What Does the Future Hold for the CX Professional?
Featuring contributions from members of the Women in CX online community and summarised by Harley Stabler.
Every month, members of the first global community designed especially for women united by our interest in advancing customer experience meet to discuss, dissect, and disentangle an issue faced by customer experience professionals.
These roundtable discussions seek to shed light on and offer solutions to some of the most pressing problems of the sector.
This blog summarises the forum where members discussed how CX is changing, the skills required of CX-ers, and what the future of CX looks like.
What is a customer experience professional?
Depending on the context for practising CX, the role of the CX professional can look very different. Factors such as the country, industry, maturity of the market, department being represented, and the focus of the business or organisation greatly affect what it is that the CX professional does… and how they do it.
With CX professionals coming from a wide array of backgrounds, including business analysis, marketing, technology, and HR (the list is endless!), the role historically has been just as diverse!
Given that CX as a discipline is only a teenager (just 15 years old in terms of being recognised as a ‘thing’), it has a long way to go in order to catch up with its more mature cousins and is perhaps yet to be concretely defined.
Differences set aside, one thing we know for certain is that the role of the CX professional centres around people and humanising businesses for the greater good of customers and employees, in turn delivering better business outcomes.
Customer Experience 2.0
After being hailed as the ‘next big thing’ in business, CX practitioners failed to deliver the desired results, focusing too heavily on theory, which resulted in a lack of action on their behalf.
Frequently dismissed by the C-Suite, where talk of CX fails to resonate with stakeholders keeping a close eye on their financials, for CX professionals, the most recent challenge has been ‘making the connection’ between CX and the value that it drives for businesses.
Where is CX heading next?
In quantifying the economics of customer-centricity by framing the analysis of ROI around a set of specific measures and outcomes, the CX professional can dispel the stubborn perception of CX as just another ‘fluffy’ buzzword.
But, as CX-ers, have we lost touch with the fundamentals of what it is that we do in favour of further buzzwords, often (like much business B.S.) just two words lumped together? Think ‘CX transformation’ or ‘omnichannel CX’.
While it’s true that organisations are aware of the importance of creating positive customer experiences, many still fail to recognise the holistic and inclusive dimensions of CX and to understand that CX embodies more than just customer service and marketing.
CX isn’t a profession; it’s a mindset
Not confined to a single discipline or profession, let’s instead consider CX as a mindset – a way of thinking. Adopting this mindset and communicating it across all departments to avoid silos is crucial for implementing effective CX initiatives.
Despite differing backgrounds and professional pathways, CX is underpinned by the desire to demonstrate that CX drives value, and to prove this to those clutching the purse strings.
As highlighted with the roundtable discussion, frameworks come and go, but the ‘why’ remains the same: delivering value to the customer across touchpoints (and now channels!) and demonstrating to the organisation the benefit of this.
How is CX changing?
With businesses and organisations becoming wiser to the importance of CX, CX professionals must not only make the connection but demonstrate how CX initiatives drive commercial benefits for the business.
What are the changes taking place in CX?
With technological advancement, multiple channels, and new engagement expectations, how as CX-ers do we adapt our approach in order to design customer experiences that customers actually need, that brands want to offer, and that drive value for the organisation?
Technological advancement
With digital technologies impacting every aspect of our lives, businesses have no choice but to ‘digitally transform’ and adapt (or be left behind in the dust!). In order to create a positive customer experience, CX-ers must meet customers’ expectations at every interaction.
According to Forrester, there is still a notable gap between the experiences that businesses deliver and what customers actually need. In order to bridge this gap, CX-ers must harness the wealth of data available to them, focusing not only upon customer opinion and feedback but also data regarding customer behaviour and engagement!An increasing focus upon ‘human-centred design’
Relying increasingly on digital services and tools, embracing human-centred design (HCD) is more critical now than ever. Human-centred design refers to a process of human engagement and designing with and for the end-user.
Rather than at just a single stage, HCD foregrounds the human element throughout the entire process, from discovery, design, and development, right through to iteration, testing, and experimentation.Adoption of a pragmatic approach
Put simply, less ‘blah blah’ and more action.
Rather than being bogged down by meaningless jargon and working to design lengthy and expensive transformations, CX-ers must adopt an agile approach to CX. Identifying the projects that are beneficial to the organisation and its customers, CX-ers can execute select initiatives relatively quickly, demonstrating the value of CX and providing tangible and specific results for the stakeholder. Win–win!
What skills do CX professionals need now?
With little in the way of a cohesive job description, what skills do CX professionals require to secure stakeholder buy-in, design and implement effective CX strategies, and prove ROI?
Adaptability: CX is not a one-size-fits-all approach, and the chosen strategy depends on multiple factors. CX-ers are required to adapt to their surroundings to be “what the company needs [them] to be.”
Resilience: As agents of change, CX-ers face pushback and adversity on a daily basis and mustn’t be deterred.
Emotional intelligence: “The development of emotional intelligence will not only enable staff to differentiate their brand through more emotionally connected customer contact, it will enable people across the silos that exist within businesses to make sustainable changes that customers truly value.” — Sandra Thompson
Effective communication: In order to deliver consistent and meaningful customer experiences, CX-ers must communicate effectively across teams and departments, acting as educator, translator, and business analyst.
‘Hands-on’ practical experience... as opposed to credibility reliant solely upon qualifications!
The ability to make CX tangible: In order to combat buzzword-status, CX-ers must re-emphasise human-centricity at every stage and get the basics right.
And, possibly most importantly, the ability to ‘sell’ CX by identifying the business strategic objectives that can be fulfilled by applying human-centred thinking and design!
What is the future of CX?
To create positive customer experiences in an ever-evolving landscape, CX professionals must harness the power of technology – understanding tech as a tool, as opposed to a solution, CX-ers are better positioned to understand customers and their experiences, provide timely resolutions, and create increasingly personalised interactions.
Bridging the gap between the tech and the customer, CX-ers must ensure that digital tools and services, such as AI and chatbots, are implemented effectively, supporting the customer on their journey, as opposed to representing further obstacles and pain points.
In addition to continuous technological advancements, we’ve noted an increasing focus on customer-centricity.
So, what’s next? Will there be another buzzword to supersede CX? Or are ‘BX, HX, and XM’ just more B.S.?
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Contributors
Thanks to WiCX community members Priscila Tavares, Julie Tano-Lawson, Melissa Moore, and Ana Luisa Romero for being part of this conversation.