"It’s hard for me to understand why someone would have difficulty embracing the CX concept in today’s world because, for all of us, it is ultimately our customers who determine our livelihood.” - Patrick Losinski, CEO, Columbus Metropolitan Library
As I travel around and talk to CX professionals, I frequently hear about the travails of making the case for CX to executive leadership. A perfect example is a colleague of mine who reported to five different executives within one year as the organization struggled to understand where and how CX fits in.
For me, who has the great advantage of strong CEO and Trustee support, I am mystified when I hear stories like that. After all, It’s the job of a customer experience leader, not to make his organization better at customer experience, but to make his organization succeed
because of customer experience.
To help CX professionals who struggle with executive support, I turned to three CXers whose work I admire and asked them to share their thoughts on how to build executive alignment, how they have managed their success and where their challenges have been. They are:
- Andrew Thompson, Senior Client Experience Analyst, BOK Financial, whom I met at the recent Customer Spark in Dallas. BOK was formerly Bank of Oklahoma, which is a top 25 U.S.-based bank with more than $30 billion in assets.
- Lorraine Schumacher, Customer Experience Management Evangelist at Clarabridge, has a long career in CX. Lorraine serves with me on the CXPA Board of Directors and I first met her long ago at a Customer Spark-like event at Intuit. Lorraine speaks widely about executive engagement.
- Suzie Dieth, Director of Customer Experience at Reliant, a Texas energy company whose parent company is NRG Energy. Suzie was a presenter at the Dallas Customer Spark event and shared her story of CX.
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What is your personal executive channel – whom do you need to engage? Andrew: We have an Executive Vice President who acts as CEO for the consumer bank. He reports directly to the CEO. Reporting to him is a Senior Vice President of Strategic Services. This is where CX and I fall under.
Lorraine: My executive channel is direct to the CEO and company founder.
Suzie: The president of our organization and her leadership team who are general managers or VP is the team that I have to engage.
What has worked best for you to engage your executives?Andrew: My path has been a little different. Before I stepped into this role I went through an accelerated career program where I was given visibility with senior leadership. I established a mentor/mentee role with the aforementioned head of strategic services. Throughout my career I have regularly engaged with him about my development and career path. Through this they’ve seen my characteristics as an employee and a person. This has gone a long way in building my reputation as a hard worker and someone who knows what he’s doing.
Lorraine: I work to make sure everything ties directly to corporate initiatives, telling a human story succinctly and showing the ROI and business value on each initiative.
Suzie: Communication, communication, communication along with partnership and collaboration with their teams. I tailor the message to make it relevant for them and make specific requests of executives, whether that is reading customer comments, listening to calls or talking with customers.
What has been a challenge and how have you addressed that?Andrew: My biggest challenge has been our bank structure and the silos that exist within that structure. I’ve worked in a variety of roles that have given me insight into most business units within the consumer bank. I’ve fostered relationships with people over the last five years, many of whom are now in positions of leadership throughout the organization. Those relationships have helped me overcome obstacles as we work toward our common goals.
Lorraine: A big challenge is the silos and competing priorities within silos at the VP level. I address that through a combination of perseverance and working to ensure that challengers can be helped or – even better -- made into heroes for getting the intended results.
Suzie: Not every leader understands CX, how CX applies to them or why it matters. By getting to know each leader individually and their goals, challenges and objectives, we’ve had targeted conversations that resonate with them. CX should not be viewed as a separate department or program; every employee at every level should understand CX and feel empowered to create a better customer experience.
What words of advice do you have for someone struggling with executive engagement? Andrew: Don’t fret or get discouraged. Most people go through this and many of us are still are. Identify what is important to those executives and then show how CX can be path to improvement.
Lorraine: Your executives are customers too! Appeal to their human side and tie it to business value...always. Never give up!
Suzie: Start with one executive who sees the value of CX; really get to know their personality, goals, objectives and challenges and then demonstrate how CX can help them achieve those goals. Implement quick wins and tell the success story to other leaders. Tailor the conversation, data and stories to the executive you are speaking with, and include verbatim comments from customers and employees to create an emotional connection but have data to support your ideas.
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The common thread here is relationships, communication and customizing the message to meet the needs of the executives. Even with the support I’ve had, it takes a long time to make the cultural shift, but, in the end, our livelihood depends on it. If you’d like to see my video with our CEO about our CX journey, watch
here.