Awesome Women to Follow in CX 2026
This March, Women’s History Month, we’re celebrating the brilliant women influencing how customer experience is designed, delivered, and improved every day.
Our focus for 2026 is on Responsible CX by Design – not as a trend or a technical term, but as a mindset. One that asks us to design experiences that are thoughtful, inclusive, transparent, and human-centred from the start.
Because responsible customer experience doesn’t happen by accident. It happens when people question assumptions, consider consequences, and advocate for both customers and colleagues. It happens when humanity is treated as a design principle, not an afterthought.
Women in CX have long contributed this perspective to the industry. Often without a spotlight or recognition, they are improving systems, challenging bias, strengthening collaboration, and shaping experiences that work better for more people.
And yet, women remain underrepresented in many of the spaces where future-facing CX decisions are made. Visibility matters – not for status, but for progress. When women are seen, heard, and supported, the entire industry moves forward.
Awesome Women to Follow in CX is not a ranked or numbered list. Every woman featured here has made a meaningful contribution in her own way – each bringing a perspective our industry needs.
Our aim is simple: to celebrate achievements, elevate voices, and continue building a more human-centred future for customer experience, together.
So, without further ado, we’re proud to introduce this year’s Awesome Women to Follow in CX…
Abisola
Fagbiye
Microsoft 365 Productivity Consultant, Information EXP
United Kingdom
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Abisola Fagbiye transforms how organizations engage with customers. As a CX Strategist and Microsoft 365 Productivity Consultant, she’s scaled CX teams across 10 global locations, delivered workshops to thousands of attendees, and driven results including revenue increases and satisfaction improvements. Her secret? An artist’s eye. Before entering CX, she was a charcoal and pastel artist, which taught her to see beauty in relationships and notice details others miss. A WiCX Rising Star nominee, she holds a Professional Diploma (Distinction) in CX from The CX Academy, Ireland, and mentors young women in tech.
Adrienne
Angelescu
Customer Support Specialist
United Kingdom
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Experienced CX & CS professional specialised in turning messy processes into reliable systems that protect renewals and make teams more effective. Known for honesty, data discipline, bias for action, and focus on improvements over maintaining the status quo. Curious and always eager to learn more, Adrienne is a keen adopter of automation and AI, while also relying on thoughtful communication, strong ownership and empathy to make customer experience simpler, predictable, and impactful.
Alyona
Medelyan
CEO, Thematic
New Zealand
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Alyona leads Thematic, where she helps CX and VoC teams act on insights hidden in text feedback at scale. Her focus is practical customer-centricity: translating sentiment and themes into decisions leaders can act on, and measuring the business outcomes that follow. She writes and speaks about modern VoC, CX measurement, as well as her founder journey and leadership lessons.
Amélie
Beerens
Leadership Coach | CX/EX Consultant, Brazen Leaders
Belgium
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Amélie Beerens is a leadership coach and CX/EX integration consultant with 15 years of experience in business and organisational transformation across 10 industries.
She helps ambitious leaders build alignment, confidence, and influence while transforming the systems they operate in without burning themselves or their teams.
Founder of Brazen Leaders Incubator, host of Brazen Leaders – The Podcast, and author of The Leader Attitude, she blends transformation strategy with bold, human-centred leadership.
No hype.
No hustle.
No pretending.
Just leadership you can stand behind when the pressure is on.
Ania
Rodriguez
CEO and Founder, JourneyTrack
United States
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Ania Rodriguez is the Founder & CEO of JourneyTrack, a Forrester-recognized leader redefining enterprise journey management. A category-shaping entrepreneur, she built Key Lime Interactive into a top UX research firm and has spent 20+ years advising Fortune 500 executives. Widely respected for transforming insight into competitive advantage, Ania is helping define the future of experience-led enterprises through disciplined governance, AI, and measurable business impact.
Ashley
Couto
VP Professional Services, Passion.io
Canada
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Ashley Couto is an award-winning senior leader who's worked across CX, sales, marketing, product, operations, and people.
The VP of Professional Services at Passion.io, Ashley has spent the last decade of her career designing and delivering high quality e-learning experiences for business owners in wellness, real estate, the creator economy, creative industries, and hospitality.
You can catch her posting new content to help women leaders and founders grow their personal brands every day on LinkedIn.
Birgit
Goelen
Head of Customer Excellence, Plandisc
Denmark
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From Belgium to Denmark. From marketing professional to Head of Customer Excellence. From being part of an awesome team to leading one. While things continue to evolve, one constant remains: building and nurturing a truly customer-centric culture is my northern star. I spearhead Customer Experience, build Customer Success teams from the ground up and scale Customer Support with a growth mindset, strong drive and an enthusiastic approach that turns vision and insight into action.
Candace
Powell
Customer Experience Lead, The Benevolent Society
Australia
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Customer Experience Lead with expertise in CX strategy, client participation, and analytics. Skilled in cross-functional collaboration, codesign, mentoring and driving service improvement. Passionate about ethical practice, accessibility, language justice, innovation, and empowering teams to deliver exceptional experiences across diverse contexts.
Chelsea
Costelloe
Chief Excitement Officer, EXCO TT
Trinidad and Tobago
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Chelsea Costelloe is the Chief Excitement Officer of EXCO, a Caribbean-based customer experience consultancy that helps leaders and teams imagine bigger and build better experiences for customers and employees. With a strong grounding in consumer behaviour and a focus on journey design and UX, Chelsea leads hands-on workshops that bring straight talk, high energy, and practical tools teams can use immediately. She has supported organizations across sectors , from start-ups to multinational and public-sector teams, and is known for making customer experience feel clear, actionable, and worth investing in.
Chloe
Woolger
CX Growth Director, EMEA, Kantar
United Kingdom
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Chloe Woolger is CX Growth Development Director, EMEA, with a strong track record of driving brand growth through customer‑centric strategy. She specialises in customer experience, commercial development and technology‑led insight, helping organisations unlock new revenue and competitive advantage. A recognised industry voice, Chloe regularly speaks at CX and marketing events and is one of the early stage co-founders of the WiCX community. She is passionate about building high‑performing, client‑focused teams that deliver measurable growth.
Crystal
D'Cunha
Chief Experience Officer, The INSIDE View - Culture Creators & Delight Designers
Canada
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A global CX/EX strategist, keynote speaker, and trainer. People often say: "Crystal has a PhD in people skills!". She has trained 10,000+ professionals and supported 1,000+ businesses across industries including municipalities, trades, retail, hospitality, and insurance. A Gold Stevie Award winner and Top Woman in CX to Follow (2025), she chairs the GroYourBiz Board, serves on the CXPA Toronto board, and supports the YWCA of Niagara, helping provide 150+ families with holiday meals. Her methodology—Ignite Leaders, Excite Employees, Delight Customers—turns CX strategy into real-world results.
Diane
Magers
Co-founder and CXO, AmplifyXM.com
United States
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Diane Magers is Founder & CEO of Experience Catalysts and former CEO/Chair Emeritus of the CXPA. For 25+ years, she has helped organizations turn customer and employee experience into measurable business value—growth, retention, and efficiency. Diane builds Experience Operating Systems, Centers of Excellence, and ROI models that connect strategy, data, and governance to execution. A sought-after advisor, speaker, and educator, she blends human-centered design, analytics, and change leadership—with a master’s in clinical psychology—to develop leaders and communities of practice.
Elena
Marcelle
CX & Digital Transformation Strategist, CX as Strategy
Belgium
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Elena Marcelle is a Customer Experience and Digital Transformation Strategist. She believes CX is not a function, but a strategic system linking growth, profitability and trust. Through her C.U.S.T.O.M.E.R.™ system, she helps organisations turn empathy into structured, coherent and measurable outcomes. Her work challenges superficial CX metrics, reframing experience as an operational system where emotional insight, coherence, governance and applied AI coexist to drive sustainable loyalty.
Emily
Dahl
JourneyOps Leader & Principal CX Strategist, The Home Depot
United States
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Emily Dahl is a journey management leader advancing enterprise‑wide JourneyOps at The Home Depot. With over 10 years in experience strategy, process improvement, and UX research, she builds the systems and mindset that help organizations understand their customers and employees more deeply, so they can design experiences that truly move people. Her background spans strategic consulting, service design, and workforce experience.
Emmeliek Harren-Preijde
Head of CX, Eurail BV
Netherlands
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Emmeliek is Head of CX at Eurail, leading product and research teams to deliver life-changing rail journeys. With a background spanning marketing, customer research, product management, and CX across diverse sectors, she is passionate about building truly customer-centric organisations. At Eurail, she oversees Product & CX teams and introduced customer journey management and service design to steer company-wide prioritisation. She is proving that great CX isn’t about expensive tools, but about aligned teams, shared insight, and the courage to prioritise the customer.
Erin
Helcl
Founder, New Helio Strategies Inc.
Canada
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Erin Helcl is the Founder and Managing Director of New Helio Strategies, a service design consultancy focused on customer and employee experience strategy, transformation, and innovation. With 25 years leading CX, EX, product, and service design in highly regulated environments, Erin brings a rare inside-out perspective on change. She partners with leaders to translate strategy into experiences that work in the real world where trust, risk, and performance intersect, helping organizations design services that deliver for both people and business.
Ewa
Davenport
Senior Client Success Director, Kantar
United Kingdom
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Ewa Davenport is a Senior Client Success Director at Kantar, driving meaningful change for clients across financial services. With 12+ years’ experience, she blends sharp insight with empathy to simplify complexity and help organisations act on what truly matters. Recognised for her collaborative leadership and ability to challenge constructively, she’s passionate about elevating women’s voices in CX and tackling systemic bias to create fairer, more human customer experiences.
Elaine
Lee
Managing Director, Reynolds Busby Lee
United Kingdom
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Elaine Lee is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Reynolds Busby Lee, a consultancy helping Direct-to-Consumer brands and charities grow through customer-centred strategy and experience design. She specialises in vulnerability, ethical engagement and building environments where both customers and frontline teams can thrive. Elaine is creator of the TRUST Vulnerability Framework and the Thriving Toolkit, practical approaches supporting organisations to identify, interpret and respond to changing customer and colleague needs.
Fiona
Blades
Founder & Co-CEO, MESH Experience
United Kingdom
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Following a marketing and ad agency career, Fiona launched MESH Experience to fill a gap in marketing effectiveness measurement.
By capturing the whole customer experience, (paid, owned and earned), MESH delivers new metrics, like Share of Experience. Award-winning case studies for Fidelity International, Boots and Diageo demonstrate how these turbo-charge decision-making.
Fiona is a Fellow of the Market Research Society, Past President of the Market Research Council in New York and mentor for The Marketing Academy. An advocate for diversity, she founded diversityunlimited.org and is a founding partner of Crater Lake & Co.
Faithe
Toomy
Dir. VoC & Insights, Insulet Corporation
United States
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My work begins with being human first. I’m driven to support others personally and professionally, and to create experiences that make life easier. With 20+ years in the call center industry, I’ve stayed anchored in one belief: when we truly understand people, we can design experiences that uplift everyone. I’ve embraced learning, taken on challenges, and grown into a leader who listens, advocates, and builds inclusive, meaningful solutions that elevate the customer voice and simplify how we work.
Freya
Finnerty
Senior Change & Delivery Consultant, Enfuse Group
United Kingdom
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Most teams don’t struggle because they lack talent. They struggle because the customer gets lost, priorities compete, and silos take over.
Freya is a Change, Delivery and CX Consultant and Agile Coach with 20 years’ experience helping retail and hospitality teams deliver better customer experiences in complex environments.
She works at the intersection of Customer Experience, Agile delivery and human connection, helping teams move from busy to outcome focused.
Freya is known for energising facilitation, connecting people quickly, and keeping customers front and centre in how teams work.
Frances
Chapireau
Turning Customer Feedback into Business Results, BuildCX
Germany
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If you want to turn your Voice of Customer program into an engine for organisational learning and growth, speak to Frances. She is ideally placed to guide you, combining 15 years of experience in customer research and Experience Management technology with a focus on collaboration, team performance, and business results. Her philosophy: start small and get people involved.
She’s on a mission to broaden our definition of what ‘Voice of the Customer’ is (yes, it’s more than a survey program), and help her clients go from measuring satisfaction to really listening, learning and doing something with the feedback they collect.
Gabriela
Amaral
CEO & Founder, NECXA School & Consulting
United States
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After 7 years working at multinational companies across Brazil and abroad, Gabriela Amaral founded Necxa School, the first education and consulting company to offer a multidimensional approach to Customer Experience and Digital Transformation. She previously served as Global Head of Customer Satisfaction at AB InBev, leading initiatives across more than 20 countries and increasing global NPS by over 20 points in 2 years. Gabriela holds a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from UFLA, a Master’s degree in Human-Computer Interaction from UFMG, and completed executive education in Artificial Intelligence at MIT.
Funda
Whitaker
VP, Strategic Insights, Press Ganey
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Passionate about understanding customers to build the best experiences for them, I am a believer in well-thought-out and purposefully-designed experience insights systems. I lead a strong team of insights consultants, working with organizations to understand their goals for the customer and for the business, designing the right and robust insights programs, and diving deep into those insights to tell executives what (customers experience), why (so), and how (to move the needle) to improve both customer experience and business outcomes. I love partnering with our clients, bringing in my 25+ years experience and expertise!
United States
Jeannie
Walters
Founder and CEO, Experience Investigators
United States
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Jeannie Walters, CCXP, CSP, is an award-winning customer experience expert, author, CEO of Experience Investigators, and international keynote speaker. She helps leaders turn CX into measurable results through practical, proven strategies. With 20+ years of experience, Jeannie has led transformation across healthcare, financial services, software, education, and hospitality for brands like JPMorganChase, SAP, Comcast, and Orangetheory Fitness. A LinkedIn Top Voice, her courses have reached 500,000+ learners, and her upcoming book, Experience Is Everything, shows how CX drives growth, retention, and revenue.
Ginger
Conlon
Director of Customer Stories, Genesys
United States
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An award-winning editorial leader, Ginger Conlon is director of customer stories at Genesys. Previously she was thought leadership director at Genesys and co-host of its podcast and livestream show. In her prior roles as chief editor of 1to1 Media, CRM magazine, and Direct Marketing News, she set the editorial vision and strategy, which led to increased readership, engagement, and revenue. Ginger was a founding board member of CXPA, was CX Magazine's 2023 CXM Stars awards’ #1 CX industry influencer, and received a Silver Apples lifetime achievement award from Marketing Club of NY.
Jenny
Payne
Head of Customer Experience & Improvement, Cornwall Council
United Kingdom
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Jenny Payne is Head of Customer Experience & Improvement at Cornwall Council, leading the customer strategy that puts people at the heart of public services. Driven by a belief that leadership begins with listening, and a bit of fun, she champions empathy, inclusion and collaboration to design services around real lives, not systems. Jenny brings together insight, lived experience and innovation to create change that empowers communities and makes everyday interactions simpler, fairer and more human.
Jennie
Lewis
Sr Manager Customer Insights, Airship
United States
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Jennie Lewis is a value-focused researcher who transforms complex data into revenue-driving narratives. An expert in quantifying CX ROI, she began as a self-taught coder automating emails for GM before leading agency teams that supported iconic brands like Marriott, Chase, and Marvel. She bridges the gap between technical data and business strategy, managing a portfolio of research results that achieve increased influenced revenue. Certified by Northwestern, eCornell, and Google, Jennie is a recognized thought leader and mentor dedicated to proving that great customer experience is a measurable driver of growth.
Julie
Morgan
Product & CX Consultant, Ringtail Consulting Ltd
United Kingdom
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Julie drives revenue growth through customer-led innovation, working with businesses to strengthen product, strategy, and CX capability. With leadership experience at The Telegraph, Capgemini, and Informa, she has delivered market-leading products and built high-performing teams at scale.
As a freelance consultant, she partnered with global brands (such as Coca-Cola, Clarion, Travelzoo) to transform underperforming products, build growth, and align teams behind ambitious goals.
Judy
Bloch
VP, Financial Services Industry Advisory, Medallia
United States
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Judy is an innovative, award-winning CX leader with a track record of driving change and designing seamless omni-channel experiences. She has led CX initiatives at Sprint/Tmobile, Citi, and UMB—brands known for their customer-centric approach—delivering industry-recognized, measurable impact. She currently serves as the head of the financial services practice at Medallia,, consulting global financial brands on CX strategy, best practices, and thought leadership.
Kirsty
Dare
Customer Operations Change Manager, Starling
United Kingdom
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I’m a Senior CX professional Results -driven with nearly two decades of experience leading business transformation in highly regulated environments. I’m passionate about how businesses serve their customers and empowering teams to deliver seamless, meaningful experiences.
Karyn
Furstman
Founder & CEO, CustomersFurst
United States
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Karyn is Founder of CustomersFurst, where she advises and coaches CX leaders to be successful by guiding them to build and supercharge CX strategies that drive financial results.
Karyn understands business challenges firsthand – she’s walked in your shoes. With her extensive operational experience, she empowers leaders and teams to deliver superior customer experiences, align CX with business strategy, and build a culture of continuous improvement and accountability. This holistic approach not only enhances customer satisfaction and loyalty but also drives tangible business growth and long-term organisational value.
Lara
Khouri
Founder, there is no spoon cx*ex*change leadership
United Arab Emirates
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An award-winning people-centric leadership strategist, Lara founded there is no spoon in 2018 after a career in international business development for UK multinationals. In 2022, she and Rajeev Daswani, founder of AHCC, developed The CEO Maker™, the world’s first empathy-based, business-focused leadership accelerator, and The CXO Maker™, blending leadership development with an adrenaline shot to the heart of CX & EX understanding.
She is one of the female factor’s “New Era of Leadership” global leaders, founding member of global communities, mentor, awards judge, speaker, and contributor to CX & EX initiatives worldwide.
Lauretta Campestre
AVP, Success Strategy, CallMiner
United States
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Lauretta, AVP Success Strategy at CallMiner, drives necessary change in how brands embrace Intelligent CX Automation. She leads success strategy, ensuring success teams consult deeply with brands and deliver strategies that accelerate transformation and measurable value. Driven by empathy, data‑driven insight, and a dedication to meaningful transformation, Lauretta helps brands turn Intelligence into CX Automation and thrive in a rapidly evolving digital landscape. Passionate about culture and inclusion, she sponsors CallMiner’s expanding Women’s Summit.
Leonora
Gouveia
Sr Business Solutions Manager, SAS
United Kingdom
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With nearly 20 years of experience in MarTech, Leonora has worked on Customer Engagement projects across the Banking, Retail, B2B, and Telco sectors. Her career includes collaboration with Retail Media, Advertising, and Marketing teams, always with the purpose of strengthening the relationship between brands and customers through technological solutions. An active member of Women in CX, she is the mother of two girls and a strong advocate for gender equality.
Lily
McNally
Design Lead, Lloyds Banking Group
United Kingdom
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Lily looks after the team who design the Scottish Widows app.
She’s all about designing experiences that are straightforward, engaging and delightful. To meet users where they are, help them do the things they want to do easily, and leave them feeling lighter.
In the last few years Lily has used her own lived experience, and storytelling superpowers, to really focus in on the unique barriers women face when it comes to financial independence - to support women in the UK to reach a better financial future.
Lina
Yahya
Founder & CXO, the change cue
United Arab Emirates
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Lina doesn’t just talk about customer experience; she builds it into how organizations actually work. With 25+ years across strategy, product, sales & CX, she specializes in connecting customer value, employee behaviour, operational delivery & regulatory expectations.
Today, Lina’s focus is on what’s next: changing the measurement scene. Through the change cue, she’s developing connected models that move beyond siloed KPIs, linking behaviour with emotion at key moments to predict friction earlier & drive outcomes. Her aim is to help companies sustain change in an AI-driven, multi-channel world, one cue at a time.
Linda
Howard
Senior Marketing Manager, Withum
United States
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With a rich background spanning market research, customer insights, and strategic communications, Linda brings over 20 years of experience—and a truly global perspective – to her projects.
Her journey has taken her from England to Los Angeles, with a courageous mid-career pause to pursue her passion for yoga in India.
At Withum—a Top 25 Accounting and Advisory firm—Linda leads national client experience and advertising strategy, while supporting regional marketing and sponsorship initiatives. As a local leader for Women of Withum, she’s deeply committed to elevating women’s voices within the firm and the wider business.
Lisa
Tarry-Sellers
Head of Group VOC Programs, RS Group
United Kingdom
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Lisa is a global Voice of the Customer leader with over a decade of experience driving customer‑led improvement and commercial impact. She excels at turning complex insight into strategic stories that unite teams, influence senior stakeholders, and accelerate action. Passionate about elevating real customer voices, Lisa builds VoC programmes that strengthen relationships, improve outcomes, and help organisations make smarter, more human decisions.
Lorena
Lovric
Director of Customer Experience, Aterian, Inc
Croatia
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Accomplished Director of Customer Experience driving global AI-enabled CX transformation. At Aterian, she architected a unified ecosystem on Genesys Cloud, integrating voice, digital, automation, and workforce engagement into one operating model, work that earned the 2025 Genesys Level Up Award for Empathetic Experience Generation. A former frontline agent turned executive, she leads with disciplined execution and an unapologetically agent-first philosophy, proving AI performance and humanity are not trade-offs. Committed to continuous learning, she is currently studying finance at Harvard Extension School.
Luisa Onnebrink
AI Product Enablement Manager, Vonage
Germany
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AI Enablement Strategist Transforming CX: Luisa builds bridges between cutting-edge AI and real customer impact. As AI Product Enablement Manager at Vonage, she transforms complex conversational AI into strategies global teams can use, collaborating across Product, Marketing, and Sales to ensure technology serves customer needs. Creator and host of "AI Conversations Live!", she champions thought leadership across the CX industry. With roots as a Conversation Designer who built hundreds of AI-powered experiences, Luisa brings technical depth and strategic vision to democratizing ethical and effective AI solutions.
Marion
Boberg
Offer Strategy Lead, Orange Business
Belgium
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Marion Boberg, PhD, is a CX strategist at Orange Business Digital Services, helping organizations turn customer journeys into measurable growth. With 15+ years across telecom, and retail, she bridges strategy, service design, and data to move companies from journey mapping to true experience orchestration. She focuses on aligning cross-functional teams, governance, and KPIs to make customer-centricity operational — and impactful.
Megan
Armour
Founding Designer, Strata
Singapore
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I'm Megs - I lead design practices, help founders build 0-1 products, and coach design and CX leaders. I believe the next era of design leaders are builders.
I've scaled design teams of 30+ at EY and Lloyds Banking Group, delivering omnichannel services used by over 8m customers and embedding enterprise-wide journey management systems and CX frameworks. I've also built and launched founding products for early-stage startups in fintech and AI.
Michole Johnston
Customer Retention Specialist, Farmers Insurance
United States
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Michole is a Customer Experience and Success leader with over eight years of experience across healthcare technology and insurance, two of the most complex and highly regulated industries. The majority of her career has focused on patient experience, partnering with health systems and health tech organizations to improve engagement, trust, and long-term loyalty through digital and human-centered strategies. Today, she brings that same lens to insurance, navigating change and regulation while designing customer experiences that strengthen retention and turn insight into action when it matters most.
Oana
Man-Kesselheim
Strategic Advisor | Founder | Customer Centricity Expert | Developing an AI-powered, Centricity Consulting
Romania
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Over the past 15 years, she has turned her obsession with Customer Experience (CX) into a measurable competitive advantage for companies in Romania and internationally. At Endava (NYSE: DAVA), she designed and led the global Voice of the Customer program, embedding customer satisfaction as a strategic business objective at Board level. In 2024, her first research paper on Customer Satisfaction—was published at the International Marketing Conference (15th edition), held in Cluj-Napoca. Today, she is she is building Sentimentalistⓒ, the first Romanian platform that uses AI to analyze all customer feedback.
Olga
Potaptseva
CEO, European Customer Consultancy (ECC)
United Kingdom
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Olga Potaptseva is a globally recognised strategist specialising in customer-informed operating models for large organisations across Europe and the Middle East. A Top 15 Global CX Influencer, she partners with C-suite leaders to transform structures through deep research and experience management. With 20+ years of leadership, she bridges strategy and operations. From pharmaceutical supply models and OPEX savings to higher insurance retention and doubled banking conversions. By combining human insight, AI enablement and strong change management, she reduces burnout and builds future-ready organizations.
Pat
Osorio
CCO, Birdie.ai
United States
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Patrícia Osorio is Co-founder and CRO of Birdie.ai, where she helps enterprises turn customer feedback into measurable business impact. A bold voice in modern CX, she challenges vanity metrics and dashboard culture, advocating for data-driven decision systems that reduce churn, cost, and friction. Investor, operator, and community builder, Patrícia speaks globally on AI, customer intelligence, and female leadership, bridging CX, Product, and growth with clarity and conviction.
Polly
Hammond
CEO & Founder, 5forests OU
Spain
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Polly Hammond is a globally recognized wine marketing strategist whose work has changed how the wine industry talks to — and understands — its customers. As founder of 5forests, the Wine Culture Lab, and the WineStories™ persona framework, she helps wine brands build strategy around how customers actually think, feel, and buy. When many brands were still resistant to change, Hammond was urging the industry to embrace e-commerce, customer-centric marketing, and culture-led communication. Named one of wine's Most Inspiring People and Wine Business Monthly's 2025 Wine Industry Leaders.
Rebecca
Brown
Co-Founder and Principal Consultant, Think Wow
United Kingdom
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Rebecca Brown co founded Think Wow just before the pandemic and scaled it through uncertainty into an award winning CX, sales and training consultancy. She created the trademarked IDEA Method® (Identify, Design, Execute, Anchor) to make change tailored, focused and sustainable long term, not a one off initiative. Think Wow has expanded into CPD accredited training and commercial sales support, has supported multiple award winning clients, and won Best Start Up at the UK Business Awards. Rebecca is a global CX influencer and speaker.
Rebecca Edwards
Practice Lead, Experience Design, Datacom
Australia
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I have dedicated the last decade of my career honing my skills in customer experience, service design, user experience design and people management and development. My career has spanned across managing large BPO portfolios to leading consulting engagements and designing operational and digital uplifts. I have spent my career focused on one core mission: creating personalised experiences that truly elevate the lives of the people they serve. My approach to experience design and digital transformation is rooted in empathy, diversity and the belief that technology should be a seamless enabler of human connection.
Sandra
Thompson
Founding Director, Ei Evolution
United Kingdom
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Representing the brain and constantly asking the "human" questions very few of us think about in customer and employee experience, Sandra Thompson is an "empathy expert" (a title bestowed on her) and a scholar and teacher of psychology and neuroscience in the customer and employee space.
Sandra designs and delivers learning experiences, she lectures, she gives inspiring keynote speeches, occasionally coaches, and she's written a practical guide to become more emotionally intelligent.
On a mission to create greater connection, she's partnered with an amazing human to run EQ and communication programmes. Here's to 2026!
Sandrea
Morgan
Head of Customer Support, Adanola
United Kingdom
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Strategic CX and Contact Centre leader with 20+ years’ experience scaling global operations, outsourcing partnerships and AI enabled service transformation. I’m passionate about reducing contacts, improving efficiency and designing customer journeys that deliver better outcomes for customers and businesses. I combine data driven thinking with collaborative leadership and a positive, people first approach to change. Energised by turning customer insight into smarter service, stronger teams and sustainable growth, and by sharing learning with the wider CX community.
Sarah
Caminiti
Head of Business Transformation, SupportNinja
United States
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Sarah Caminiti is the Head of Business Transformation at SupportNinja, where she's redefining outsourcing as strategic partnership through a customer experience transformation practice. Named to ICMI's Top 25 Thought Leaders for 2026, Sarah hosts The Career Strategist Podcast, writes The Career Strategist newsletter exploring space, power, and taking control of your career, and hosts CX Roundtable. She's the founder of Epochal Operations LLC and an advocate for psychological safety in CX.
Serena
Riley
Customer Advocacy Program Operations & Technology Manager, Thomson Reuters
United States
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Serena Riley, CCXP is a high-energy customer experience and advocacy leader with 20+ years of experience building scalable, human-centered programs across high-growth SaaS organizations. Known for blending structure with heart, she has led CX, Customer Success, Support, and Operations teams to outcomes including 100% CSAT, +42 NPS, 110% NRR, and accelerated time-to-value. Serena currently serves as Customer Advocacy Program Operations & Technology Manager at Thomson Reuters, where she’s building the systems and processes that turn customer voices into meaningful impact—at scale.
Shameem
Smillie
Senior, GTM Specialist Amazon Connect, AWS
United Kingdom
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GTM Specialist and CX/AI expert in Digital and Customer Experience Transformation. With extensive Amazon Connect and AI expertise, I drive strategic initiatives that accelerate adoption and deliver measurable outcomes. My approach focuses on continual innovation while supporting empowerment and inclusivity. I excel at building customer relationships and developing comprehensive market expansion strategies. Passionate about championing Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Women in Tech.
Shannon
Hodshon
Senior Business Lead, DevelopX
Germany
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Shannon builds digital businesses, services, and products with humans at the center—not just customers or features, but real people with real issues. She leads complex transformations and cross-functional teams through the full product lifecycle: from discovery and user research through MVP launch to market expansion.
With 7+ years at Bain & Company and KPMG, she drives 0→1 product development, service design, and AI-powered innovation across Finance, Health, Energy, and CPG.
🏳️🌈 LGBTQ+ advocate | Neurodiversity champion
Shannon
Knowlton
Lead CX Journey Owner, Farmers Insurance
United States
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I’m a customer experience leader focused on owning and improving end‑to‑end customer journeys to deliver meaningful outcomes for customers and the business. My background spans journey management, experience design, VOC leadership, and cross‑functional partnership. I bring customer insights to life through clear, thoughtful storytelling and strong relationship‑building. I hold a Master’s in Customer Experience Management from Michigan State University.
Sheila
March
Vice President, Healthcare Delivery Team Lead, Walker
United States
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Sheila leads the Walker Healthcare Delivery Team. With a background in healthcare shared services, marketing, and talent acquisition, Sheila brings a unique perspective as she partners with healthcare organizations to elevate patient, consumer, and employee experiences by combining data-driven insight with empathetic, practical change leadership.
Simone
Wilson
Vice President, CX Research & Advisory, Ipsos
Canada
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I help companies turn customer voices into business impact. From shaping CX measurement ecosystems to advising Fortune 500s on strategy and research, I thrive on building experiences that matter. As a proud Women in CX member, I’m passionate about elevating customer journeys—because when we truly understand people, we deliver happier moments for customers and meaningful outcomes for businesses
Siobhain Goodall
Account Executive, Ventrica
United Kingdom
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With 25+ years in CX and BPO, I have one core belief - relationships. honesty, humour and integrity create results. I blend experience across many sectors, driving longevity in commercial contracts, growing accounts and winning new business through a passion for digital transformation impacting and improving journeys for customers and front line teams alike. Whether designing operational and technological solutions, or participating in CX communities, I am passionate about what I do, and love the connections I have been privileged to make.
Sneha
Iyer
Lead, Business Value Consultant, Observe.AI
United States
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Sneha Iyer is an award-winning CX leader defining how B2B companies drive growth through Customer Value. She leads Customer Value and Analytics at Observe.AI, shaping value strategy from pre-sales through post-sales for 450+ enterprise customers. As the architect of frameworks like the Customer Experience Index and First-Mile Intelligence, Sneha turns real customer conversations into executive-grade insight, aligning GTM teams, accelerating time-to-value, and enabling multi-million-dollar expansions by replacing vanity CX metrics with accountable, outcome-driven systems.
Sophie
Chkhaberidze
Partner and CX Consultant | President XMGlobal Collaborative - Georgia Chapter, Lexden | XMGlobal Collaborative
Georgia
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Sophie Chkhaberidze is Georgia’s pioneering human-centered CX leader and founder of the country’s first Customer Experience team, with over 15 years of experience in service and experience management transformation. A certified Public Service Reform expert since 2020, she has simplified 500+ public services, enhancing citizen experience and embedding national CX standards. She is a Partner at Lexden UK and President of the XMGlobal Collaborative Georgia Chapter, a Subject Matter Expert, international speaker, and member of CXPA and Women in CX. Sophie is a former ICXA Judge and a CXMStars 2026 finalist.
Stephanie
Linville
Global Customer Experience Leader, Corteva Agriscience
United States
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Empathy fuels loyalty, and every interaction is a chance to make customers feel valued. I combine a passion for Customer Experience (CX) with data-driven strategies to connect on a human level. As an award-winning leader, I have been recognized for driving transformation and operational excellence across sectors like life sciences, healthcare, financial services, SaaS, and logistics. By listening deeply, bridging data across teams and systems, and turning insights into impact, I excel at embedding CX into business functions to build cultures where customers are central to decisions and employee excellence is celebrated.
Stine
Marsal
Founder, Experience Management Consult I InklusioNordic
Denmark
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Stine Marsal is a Danish sociologist and CX specialist turned accessibility and inclusion strategist. She helps organisations remove hidden barriers for customers and employees and translate the work into measurable results. With 20+ years in operations, she’s led CX at Copenhagen Airport, Tivoli Gardens and Copenhagen Zoo. As a consultant she has worked with LEGO House, Novonesis, Keolis, Berlin Airport, Securitas Germany and more. Stine is a seasoned keynote speaker and also hosts the annual CX conference: Experience Management Nordic Summit.
Susanna
Baqué
Senior Director Global Customer Experience, SCIEX
Spain
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Senior CX leader at SCIEX, a Danaher Company, driving CX transformation since 2014. With over 25 years in Life Sciences, she’s held leadership roles in sales, tech support, market development, and CX. Holding a PhD in Biochemistry, she began her career as a researcher and university professor.
Passionate about customer-centricity, she leads global teams to enhance CX and accelerate growth.
A strong advocate for Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, empowering others to succeed with people-centered leadership.
Tammy
Benevento (Pinkerton)
Customer Journey Manager, Hyundai Motor Europe
Germany
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Passionate CX Professional in the Automotive Industry. Specializing in Customer Journey Mapping, Customer insights, Differentiated Experience Design and driving CX transformation by using story telling with the Customer Journey showcasing pain points, customer and business impact and turning this into opportunities with deliverable actions across the organization.
Tanya
Fowler
Head of Customer Experience, FCT
Canada
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Tanya is a CX leader, CCXP, and trusted voice in the CX community who brings clarity and perspective to unite teams around the customer. With a career spanning legal, operations, sales enablement, and marketing, she challenges silos and reframes decisions through the lens of customer impact. Long before it was mainstream, Tanya applied AI to Voice of Customer programs to elevate insight into action. An award-winning CX leader, she is known for pushing boundaries, aligning leaders to the customer’s truth, and turning insight into momentum and measurable outcomes at FCT.
Tiahna
McDowell
Director, CX Programs, CDK Global
United States
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A Customer Experience and Insight leader who believes listening well is the foundation of meaningful change. Partners with senior leaders to translate customer and employee insight into practical, measurable outcomes. Actively champions inclusive leadership and the advancement of women in customer experience.
Tracey
Pankhurst
Global Senior Manager, Expert Services, Reputation
United Kingdom
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A Customer Experience and Insight leader who believes listening well is the foundation of meaningful change. Partners with senior leaders to translate customer and employee insight into practical, measurable outcomes. Actively champions inclusive leadership and the advancement of women in customer experience.
Valerie
Peck
Partner, Elevate X Consulting Group
United States
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I work with organizations to create customer experience strategies that are data-informed, tech-enabled, and grounded in practical implementation.
I help clients:
• Develop their customer intelligence capabilities
• Align organizational strategy with customer feedback and historical/predictiv data
• Select and implement Martech and CRM systems to for 1:1 communication
• Build Centers of Excellence (CoE)
• Improve loyalty, reduce churn, and drive measurable ROI
I lead workshops, mentor CX leaders, and co-develop internal playbooks. We serve Fortune 500s and growth-stage businesses
Vicky
Hampson
Owner & Chief of all things Performance & Impact, Victorious Consulting
Netherlands
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As Founder of Victorious Consulting and Loveson Agency, Vicky is THE Performance Architect for our challenging world of work. With 30 years in the engine room of global giants, she bridges the gap between Human Intelligence and Tech. Her "Human-First" philosophy builds the behavioural muscle leaders need to thrive in 2026. Via her 'Strategic Pause' approach she becomes a sounding board for commercial leaders reframing pressure into peak performance. UK-born, Amsterdam-based, she enables transformation with integrity and critical thinking for impact.
Weronika
Rosiak-Jedz
Founder, CX & TX Consultant, Total Experience
Poland
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CX Strategist & Total Experience Expert. She popularizes a holistic approach merging Customer and Employee perspectives. Creator of systemic tools for experience management, like "Total Journey," and a passionate Customer Journey fan.
Her portfolio spans multiple industries like Finance, Insurance, Energy, Real Estate, NGOs, Public Services, IT, Healthcare, and Tech.
She actively shapes the industry (in Poland) as a conference speaker and author of publications. Judge for CX World Games & Women in CX Awards.