Clare Muscutt talks with CCO, Kate Thornton, about what it takes to have the edge in CX Leadership.
Read more about Kate and her lessons from the Nordic countries on the WiCX blog.
Episode #004 Show Notes.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Hi, Kate.
Kate Thornton:
Hi.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
How are you today?
Kate Thornton:
Yeah, I'm good. Thank you. How are you?
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah, not too bad. The weather is awful outside though, here in the UK. Isn't it?
Kate Thornton:
But the sun is coming out next week. So let's, let's cheer for that.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah. Keep our fingers crossed. So let's dive straight in there then. Kate, I know we both share a love of travel and you've had more experience than most of living and working abroad. I was just wondering, is that much of a difference in the working conditions for women in the Nordic countries you lived in compared to the UK?
Kate Thornton:
I certainly think policy wise, there's a big difference. I was talking to someone the other day and explaining that in Norway, where I spent three and a half years as a woman going on maternity leave, you get 49 weeks of full pay or 59, at 80% pay. And their face when I told them was just a picture. So yeah, definitely at a policy level and I think that changes expectations. And so it's better place. I'm not saying it's perfect. There were still issues particularly when I started my working career and I think that was a real strength and I'm grateful for having come up through that environment and being given the opportunity to be a woman leader very young. So the age of 28 in Norway, I was running a 60 million pound business, and nobody questioned it at all.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Wow. That's amazing. I was thinking kind of reflecting on that point that there seems to be quite a difference in how the Nordic countries treat society and community, generally. Do you have any insight into why that is?
Kate Thornton:
I would say that not all the countries are completely identical, but there are some clear themes that run through. One of the things that is clear is that they prioritise the collective interest rather more highly relative to individual interests than we do. There's a concept which very well known in Scandinavian culture called Jante Law**, which is all about as an individual, understanding your place in society. I think that has some really positive aspects to it and it has some less positive aspects, but it is very much more about the collective and collective priorities. **(The Law of Jante is a code of conduct known in Nordic countries that characterises not conforming, doing things out of the ordinary, or being overtly personally ambitious as unworthy and inappropriate).
Clare Muscutt- Host:
What are the less positive aspects?
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Um well I think there can be some positives around individual ambition and taken to an extreme, it can suppress people's ambition and people's willingness to stand out. So I can remember participating in a restructuring exercise in Scandinavia where I literally had to talk people into writing applications for jobs because they felt uncomfortable putting themselves forward for roles. If that was going to be at the expense of other people, as with many things in life, I think it's good to have balance. But on the whole, I’ve lived in four different Nordic countries. They've all been fantastic places to work. They regularly come very high up in all of the world happiness and equality indexes. And so it might not be perfect. It's pretty good. We could probably learn a lot from it.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
We'll come back to community again shortly, but just picking up on what you said there, about how much responsibility you had as a relatively young woman. Did you say 26?
Kate Thornton:
28 when I went to Norway.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Oh wow. Yeah. At 23 I was running a hotel and restaurant on a graduate scheme. Fresh out of university. I had spent my whole formative years working in that industry, but it was definitely a lot early on. How did you feel having that much responsibility at 28? Was it a struggle for you to make some of the changes in your lifestyle required to do that? Or did you find it quite simple over there?
Kate Thornton:
It was exciting. I was very aware of a degree of pressure and expectation I was taking on the role from a guy who'd been doing that role for sort of 30 years and was a real bastion of the Norwegian travel industry. But by and large, I think people were very generous and very welcoming and very supportive. I can remember one issue with somebody in the office who I knew quite well, really nice guy, but quite a lot older than me. And he clearly thought that he was onto a bit of a winner when I got made his boss because he thought he was going to be able to do whatever we wanted and run rings around me. And it took us a little bit of time to readjust that relationship. But it was an amazing job and Norway is a terrific place to live and work. So, you know, by and large, my memories of it are entirely positive, but of course, you know, that there's challenge there's challenging, anything worth doing. And you know, when you step up and take on a new role, you've got to be prepared for that.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
You made me think about remembering what that felt like the first time as a young female leader, having to manage older people and particularly older guys, and I personally found it quite challenging to take that role. I don't know whether I'd always believed in respect to your elders. And similarly had guys thinking that they were going to be able to run rings around me and finding that confidence to set boundaries and actually stick to them. It felt quite an alien concept to me to do that. How did you manage to make that transition? What was it about your leadership capability? Do you think that enabled you to do that so easily?
Kate Thornton:
Yeah, I, I don't really remember if I'm honest this many years on but I think I had a clear vision for the job that needed to doing and believed that I could do it and was prepared to take the time, you know, working on the relationship and you know, talking to the people in the team to get them on side. So, you know, definitely not a dictatorial approach and Nordic leadership culture, isn't dictatorial, it's very, very non-hierarchical. You know, consensus building is a strong element of it and that helped
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Well it clearly stood you in good stead because you've experienced a level of success and seniority that most women in CX only ever dream of achieving what would you say the biggest moves were in your career path that meant you got to the position of chief customer officer?
Kate Thornton:
Yeah. Good question. And I often reflect on that for many, many years. I would have told you that it was about luck and being in the right place at the right time. And people liking me and being helpful. And all of that is without doubt, really valuable in a career. But actually when I go back and I analyse kind of the biggest moves I made, were all moves that I proactively advocated for. And I think it's quite typical of women maybe to sort of slightly downplay their own agency in constructing their career and maybe hang back when men don't which is frustrating and pretty stupid really. So I definitely think putting my hand up to take on that role in Norway was a big move for me. Then a few years later when I was back in the UK my boss left, I was doing a European marketing role at the time and I put myself forward to step into his shoes, which I then got, and that put me into position where I ended up running all of marketing, contact centre and distribution activity for British Airways across all of Europe and Africa. You know, which was which was a big job and a fascinating job and lots more traveling, lots more culture we can talk about. I mean another huge role for me was actually then putting up my hand subsequently to try to get promoted into the director of marketing role at British airways. And I can remember having a conversation with my female boss at the time when the company announced that they were going to recruit externally to say, I don't understand why aren't you going to look at me because you told me I've got potential. And she said, that's a great question. Why don't we construct a bit of a plan? And I got to kind of sit around her boss's table for a little while. And at the end of that period, he asked me to take on the product and service role and that purely came about because I put up my hand proactively and said, I don't understand why I'm not in the running for a promotion and consider me and put myself in a position where I could show my leadership. And that was, that was another amazing role running the whole product and service portfolio for British Airways globally kind of massively high profile and complex and interesting and challenging and rewarding and all of those things and having done that when the time finally came to leave British Airways, I was able to put myself in a position to be considered and ultimately appointed as chief customer officer for Simply Health.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
That was an incredible story. A couple of things that you said just then I think we need to delve a little bit further into, so you said you would have previously said that it was down to look or being in the right place at the right time. Having had lots of these conversations now with women in CX, it sounds like that imposter syndrome challenge affects all of us at some point in our career. What was it that enabled you to get that perspective now, where you don't see it as that? And you can see it was your own agency and actively raising your hand and going for those challenges that made the difference for you.
Kate Thornton:
Yeah. I mean, I wouldn't say I've dodged imposter syndrome entirely. I think it's still sort of comes back in waves, but I think it is an example of learning by doing so, you know, I know that by having the proactive conversation with my boss and saying, I don't understand why this isn't happening. Why aren't you considering me? I made something happen. So I have positive experience with that when you kind of, when you try to take control and agency, it is a better, result. And I think also just reflecting on the fact that it is it's just a bit dumb not to, I mean, it's easy to do. I'm not criticising people because I've been in the same shoes, but I mean, how can you expect other people to know what you want, if you don't actually tell them I'm not a mind reader who else is a mind reader, and until I've read so much research that indicates that women are incredibly hard on themselves when thinking about promotion. So I think I read something in all the Harvard business review that suggested that women look to match themselves, that something like 80 to 90% of the criteria on a job brief before they'll put themselves forward and men are prepared to apply with about 40% of the criteria. It' so dumb Because that means that so many very qualified and talented women and not putting themselves forward for opportunities. And then sitting back in frustration when frankly less talented men are bullshitting their way into the job. And, that makes no sense for the individual women. It makes no sense for the organisations that they're working in and it makes no sense for kind of the wider world we live in. So I think we just have to challenge ourselves to go for it. And I'm not underestimating that there are barriers to women. It's not obviously all about our own actions, but I do think the only actions we can really change are our own all that we can do to champion ourselves and our female colleagues to help advance our position. I'm not sure that really helps with your question,
Clare Muscutt- Host:
It does. I think it leads me a bit deeper into what I'm picking up on is that you were able to get really clear about what you wanted. So rather than waiting for opportunities to arrive at your door and perhaps taking that path, perhaps you could see what you wanted your life and your career to look like. And as a result questioned, when the opportunity for the marketing director role came up to say, well, why not me?
Kate Thornton:
I imagine, you know, you'll have similar experience. I mean, the clearer you are about what you want, the easier it is to tell other people and therefore for them to help you to get there, but is the easier it is for you to build plan to get there. I wouldn't say that I've always been clear about what I wanted at all times in my career. And I'm also very open to the fact that there is real benefit sometimes, in just being open and receptive to opportunities that, that come along. But I do know that at the times in my career, when I have been most clear and focused, I have had a lot of momentum and confidence, and it has helped propel me forward.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah. I think just to echo what you said, being able to control the controllables in these situations, that is something that we can work on to become more clear. We can get coaching, mentoring, and support to have those conversations where we get clearer on what we want. I'm the same as you. I haven't always been clear, but I know for sure when I started this business or my consulting business, I was the clearest I've ever been in my life. And it made it so much easier to move forward with momentum to use your words because I had the vision and the energy to going out there into the world and get what I wanted said. So, yeah, I think that's definitely something that resonates with me In what you said.
Kate Thornton:
You've built an awesome business. And we started off by talking about Scandinavia. One of the clearest things or one of the things I've been curious about in my life was I was determined to study Danish at university and that was such a clear choice. And because I knew that with certainty, I had the energy to pursue that and make it happen. Despite the fact that everybody around me was saying, are you completely and utterly crazy? What are you going to do with that degree?
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Well, springboard my career at British airways for 20 years, that's what I'm going to do with it.
Kate Thornton:
Well, yes, exactly. So, but if I hadn't had that clarity of purpose and thoughts and the energy that came with it, I wouldn't be sitting here having this conversation with you now.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
No, that's, that's a really great thing to reflect on that isn't it, that the choices that we make lead us to paths, that perhaps we didn't quite envisage, but if it's been driven by a clear purpose and a set of values that are true to ourselves, it leads us to the right place. Ultimately, I like that. Okay. So moving on to a bit more of a chat around
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Leadership this is a bit of a CX geeky question for all the listeners out there, but with Companies still not having clear accountability, Your experience at board level, I just wondered in your opinion, what makes a really great chief customer officer And where do you think that job title or responsibility should sit within the organization in order for it to be most effective and make a difference?
Kate Thornton:
Yeah, so I'm not sure that there is a one size answer to that. And you know, organisations will all be in their own situations and different stages of maturity. And to some extent to build great customer experiences, you need everybody around the business to be advocating for the customers. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's nirvana. But I do think there is evidence that having a chief customer officer in a strong position of influence around the business can make a big difference, whether that's on the executive team and interacting regularly with the board or on the board itself. And I know there've been some recent, great examples of chief customer officers being promoted up to board level. And I think that's really encouraging. And actually particularly at this time when consumer expectations and needs are changing around us so fast and businesses are having to adapt more than ever to, to meet those changing needs. It makes absolute sense to me that they are putting the voice of the customer fair and square around the board table. I mean, come back to your original question. UI mean, you've got to be passionate about your customers. Of course you have, and really walk the talk. I think you have to be equally passionate about giving voice to the people in your organisation who are interfacing with customers most often. And there is such a strong link between employee experience and customer experience. And so really understanding that environment is vital. You have to be good at telling stories, getting underneath the skin of the stories that your customers are telling you. But you also need to be good with the numbers. You have to be able to connect that customer story to whatever the metrics are that matter to the business. And I think you have to be really good at building alliances and collaborating across silos because no chief customer officer is ever going to control all of the levers and the need to come together to build that brilliant customer experience, all the things you need to be able to do.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah, and absolutely the point that customer experience can't be a function that controls everything. We need a vision for how CX works across the entire organisation, but those leavers and responsibility is always going to be split. So the power of influence, I think, for anyone in CX at whatever level you're at, is definitely a capability that one needs to build early on and as one advances into leadership roles, becomes even more critical. Yeah. I just had a question just cause I'm really curious. My experience of big companies has tended to be that they want to grow generalist leaders that have experience of other areas that are non-customer in order to be taken seriously as a potential director say, have all your roles always evolved through various customer roles, or have you ever worked outside of a customer function?
Kate Thornton:
So, I have predominantly worked in commercial functions? I mean, I think it depends on your definition of what a customer function is. But I mean, if you work from the hypothesis that everything that gets done in the business ultimately affects the customer.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah. Fair enough.
Kate Thornton:
I mean, I've worked in sales, distribution pricing, I've run contact centres, marketing, product and service. So all of them have had very sort of directly traceable impact on customers, but then you could say that it's been quite a broad generalist career.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah. Okay. That's interesting. I just thought it was interesting for the listeners to consider kind of career paths and steps, especially if you're in CX right now in a more junior role, perhaps considering Looking outside of that immediate sphere now could stand you in good stead later down the line. Great to hear that, that traceability to customer or be it in different functions Is okay a Good route to be able to get that generalist leadership experience and be taken as more than just a customer person or a specialist sorry, I think that's what I'm trying to say. The difference between Generalist and specialist but if anyone's got aspirations for leadership at that level, they're likely to have to make some Switches because it isn't a direct ladder is it? You can't be customer experience manager, customer experience 'head of' or whatever. And then customer experience director, chief customer officer, I don't think I've ever met anybody. That's had a career path that looks like that.
Kate Thornton:
Maybe the future. But I mean, when I was starting out, I don't think anybody even knew what customer experience was. So, I mean, I just don't think it was a thing that I can remember. And for anyone I think there is benefit in having a bit of organisational breadth and depth and also operational and to understand perspectives and the languages, the language and the things that are going to trigger the people in other the parts of the organisation that you need to support. I also think it's incredibly useful to have had some frontline experience. So I started out on the phones in the contact centre, but actually one of the most powerful things I ever did was to train and operate as cabin in the final six years of my senior management career at British Airways. So I would come sit in head office and do my head office thing. And then there'd be 90 days I put on a uniform and literally push your trolley in uniform, on board, the aircraft as the most junior crew member. And that's ability to bridge in some ways the experience and the conversation between those two parts of the business was absolutely invaluable to me.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Yeah. I agree with you, similarly, I spent eight years on the front line in customer service doing pretty much every job under the sun. And I absolutely trace back my ability to be such a good CX-er now, Because I Remember the reality of what it was like, and also in management and leadership on the front line of customer service and customer experience working in hospitality mainly was I think one of the most formative things about my pragmatism and realism. It's good to remember, 'Going back to the floor' in my supermarket days, every Christmas, every Easter we'd be back on the shop floor, stacking the shelves and remembering what a truly difficult and challenging job is, especially at peak times. And yeah, getting to see the executives doing the same thing I think for everyone in the organisation was a really motivating and inspiring thing because it also made them more relatable and believable because the colleagues on the shop floor in a supermarket had been working alongside the executives together in these really busy times and that sense of community and being on one team and it not being the ivory tower and the support centre really it helps to bring us together, which brings me on to my next question. We've spoken at length about customer experience and employee experience being two halves of the same coin during these podcasts. But you're one of the few people that I've heard talk about the notion of community in CX discussions. I know we talked about it the beginning in relation to Scandinavian culture. But I just wondered if you could tell me a little bit more about your perspective on how these things all fit together, particularly as regards to community.
Kate Thornton:
Yeah, I guess I've been on a bit of a journey through my career. So as we talked about, I started off in very all in a customer facing role and customer centricity has been an anchor point in my career. As we've also just talked about them, particularly through my experience, working in cabin crew and work that I did at British airways on developing customer service culture, I became increasingly convinced of the link between EX and CX and really the, the critical role of leadership decisions and behaviours and setting the context in which colleagues can deliver the optimum customer experience. I became quite disenchanted at one point around the perceived tension between an extreme focus on shareholder value and the ability of the business to make the long-term decisions that needed to be made to protect that employee and customer experience. And that led me on a mission to explore social purpose and community value creation more in the context of the business. And I remain convinced that you know, when businesses can align the creation of value for all of their stakeholders the shareholders, yup. Businesses have to make money. Investments needs to make a return, but also their customers, their colleagues, and the community in which they exist. It is better for everyone because we are all ultimately connected. And there were some really powerfully examples of businesses that do that well, and it's not an excuse for not being commercial. In fact, at Simply Health, which, you know, is a business founded with a great sense of social purpose. We used to talk about the fact that it actually makes commerciality more important because when you think about the role that your money and your activity is playing in your wider community and potentially serving the needs of people in the community who considerably less fortunate than you are. I think it gives you real urgency to, and a real significance to that business's commercial performance.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Hmm. Do you think that being able to demonstrate that in a tangible way is difficult to some extent, because I'm thinking there are clear brand benefits to behaving in a way which is overtly doing good in the community and in society, but it's not that easy to measure. You can have metrics like love and trust, for example, which I hope more companies are going to embrace those as the golden metrics in the future. But what we tend to see in reality is more of a pull towards things like net promoter score. Or you can tell, by the way I said that I'm not so keen or those kinds of things. Do you have any thoughts on that? How CX-ers can help to influence people, particularly a senior level about the importance and value of community, CX and EX?.
Kate Thornton:
Yeah. so I think you can measure probably on a number of different levels. So in terms of the actual customer experience the more that you can work with your insight team to understand what the drivers are of your customer's purchase behaviour and kind of likely to recommend the closer you can get to that. And certainly I've seen powerful evidence that suggests that all things being equal customers would increasingly spend more or stay longer with brands that are behaving ethically and creating positive impact in their society. It doesn't get you off the hook of having to have a relevant product and service at the right price point. But if they're comparing between two organisations with product parity, then a sort of social responsibility can give you some competitive advantage. So that's one angle. On the employee side, I think there is very good evidence to suggest that people are increasingly looking to work for companies that are having a positive impact on wider society as well as also providing a very strong employee value proposition. And that's, you know, massively in focus now. So you might want to look at the business case from a talent acquisition cost. There are interesting ways increasingly of actually measuring your social impact. So measured like social return on investments and just a board level. My view is that whether we like it or not, we are going to see more regulation around the way that companies behave and the impact that they're having, whether it's on the climate or whether it's on societies as a whole. And I think it'll be very interesting to see post the Covid crisis. Kind of quiet how that agenda changes as more and more companies are taking money from the public purse. What are we going to expect in return? So you can look at it from a risk management handbook, how do I manage against the risk of regulation that's coming in? Or you can look at it from the perspective that says, actually we are likely to be expected to do more of this in the future. It is likely to become more of an expectation by consumers and our people and the people who regulate us. And therefore, if we can do the smarter, we can do it early and we can do it authentically. We may be able to build some competitive advantage from that.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
So perhaps needing to have a slightly broader, more balanced scorecard in the future, rather than the metrics we were looking at pre COVID-19, there might be a requirement to broaden that horizon now, especially for CX-ers as well to consider how the work we do in proposition development and customer journey design can help to trigger more benefit than just ease and effort, but also community and social benefits. I love that. Okay. So I, this is it final question, and I'm sure all the listeners at home would just love us to summarise or would have you to summarise, what would your top piece of advice be for any women with aspirations to reach the chief customer officer level role? What would you say to them?
Kate Thornton:
All right, well, go for it. And clearly don't be afraid to ask don't be afraid to tell people that that's what you want. Don't be afraid to ask for help as you go along the way. I mean, one of the, one of the things that I wish I had learned so much earlier in my career is just how helpful it is to ask for help. And how rewarding so many people find to give it. So I had another piece of research really started recently that said that people on average underestimate the likely cause the other people will help them by 50%.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
I saw it too. Yeah.
Kate Thornton:
So, you know, ask for help because it will help you and it will make someone else feel good and ask for those opportunities. Don't let less qualified people get there before you and feel frustrated. The people that go for jobs, perhaps they're less qualified for the work, but if you don't apply, no one is going to give you the job.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Exactly. You miss a hundred percent of the shots you don't take. So thank you so much for today, Kate. I know when I first met you during the lockdown on our very first Zoom, that I felt this real affinity with you and you definitely brought and shown your CX sisterhood to the audience today. And I'm absolutely inspired by your story that I guess I would summarise is somebody who absolutely decided what she wanted and went for it. Despite what other people said with the example of, you know, picking Danish university choice and being brave enough to continually ask for what you want. When you were faced with blockages and barriers, you continue to say, no, I want more. And I think for all the women that are listening here today, they'll see, you know, the absolutely amazing impact that you've had on customer employee experience and also the communities you work in and will no doubt be reaching for much higher opportunities and aspirations. They perhaps even saying I'm going to go for that job that they weren't considering before they heard you today. So thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you.
Kate Thornton:
Well, thank you Clare too. And I think what you're doing here with this podcast is awesome.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Oh, thank you. Thank you. Just one more. Thank you to say to Joakim Thörn and our sponsors at Effectly for producing the women in CX podcast today. And I do really hope to see you all again next week. Thanks Kate.
Kate Thornton:
Thanks so much.
Clare Muscutt- Host:
Bye for now!