book review of the current series. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:09

Hello and welcome to an episode of Customer Experience Superheroes Podcast. My name is Christopher Brooks and I am your host throughout this series. A series in which we bring you inspirational figures from in the world of customer experience. They share their ideas and their insights, and we hope you as the listener can take some value from what they share and apply them to your own worlds. Today is a bit of a double whammy because it's a superhero podcast Meets the Customer Experience Book Club. So at Lexton, the company I work for, we've been running the CX Book Club for about 18 months or so now. And it was a way of encouraging those who find it challenging to get their head into business books to come together with other like-minded CX people and spend some time indulging in some of the customer experience titles that are available. We would get together, have a QA session with the authors, and also then run a workshop so we could demonstrate how we could turn the principles in their books into practical usage within the workplace. This year we've completed the final of our current series in the book club, and that is the book titled Why Your Customer Experience Program Will Fail. Now, if you've come across this title, you'll know it's by the incredible Frederick Nierhoff and Alexandra Pilniak, who, as a kind of powerful double act, have put together what is a brutally honest and in their own words authentic book on how to deliver customer experience successfully by understanding and recognizing all of the traps and the opportunities to fail along the way. So we caught up with the dynamic duo recently when we hosted our CX Book Club episode and combined it with this superheroes podcast. So I hope you enjoy the mashup as they tell you all about why they got into writing the book, the creative process, which is one of the most interesting we've come across in the book club, and also they share their answers to some of the questions that the people in the book club pose. So hope you enjoy it. Over to the dynamic duo. So we are here today for another one of our book clubs, and we have Alexandra and Frederick with us who have penned some some time ago, not a long, long time ago, but some time ago, why your customer experience programme will fail. So welcome to you both. How are you? Thank you, Christopher. Great to be here. Thanks. Excellent. Thank you for coming along. I've actually got my copy here, and uh you won't remember this, but I've got the card that says, Dear Christopher, enjoy reading our book and let us know what you think of it. We would be happy to become part of your book club. So if if I was some sort of weird wish giver, this is it.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

We do remember writing this.

SPEAKER_04 3:23

It's legible as well, which is very different to my own.

SPEAKER_01 3:26

But um it must it must have been me then who wrote the so it's finally it's finally happened.

SPEAKER_04 3:34

We're having it here. I'm sure this this won't be or hasn't been kind of the the pinnacle of your engagements throughout this because what we find talking to authors is you get invited to some strange and wonderful things when you've written a book. So it'll be interesting to find out both nodding there. So it'll be interesting to find out how that goes. Okay, so um, and we have some of our book club members uh here with us. We've got Michael, Natasha, Lauren, and and Kat. So um we're gonna get to know Alexandra and Frederick a bit to understand the motivation for the book. Um, you actually give us quite a good appreciation, more than any other author I think I've come across, in terms of your process of working together. And um, you're both smiling, you seem to get along. It seemed to like, you know, work at the moment quite often. We had our previous uh author was Professor uh Dr. Phil Klaus, and we said, How was it? And he said, I hated it, absolutely hated it, never again. Really didn't enjoy the process at all. So it'd be interesting to see how it was for you.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

Um we had those moments too, Chris.

SPEAKER_04 4:32

Oh, we had those moments. You have to be honest the way you go on about authenticity in your book. You know, you have to be, don't you? Um and uh and obviously we'll we'll go into some of the topics uh in the book. It's a it's a very refreshing write, I have to say. Um, I don't know whether you had a lot of battles with your editor to keep stuff in. I don't know, we'll find that out, but there's lots of you know what you shouldn't do, which quite often editors don't want you to include, but we'll we'll we'll find out from you as we go on. But um, quick introductions then. So um uh I had a look at LinkedIn profiles. You both also have the rarity of of authors' um kind of credibility of working within companies as well. Quite often there's there's people who stand on stage and tell us what it's like to work in a company, but you guys actually are working within the organizations and appreciate um, I think some of the way you've you've written it, you can tell that perspective is coming rather than from the outside kind of viewing in. So, Alexandra, you're first on my screen. Could you give us a little bit of an introduction about yourself and and your way in the world of customer experience?

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Yeah, of course. So I was born and raised in Poland, and then I did my studies in Italy in Milan. This is where I fell in love with the language, the culture, uh the Italian mentality. Uh, and uh for the past 11 years already. Oh my gosh, the time flies. I'm living in the Netherlands. So I had quite some international experience. Um I uh I work as a customer-centric culture manager currently at Crumb. It's an agricultural wholesale in the Netherlands. Um, well, yeah, present in the whole Europe, uh, serving uh more than 60,000 customers and having more than billion, one billion turnover. Um I of course worked in customer experience previously as well. So uh for me that's already 10 years working in that field uh jointly with project management and marketing as well as sales. So quite a vast portfolio, uh so to say. Uh I'm passionate about people and about culture. That's why I'm also a uh certified also organizational culture practitioner to help organizations to assess their level of the culture that they have in the organization and if it supports their strategy or eats it for breakfast and lunch and dinner. Uh I was also judging at the six awards um because I love celebrating people who go the extra mile, do the extraordinary work, and really appreciate their effort. So I think that's for me personally very important. And I think in the whole field of customer experience, we should do more of that. And uh of course, since January, a published author, and since December uh last year, I'm also a proud, happy, but also extremely exhausted mom. So those of you who are parents, I think can uh can relate, and uh, brain fog is a real thing, that's for sure.

SPEAKER_04 7:26

Uh congratulations on that. I know we were due to to meet up previously, but understandably you were busy, and of course, you will continue to be busy for the rest of your life.

SPEAKER_01 7:36

The rest of my life, but obviously, yes. But that's the most important role that I will ever have in my life, so that's priority number one. But uh yeah, uh definitely happy to be back also uh in the professional uh setup uh and find some new inspiration, meet with people who who are like-minded and exchange ideas. That's always something that uh fuels me and gives me a lot of satisfaction. So great to be part of uh today's.

SPEAKER_04 7:59

That's wonderful. Thank you. And I'm glad you say about the awards because um having having myself judged awards as well, I I love being in that moment when someone's presenting the you know what they consider to be the best they can possibly be. And it's just it's just where else do you get that? Maybe on your wedding day where you're kind of standing up and presenting the best version of yourself to all the people you love. But you know, those awards people think I've done really well here, and they've got to the final and they're presenting it to you, really proud of it. And you you almost you well up a little bit because it's a case of God, you know. This is just does feel a motive, and it's okay to feel emotive. So I'm glad you get that perspective as well.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

And it's very often for me what was extremely valuable. That's very often you just come across companies you've never heard of uh from industries that maybe you were unaware of, and they do super cool things, and that's extremely inspirational and deserves to be put on the spotlight more often.

SPEAKER_04 8:53

So exactly you get you get to understand the conditions and the the expectations and the context of their markets, and you go, Oh, I've never really thought about how challenging that must be to make customer experience a success. Thank you, Alexandra. Lovely, lovely introduction, and great to see you again. Frederic, would you mind um giving us an appreciation of your your journey through customer experience as well? Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_03 9:15

I'm a customer experience coach actually, so I really help individuals, CX professionals in different industries to get more out of their CX programs. That's uh what I like to do most. Um, and it's all it also connects nicely with my background because I studied uh psychology and coaching. I have a master in economic and consumer psychology, so I'm all about behavior and why do we do what we do, not only consumers but also normal people. Um yeah, I'm native German. I grew up in in Germany and I moved to the Netherlands 15 years ago. So just like Alexandra, I have a different background and I love to work with different cultures and uh yeah, really dive into those differences. Um, I'm a certified customer experience professional since 2019. Uh I'm also a columnist uh to CX Magazine here in the Netherlands because I love sharing stories and writing about customer experience. I'm not sure if you recognize that, but if you work in customer experience, it doesn't matter where you go or what you do, you always look at it from a different perspective, right? You you judge it almost from like the CX professional point of view. Like how could this have been done differently, or what did they do so well to make you feel welcome or to make make you feel um yeah, a happy customer. So I like to share those stories. Um yeah, I have a history of working in uh CX for for 10 years in different roles. Uh CX management, CX interim management, uh conversion optimization in the very early years of my career, more focusing on the online side. Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:56

You're also a published author as well now. I'm also a published author, yes. Thanks for pointing that out, Christopher. Yeah. So uh wonderful. Well, it's great to hear. I mean, um, I've always found you, Frederick, to be someone who is committed to the community and you know, raising standards um and sharing kind of expertise and learning uh uh along the way. And I think you're absolutely right in that respect. We do look at things slightly differently. Um, I think when you're in customer experience, you you try and look at it from why are they doing this? What's the outcome they're trying to achieve? And has it worked? Because you know, it may, it may be, it was really well intended, but by the time it's got diluted down to being something quite awful and landed in front of us, it feels quite quite uncomfortable. But you know, being able to process where that might have come from is is really quite healthy. Well, look, thank you both for giving that wonderful introduction. And you are you are joined, I'm sure, in in many different ways, but as co-authors forever. Your name's branded on the bottom of the book. Now, um and and I said earlier, so we've had probably 10 different authors um come and uh and and share their stories with with the with us um before last year we kind of set up an official club, but before that we were doing it as well, with the exception I think of um Adrian Swinsco, which kind of who takes kind of a bit of an attitude, a bit of a swipe at you know, that's a silly way of doing things, why are you doing it like that? No one's ever come at it from the perspective of how you get it wrong, so it's a really it's a very you know it's a very unique kind of kind of approach. And actually, whenever we present ourselves, and I think organizations consider you know, employees, what they don't want is someone who said, Oh, I've had a perfect career, I've just sailed through everything without any trouble. They want to have people who've said, I've fallen over, I've picked myself up, I've you know, I I've I've broken things, I've had to put it, I've really learned the hard. You want people who know how to get things back on the rails when you come off the rails, not simply, well, I've never had to do anything different because the rails work brilliantly. So it's really refreshing to get that. What was the inspiration behind creating that perspective? Or or was that not the intention? Is this just you outpouring and the title came later?

SPEAKER_03 13:08

No, I think it was definitely our intention to share those scars that we have. I mean, we have the stars and the skies, that's what we always say. And like you mentioned before, um, we work in the business, so we know all about the the daily life of customer experience professionals. Um, and we made so many mistakes ourselves. I mean, we worked together for I think five or six years in the same company. That's where we got to know each other, um, and that's where we where we also came across so many challenges. We we faced so many like difficult managers, board directors, um, challenges on the on the IT side, like different systems that don't work together. Like we've been there, we've done it, and we just wanted to share that to yeah, really add to the community and to help others to not make the same mistakes over again because they can make new mistakes that we can learn from, and we'd rather have that than make making the same mistakes over and over again. That was our intention and our goal.

SPEAKER_04 14:06

But but I think it's one it's one thing to actually to do that, but to actually commit it to paper is you know, it it is brave. This is not to know it is brave because you have you're putting it down there. It's not saying it doesn't come at you know it doesn't present you as we got it wrong, it presents you as this is how our learn these were our learnings on the way to getting it right. But sorry, Alexandra, you're gonna say something there.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

No, I just wanted to add that basically, you know, we are huge admirers of Brene Brown, who's really well known on vulnerability topic, and we were just also vulnerable, saying, Okay, these are the things that we did wrong, and there were many of them. And also, I think uh there is this saying uh about what a success is, is just going from one failure to another, you know, because this is the only way how you learn things and how you can improve things. So, actually, uh, the overall journey, uh, I think there are more mistakes and pitfalls and things that didn't go the way you're supposed to before you actually succeed, because that's the only way to achieving what you want. Uh, so yeah, just adding to the point that Frederica made that that was intentional because it was just representing our journey, how it looked for us in the companies that we've worked previously.

SPEAKER_03 15:19

And I think it also really helped that we knew we were not the only ones because from research we knew that 93% of all CX programs basically fail. They don't get the results that they wanted to. So, reading their research, we were like, whoa, so it's not only us who are struggling, there are more six professionals out there who could use some help.

SPEAKER_04 15:38

Yeah. But I remember reading a CX typology report on exactly that that point, and it was astonishing how the 7th percent actually have made it work because um, you know, it just seemed more luck than judgment. I think it needs to be very well structured, doesn't it? But but obviously, I mean, I'm I'm imagining the scenario, but you're kind of you're you're sharing with each other kind of almost in a therapy session, just you know, these are the things that kind of go wrong. To go from that point to actually saying, let's do this, let's make it a book. Had you always wanted to be authors, or was this kind of a gift that you wanted, or or is it is it you know, kind of an attempt to to get people to be more authentic and share their failures so that we could all learn faster? What was the motivation behind the book?

SPEAKER_03 16:23

I think it all started when I left the company at Crump where we worked together. Uh, and we were really sad that we wouldn't be working together anymore, and we were looking for a new project, and we both had this bucket list thing of one day writing a book, you know, like really abstract one day in the future when we're like old and great. Um, and suddenly we came up with this idea and everything just made sense. I think it was like yeah, a combination of coincidences and good timing to put this idea into practice and really get it done.

SPEAKER_04 16:54

And and did you decide to do it off your own back or did you speak to a publisher or get approach by a publisher? How how did how did the pro because you've neither of you written before this to this extra extreme, had you? I mean, you talk about you you went away and locked yourselves away somewhere and just I can't remember which of you is the one who said let's do it this way, and the other one was pulled along. I can't remember who's who who did the driving. But um, you know, how how did you get through that piece?

SPEAKER_01 17:21

We just had the idea we rewrote because we were sitting, we were having uh uh lunch, uh, and then we asked the waiter, can you bring us a piece of paper and a pen? So we wrote like on this small piece of paper that we still have. I have to actually put it in the frame. Just okay, what are the ideas? The the goal, the deadline. We already put the deadline for ourselves. And uh we without having a publisher, without knowing even a tiny bit of how the process looks like, what do we need to arrange? But we already had the content in our head. So we started with that. We started with brainstorming and saying, okay, this is uh and only once we so basically we went to Italy for like this writer's retreat for 10 days. This is where we started our creative process. We started uh uh writing, and only once we had having half of the book ready, we actually uh started contacting publishers. Um and then we came across as one that actually uh sparked something in us, and we got a really good click. Uh and we decided to go uh with that. But yeah, it was just everything was totally new, but we were so um into this idea, so into this process, we wanted it, and we were actually enjoying it very much.

SPEAKER_05 18:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Uh actually before even uh meeting the publisher, we already did the photo shoot for a book. So you kind of reversed the whole process.

SPEAKER_04 18:42

Yeah, yeah. So what were you in? Were you enjoying writing, or was you enjoying just you know this extra opportunity to be in each other's company and feed off each other? I mean, what was what was the best part of it?

SPEAKER_03 18:52

I think it was was both, really, because we complement each other perfectly. Um, I mean, we're not only former colleagues and co-authors, but also good friends. Um yeah, I don't know, we are just a good combination. So I really liked the process of working on this together to complement each other's ideas and the process, and um, so that was nice, but I also like to to work on the content to see our ideas getting more tangible and really creating something together. Um, and if you would compare this whole process to a customer journey, really, I think there were a few peaks and a few lows, obviously, as well. But uh going to Italy for 10 days together to really focus on writing was the best idea ever because we had lots of pasta and red wine, but we were also really focused on this one thing, you know, not distracted by meetings, by busy schedules. So I think that made it made it really nice.

SPEAKER_04 19:46

It's not a big commitment because obviously at this point, Frederick, you'd stepped out of full-time employment. But Alexandra, this must have been your holiday, your personal holiday.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

Indeed, indeed. That was my personal holiday, yes. But uh well, even though we were working, it was still in Italy, so that's my favorite country. It still felt, you know, a bit holiday-ish, so to say. So we were also enjoying, you know, uh late dinners and limoncello and ice cream and uh just uh really beautiful scenery. So that also helped us to to you know making it special, so it wasn't just a boring, dreadful thing that you have to sit behind your computer because it was end of May, really nice weather, and it was so much more uh rewarding, and you know, uh uh we really enjoyed that part a lot.

SPEAKER_04 20:33

Well, Lauren is um half Italian and Michael is uh speaks good Italian, so I think that the audience can concur with you. I spent my holiday in in Italy last year, and my family are furious with me this year for not going back to Italy. So you know it's once hooked, eh? Once hooked. And tell us about you know, since well, I wanted to ask about editing because obviously you normally have an editor, but you've got two editors um who are also the authors. I mean, you you must have been what was what was the criteria for allowing something in? Did you just roll over with each other or were you quite challenging about what should and shouldn't go in?

SPEAKER_03 21:09

I think it was a good decision from the very start to keep our different chapters. Exactly, because that made it easier for us to really stick to our part, and we gave a lot of feedback to each other, obviously. Um, and that helped a lot, but we did have an editor afterwards. So once we found our publisher, we also got an editor who was really critical on our content. So that was like where the customer journey took a deep dive and where it was really hard. And I mean that was the hard work. But in general, again, because we are a really good team, we yeah, we accept each other's feedback and we had a few discussions, but not it wasn't too difficult that part really.

SPEAKER_04 21:49

Because I've not found any conflict. I mean, with the two authors, I'd anticipate there could be some conflict in there, you know, in terms of I think like this and I actually think slightly like I've not found that, I've not found Gaps, I've not found conflicts. You know, it feels like you were almost sitting next to each other at with your desks and your typewriters, and just you know, just checking as you go through as if one of you was responsible for the the goodies and one as you responsible for the baddies in the book. And you're just like, just check they're still working. And was it was it as kind of as as easy as that? Or are there points where you go, actually, this has made me think?

SPEAKER_03 22:24

No, I think we were literally sitting next to each other while we were writing, so we were able to check in with each other all the time. But I remember that later, like half a year after writing the book, the editor came in and he was like, No, this this chapter, this whole chapter has to go out. This shouldn't be in the book. And then we had some discussions about whoa, really like it took so much time and effort to write this. And it was my chapter, I loved it. It was really difficult to let go. So we had some discussions about that for sure. Um, and also afterwards, we had to rearrange everything again because writing is one thing, but then, like you said, uh making sure that everything aligns and that there are different um logical connections within the book. That was a lot of work. That that sounds really easy right now, but that was a lot of work um to make it fit together.

SPEAKER_04 23:10

And a lot a lot of research, I guess a lot of research in here as well, because I mean you you cram it full of kind of models that have inspired you and references and and very kindly provide lots of kind of case studies to evidence, which obviously is is what you really want, is kind of you know, prove it to me. So uh did you was there a period of research, or did these things kind of come to you as you were forming the content?

SPEAKER_01 23:31

Yeah, indeed, the the latter. So uh as we were working on it, we were also trying uh some of it we already knew because there are things that we just swear by and we use uh very often, like Cutter's model of change, for instance, but other things we were we we didn't want our book to be yet another theoretical book about customer experience because there are so many out there. Uh so for us uh it was really essential that it's very practical, but also fact-based or research-based. Some things we also were researching while we were writing the content to see, okay, can we see if we can back it up with uh something that already exists or has been done, but a lot we already knew that we want to include in the first place. Um, and I also do not recall any yeah, long discussions about what should we keep, what should what we shouldn't. Uh for me, like really the editing part was really the most dreadful because you have to reread what you have written for the 50th time, and then you don't really know what your uh reading you are. Um, so I think that was uh uh that was the least fun part. Um, but yeah, as Frederica said, we complement each other so well and we are quite uh really good at giving each other feedback. It went quite smooth. I think we had more disagreements maybe with the editor on some small bits than uh between each other.

SPEAKER_04 24:55

So we we've got we've got some questions. So I'm I'm gonna give my my colleagues and uh Natasha an opportunity to to pose some questions to you, and then we've got a whole raft of them that people have provided to us. If it's okay, I'll I'll come back to those uh afterwards. So so Natasha, I'll I'll let you come in first if you have a a question you'd like to put regarding regarding the book. And please in terms of who you are and and your role, Natasha.

SPEAKER_00 25:19

Fab, um yeah, I'm Natasha. Work for Worcester Bosch as the customer experience and employee experience graduate. So we're in the manufacturing sector, so um, yeah, lots around customer experience, providing products to our consumers, but also installers of our goods as well. Um, so I work as a team of two at the minute within the marketing department, so very small, but it's really nice that the business is very on board with customer experience. One of our strategic pillars is focused towards that's a great buy-in from the start. Um, really loved the book, really nice to see different perspective. As Christopher was saying, you often read a lot of books, either shunning MPS or going quite general in terms of I agree with this, but I disagree with this. So this was a really good, uh different perspective that I hadn't read before. As I'm quite new to the customer experience field, only been working within this for the year. Really nice to see your links between EX and CX, as that is directly my role. Um, I'm the only one within Worcesterbosh that does that as a role, so it's really reassuring that you agree that it's really important. Um, definitely agreeing. I've written some notes on my screen, that's why I'm looking over here. Um agree about being more transparent about our work as a team of two, find it very difficult. We have regular check-ins with different departments, um, which we call our clinics. So we get survey data back every month. We do a lot of active listening on social media, um, and then feedback in these clinics every month with these wider departments, but it's often tricky to with just two, get all the information read, feedback what we think, hope they're working on it, but the loop is often difficult. I don't know if you've had experience of that trying to get it closed often the time is the most difficult challenge. So I think for me, question-wise, I don't have done a lot of talking there. We're finding it difficult in terms of for one, we rely heavily on surveys, we're reviewing our reporting at the minute to do a bit more active listening. Um, one of our difficulties has been getting good response rates. So I don't know if you have any suggestions on that or different avenues we could look into. Um, and also, yeah, anything in terms of feedback loops and promoting what we're doing internally, we're often worried that if you rely heavily on emails, it would just get lost. Um, so anything in that sort of remix, if that's clear.

SPEAKER_03 27:46

Yeah, good question. I think something that many companies and six professionals struggle to get done in the right way. Um, concerning the response rate, I think the most important part is closing the feedback loop, especially if you have recurring customers, because once they notice that you act upon the feedback and you give them feedback about their feedback, they are happy to provide more insights for you as well. Um, and really depending on on your company and how many customers you have, you could of course look into splitting different customer groups and not asking the same customers over and over again. Um you can look at um, yeah, making sure that you provide short and relevant questions. So what's really something that you have to ask to the customer, or which information could you maybe already get out of your process information or from from employees? Because I think that's one huge misunderstanding that we have to ask everything to customers. There's always so much information already available within the company that you could almost cut your survey in half. Um, looking at sure if you do that already, but that would be.

SPEAKER_00 28:58

Yeah, this is literally what we've been doing this week. We've literally looked at it and thought we're abusing this because marketing purposes, we want to have a nice typeline, or we wanted to find out a bit about that. So, yeah, that's really reassuring because we've tried to condense it as much as possible. Use those either like digital tools or things like that. So that's great. That's great to yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_03 29:18

Yeah, as for the feedback loop, um, what we did at Chrome, for example, is we really appointed one responsible manager to each question in the survey. Because questions to customers, it's not a goal itself, right? You don't do that for your own team, you always do that to help the business. So if you really connect every single question, every single KPI to the right uh team, to the right manager, and make sure that they act upon it, um, that really helps a lot. Because you will also notice um once there is maybe a team that is not acting upon it, or maybe they don't need it anymore, or maybe they are busy doing other things, then what's the point of still collecting this feedback if it's not picked up anyway? So I would really start there and make sure that you have responsibilities um really matched with the different uh different questions in your survey.

SPEAKER_05 30:07

Brilliant.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

Thank you. I would add one more tip for engaging also employees to kind of take action on that feedback. Uh, what also one of the countries at Crump is doing that's uh, for instance, if you have feedback about I don't know, pricing, there's also customers also often giving you open comments, right? Where they just explain something.

SPEAKER_00 30:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:29

Um, let's say every month uh you could just collect everything or everything or just uh a part of what comes in and share it with the employees and let them uh choose, for instance, what do you think is the most important topic or the most two important topics that we should work on? That also helps um let's say the department to prioritize, and they also feel like they are involved, like they get to say something about it because they also understand the business process better. So they know that for instance these topics are way easier to solve, and but maybe we can do some quick fixes and it will not require long uh uh uh uh project. So that's also how you could tackle this. So also involving employees more and and uh uh taking them along. So the um uh they also feel like they have uh say in it, they can also contribute uh to improving um services. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

No, that's perfect. I think yeah, that will work really well with the setup that we've got. It's really great that we've got buy-in right from the top. That's definitely really um great and supportive in this tiny team at the minute. But yeah, no, that's really great. So thank you both.

SPEAKER_04 31:37

I like the way you get masterclasses out of these sessions, Natasha is brilliant. Very good, very responsible.

unknown 31:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:42

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04 31:43

Uh Michael, do you have a question?

SPEAKER_02 31:45

Sure, yes, thanks a lot. Um, my name is Michael Brandt. Uh I'm an independent CX consultant, and I live just outside Logano in Switzerland.

SPEAKER_01 31:55

So close to Lake Common.

SPEAKER_02 31:58

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I learned Italian in high school, and now the past four years I've been able to use it on a daily basis. So uh I I really liked your answer to to Natasha's question because um I was working 25 years in a corporate environment with ABB, where I was responsible for for our NPS program, our voice customer, customer experience and applied management. And I love the the way that you said it it's good to attribute responsibility for a question that we did slightly differently, but the principle was the same, and I think that's great. And how that also increases your response rate because customers see that you know that you're actually doing something with their feedback. My question is uh why do you think it is that so many companies uh have problems with closing that loop when it is such a beneficial part of the process, but so often gets neglected or ignored or yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:00

I think there's a huge misunderstanding, and I'm curious whether you recognize the same pattern, but there's a huge misunderstanding, especially in bigger corporates, where they are only focusing on the KPIs, like on the target that they have to achieve, only on the numbers and not on the whole system that's behind it. So they are only focusing on getting the MPS like to a 60 instead of 50, and they are blindly focusing on this number without really acting upon it, and then they wonder why uh MPEs start gaming, so why they start to influence the scores. Um, so I think that's definitely one part, uh, and the other part is that it's really hard, it's really difficult to uh get everyone's commitment because you are kind of on this CX island. I mean, we try to get off it as much as possible, but still you are within one department, doesn't matter which department, but you are within one department, and all of these other departments have different priorities, have different goals. Um, and everyone's busy, right? Everyone has a packed schedule and they are focusing on their own world, their own bubble. Um, so I think one of the secrets is to burst that bubble and to help them understand how valuable this feedback is. Because once you get them to read the feedback, to make it visual, really maybe record a few videos with customers, really let them feel the pain and see what's going on. My experience is that they often open their eyes and they're like, oh wow, I had no idea that this was going on. And that gets them motivated, right? That's get that that gets them really into this place where they want to help the customer and want to solve problems.

SPEAKER_02 34:42

Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:45

I also think that naturally people tend to, even though they would like to see the outside in perspective, so they say, Yes, I want to to know what my customers think, what they need, so that we can adjust our processes and services so we can be more customer-centric. Your natural tendency is still to do things inside out. So you still have, if you're working with an organizational company, uh that's still your primary vision, so to say, yeah. Because you know internal processes, you know the people, you know how things work. Uh so it's a tidy bit more difficult to step out of that zone and turn around and just uh look at from the other side. Um, so it takes effort and and it it you need to be conscious of that in order to see the difference. And I also think that proving the ROI of customer experience is still a huge topic, and still many companies or at least professionals struggle with this. They try to really come up with numbers. Uh so how this KPI or what this our NPS means in terms of turnover, profits, losses, etc. It's also complicated to prove that, to be extremely certain that that's the connection because you have so many factors that are influencing it. So that's what I've seen at least in the companies that I've worked before. Some people are reluctant uh when it comes to acting on this feedback and taking action because they say, okay, but what will it actually bring? Um, so that could be also one of the uh influencing factors. Uh, there's a lot in there that could be the yeah, be the answer.

SPEAKER_04 36:24

I do like that point because um you hear that quite often, don't you? That you we're all accountable for delivering a great customer experience. Well, let's have a look and see what that measures like in terms of satisfaction. How can we all be responsible when everything we do influence customer experience? And yet we just need we can just measure it on this one single sentiment. You know, to your point, it's too many variables that that influence. And if you can get the organization to measure the progress you're making and the outcomes you're achieving, then obviously you're in a better position. Um, so uh thank you, Michael and and Natasha. I've got um Lauren's question, but I've got I've got another one first of all for you, which is it's put by one of the other guests of the uh the book club, and they wanted to know are there any other failures that surprised you? You kind of you look back and go, why did that not work? That should have worked. You know, is there some aspects of customer experience which are just we haven't figured out yet.

SPEAKER_03 37:20

I think what's what's curious is that the more companies I get to know from the inside, the more I'm surprised how different all of them are. Because you would expect that customer experience is like one field of expertise, and once you know how it works, you know how it works, right? But every time I get into a new company, I'm I'm surprised again that it's difficult again, that you have different challenges again, that you have different management again, different systems again. Like, I think that's still up until today my biggest surprise that it's never it gets never boring, it's always challenging. And I see Michael nodding indeed. I mean, it's it that's really surprising to me. Like at one point I thought I would have figured it out and I would like know what to do, and it would be like copy-paste, but that's actually not the case.

SPEAKER_04 38:10

So we're always, I mean, I can't remember who said it, we're always students of customer experience because there's always learning to have, isn't there? Different context than what have you. Um as you go through. You got any any views on that, um, Alexandra? Is there a is there a topic that you feel, you know, actually, why does that not work? That should work, or when it failed, it surprised you.

SPEAKER_01 38:28

Yeah, when I look back, I came across this uh situation uh almost exactly the same, very similar, uh in two companies. When uh you already have customer experience quite well embedded in the organization, you have your measurements, you're reporting on uh NPS, C set, uh you're already part of the business goals, you have your ambassadors or people who are uh helping you with it, uh and everyone seems to be on board. They understand that you know we we want to be customer-centric as an organization, we want to do everything uh that we can to uh be better, and then all of a sudden, let's say management changes. Uh there's there are new people uh on board who are shifting the direction. And then you feel like okay, so we are going back to square one. You know how quick I was really shocked and even frustrated to see how quickly can it go from yeah, we are already so far, or we have achieved so much, into okay, we need to uh rethink, refine, redesign because we are starting from scratch again. We need to readjust because the business direction has changed drastically. Uh so we need to redefine the value that we are bringing. Um yeah, it's uh it's kind of you know, I understand that sometimes you have to go two steps back in order to move forward. Yeah, but that in that moment when you're in this particular situation, it feels like a huge, uh huge step back. Like, okay, what the heck happened? But it's just, you know, you work with people, you know. If you don't understand people, you don't understand business. So you also need to understand their motivation, where they are coming from, what they want to achieve. And then your role is okay, how can I support them in their strategy by also still keeping CX alive and still working on the things that you believe in? Because at the end of the day, we believe that customer experience is the way to go, right? But it it does happen, it does, it can really change very quickly.

SPEAKER_04 40:30

I mean, you you referenced their cynic, who's uh is another one of your favorites in in the book, I noticed. Um, so I mean we we talk about um sharing everything in the spirit of progress. We we've recognized the importance of being transparent. You go on a lot about being your authentic self. You can't pretend to be something to customers and on the inside be very different. I think Disney say, don't they, you know, make them smile whether you're at the front on the stage or backstage, you make them smile, that's what you do. But um I I've had this with organizations who have said that that's difficult. That's difficult because a number of reasons. One, we like to keep things close to our chest. If we want to we want to change, we can change. And two, we feel like we're giving things away to our competitors if we actually are being authentic and open and and and revealing more of ourselves with change in expectations. I saw a really interesting piece last week by concentrics talking about if we know we're talking to an AI, we will lie more often, hugely versus than if we're talking to a human. So, how can you still be authentic in such a rapidly changing landscape where things are moving so fast and customers' expectations, rightly or wrongly, are moving? I mean, how how can you continue to be authentic? I'm not saying you can't, but I'm just interested to get your perspective because it really is, you know, back to your period there, you really have to be vulnerable, don't you? You have to show your vulnerabilities.

SPEAKER_01 41:59

Absolutely. I mean, it really uh takes a lot of courage to allow yourself to be uh genuine and authentic. And I think this is something that you get to practice every single day. Uh, because for I think for individuals, sometimes it takes a lot of time to realize okay, how can I be more authentic? What are the things that make me more authentic? And then I think for organizations can even be more difficult because, of course, we live in an ever-changing world. There's a lot of competition around, so you want to keep taps on what they are doing, but at the same time don't get influenced too much uh by what's out there, because then uh you might uh uh do things that are not necessarily doing your favors because they are not in line with your identity. Um I would say just maybe a simple thing like um we both do. So whenever we are starting something new or considering a new project, we always do this strategy check. Does this new initiative is this supporting our strategy? Uh um and a similar thing, maybe companies could do. Okay, is this a step that we are taking? This is maybe new acquisition, this is a kind of piece of communication. Is this representing who we truly are, who we want to be to the outer world? Is this the message that we want to convey? Um I think it doesn't have to be very complicated, but it takes a lot of self-awareness and also creating a habit for yourself. Um it's it's not easy, of course, obviously, and it's um it's a lot of work, but what what's not what's not, right?

SPEAKER_04 43:39

You referenced the importance of HR, I mean, and that that idea of bringing the right people in then because you know you you you can't just become that, can you? You know, if you're if you've grown up and you've you're I mean, we we we've started to find some companies have the hoarder mentality where they won't share information because it's kind of you know, we don't want other people to know our colleagues. You know, or I can't show it to you until I've shown it to them because obviously it's not that's not the right thing to do. And then you have the others who have a sharing mentality where they're so here you come and come and read it all, come see it all. You know, not edited yet. And and I guess that goes right back to who they think they are, their purpose for being, and even the the original leaders and how they thought you know success would look like. So is it fair to say that you could find organizations for which that authenticity will work against you?

SPEAKER_03 44:29

I don't I don't think so because I think the whole point of authenticity is that you cannot copy it. So um I mean you can be transparent because if another company tries to copy what you do, they won't be authentic, right? They will be the copycats who don't have it in their culture. They do it to be successful and they they try to learn this kind of kind of trick. But I think if you're really truly authentic in your culture, in the way that you do things, in your HR department, in the way that you hire people, in how you develop people, that's not something that someone can easily copy. And it doesn't really matter, like Alex also said, what's going on in your environment because it's about yeah, staying true to yourself, who you are, and what yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:12

We also had uh multiple uh inspiration sessions with other professionals from other companies just to learn how they are doing things. And very often we had this realization oh, this is super cool, but it's not gonna work in our company.

SPEAKER_05 45:25

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:26

So you also, if you are aware of that, then you know, okay, it's it's great for them. Uh in your in their context, it's an absolutely fantastic uh idea, but it's not gonna work in our case. So you have to also yeah, picking cherries, picking the things that are right for you, right for your vision, uh, and supporting what you want to achieve, who you want to be.

SPEAKER_04 45:45

It's as you say, it's self-awareness, it's having confidence, it's being comfortable with your own vulnerabilities and having a really strong frame of reference in terms of what your authenticity is, I guess, is is is important, which is back back to the culture piece. It's back to the culture piece. Well, uh we're coming to the end of our hour now, so uh I want to give you an op an opportunity to just share with us what comes next. Is there a book? Is there a TV show? Is there a next dancing with the stars? Exactly, yeah. Dancing with the CX stars. So, what are your plans now? I mean, you clearly you you lit up when you were talking about the process and working together again. So um is there an opportunity to to come together and do other things, or have you got other books you want to pen, or what are your plans? Alex, you go first, Alex.

SPEAKER_01 46:32

Okay, well, funny you should say this, Christopher, because literally today we just had a WhatsApp conversation and I was saying that okay, I don't really feel sharp because I'm a I have a mum brain, so I'm still, you know, I'm not gonna be sharp ever. Uh and Friderike uh uh said, Well, remind me to never write a book with you again. Of course, we were laughing because and I said, Okay, they say that this comes back, the sharpness comes back after a while of being a mom. So I do hope mine comes back. But I'm definitely in, and I think that would be a really nice continuation. Um, not sure which topic we will we pick uh next, uh uh, but uh I think uh the future holds something for us.

SPEAKER_04 47:18

Um yeah well, I think you'll have an absolute catalogue of AI failures that you'll be able to help people. You probably won't have to wait very long until you know that the books were there.

SPEAKER_03 47:34

Yeah, and I think it's even more interesting now because we haven't been working together for three years, and within these three years, we've learned so much. Uh I mean, so many new things, so many new failures, failures that we made, new directions that we developed into. So I think there's a lot of stuff in there for the second book. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 47:53

Well, I'm glad I'm glad to hear it because as as Natasha said, it's a different perspective. And you can't write this book unless you know what you're doing, it's impossible. Um, so it really echoes your credibility as as practitioners and um working within organizations and now from your perspective, Frederick, helping other organisations. I've had a delightful time, really enjoyed spending some more time with you. And I I've read the book uh when you first sent it, so it gave me an opportunity to go back into it again. And I realize it is a bit of a reference book as well, it's quite helpful. You can just dive into different parts and go have a look at that and see what they said about that. So it's really really really helpful. Thank you so much for eventually being guests on our um, really, really grateful to have you. And uh and I and I hope you've had plenty of other podcast opportunities. I mean, your book deserves to get a wide recognition, it isn't written with a particular geographical bias, it's a really helpful book for for anyone. So uh I do hope it gets spread far and wide.

SPEAKER_01 48:53

Oh, we're very glad you think so. Thank you very much. Yeah, we've been uh uh it's been great to to be here and to to uh share our experiences and have a chat with you. Very lovely. So thank you very much. Absolutely opportunity.

SPEAKER_03 49:06

See you maybe one or two years from now to yes, talk about the second book.

SPEAKER_04 49:12

Absolutely very much look forward to that. Well, look, thank you to all the book club members and Alexander and Frederick. We'll end it there and wish you both all the best with your future endeavors.

SPEAKER_01 49:24

Thank you very much. Have a great afternoon.