Grow the power of Customer Experience with new leadership skills with this innovative and unique podcast that dives into the lives of some of the world's brightest minds. And have a hoot with the Hump Day Hoedown with Jim Rembach, President of Call Center Coach. Create dynamic customer experience strategies, improve employee engagement, and develop stronger leadership skills with practical advice that you can use immediately.
Jim Knight was asked by his CEO to deliver on a project with an extremely aggressive timeline. Despite all of their effort of working 18-20-hour days and on the weekends, Jim began to realize the task was larger than first assessed. So, Jim reported to the CEO and ultimately learned a vital lesson about transparency.
Doug Sandler was hired to be a DJ at a party hundreds of miles from his home. He was feeling on top of his game but within 15-minutes of the four-hour event, he realized why he was really hired sight unseen. He also realized that everything he had done in his career to that point was just about being lucky.
Lori Bocklund and her husband lived in the Washington DC area during 9/11 and then the anthrax scare and the DC sniper. She was living in constant fear. Despite loving where they lived, they decided to move. But they didn’t know here they wanted to live. After finally figuring that out, she took an even bigger risk which paid off in her becoming one of the leading authorities on contact center technology.
Michael Gale owned a number of trademarks on journey mapping when they built the methodology 14 years ago. But now he has to admit it’s no longer relevant because you can’t fit a journey map into a world of moments. With organizations now needing to digitally transform and customers being in complete control, Michael explains you must think and do things differently.
Jennifer Moss had two young kids when she founded her company and then her husband became almost fatally ill. They thought he would never walk again, but after a six-week recovery where he focused on gratitude, they realized they found a new passion that changed their narrative.
Ian Golding felt like he beat his head for 17 years working in an organization as a champion for the customer. Over the past 6 years he has traveled to over 60 countries and worked with organizations to help support those that thrive on the customer experience to be heard, recognized and supported. Listen as Ian shares insights on the future of customer experience as a discipline and profession.
Gabe Alves was working on a project that was going to digitally transform the way a hundred-year-old company managed its workforce. After weeks of presenting, Gabe finally got approval. Just prior to going live a vital component didn’t arrive. That’s when Gabe learned an age-old lesson that saved the day.
Heather Younger was leading the entire client facing team for a company that was going through a big merger. After about a year into the merger the company culture took a nosedive. Heather went to the head of HR, even though she was leading the customer experience, about making changes to improve the employee experience. Heather ended up being responsible to managing the experience for both.
Jillian Medoff was a business consultant with a passion for being a novelist. After having sold a few novels she was unable to sell her next manuscript. That’s when the editor of her first novel gave her some advice that she thought was crazy. But it paid off and Jillian is now following her passion of writing about corporate life.
Tal Shnall was promoted to managing a staff that was more than double the size of his previous role. But Tal did not realize that he was missing a lot of manager and leadership skills that would allow him to be successful. Tal struggled and paid the price. Eventually he found his way forward and now helps others from repeating his experience.
Debi Mongan decided to take a break from her career to raise her daughter. After five years had passed Debi decided to go back to work. She thought she was going to re-enter where she left off. Once she realized that wasn’t going to happen she took a step back, which helped her to take a leap forward.
Jenny Dempsey was working more than 50 hours per week, she rarely took breaks, and had the highest amount of vacation in the entire company. She kept stuffing her emotions down and wore a smile. Then one day she had an anxiety attack. A few years later, it happened again. Finally, Jenny realized that she had to make changes.
Dean Lindsay had a client that hired him for sales training. Everything went great and participant feedback was high. But once the client learned that Dean had some minor roles as a professional actor, he terminated the remaining sessions. This caused Dean to make some changes that had some unintended consequences.
Steven Keith was hired by a creative agency to build their digital consulting practice. As Steven began to build his team, he was hiring people and managing the team in a culturally different way than the legacy business. It wasn’t working. The CEO sat Steven down and told him he needed to fix it fast. Ultimately, Steven found success by getting the entire agency to focus on this one thing.
Christine Comaford fell to the ground and her body couldn’t stay standing. She had just found out that her step son died unexpectedly at college. While trying to cope with this tremendous loss, she had to fulfill numerous professional obligations. But she was unable to function. That’s when she found something that she had never realized before that has allowed her to experience an entirely new existence.
Jeffrey Shaw was tops in his class and returned home to launch his new business. Ready for success, Jefferey spent three long years moving down the path to failure. After he gave his best sales pitch ever, he realized how off he was trying to promote the message of his business. He was unable to speak the lingo of his customers. That’s when Jefferey launched his transformation and went from overlooked to overbooked.
Darrin Poole was challenged as a leader. He had to engineer a mindset shift. He suspended the normal drills and implemented a game changing tactic that dramatically changed their performance and helped everyone get over the hump.
Andy Swann was at a barbeque when he congratulated a guy who said he was at his job for 10 years. The man said he hated it. Andy realized he was that man and decided to make a resolution to do something about it. Now, Andy helps people to be rescued from the same fate.
Kimberly Davis had an anxiety attack. Days before she was to give a TEDx talk about being brave she lost her brave. She began to fear the spotlight, failing to connect to her audience and missing out on capturing her opportunity. But Kimberly knew what do to squash her own anxiety. She retrieved her brave.
Peter Lisoskie bet his job on a new idea. After numerous failures, Peter finally obtained 7 patents for his effort. Since then, Peter has focused his innovation on artificial intelligence and emotionally connected user interfaces to create interactive conversational brand experiences to shape customer experiences for companies and their customers.
Kumar Mehta experienced a culture shock. After working for Microsoft for many years, he became the CEO of Blue Ocean Market Intelligence. The same people that used to respond to his emails and phone calls when he was at Microsoft, now would not talk to him. His calls and request became less important without the Microsoft brand. That’s when Kumar learned a hard lesson about innovation.
Vicky Oliver was working at an advertising agency on September 11, 2001. After that day, Vicky decided to do a career redirect. She set upon a path to use her skills in a different way that ultimately led her to write about Bad bosses, Crazy Co-Workers and Other Office Idiots .
Rick Brinkman knew he had to get better at presenting. While presenting to a large group, he was unable to understand why everybody began to laugh hysterically. But he learned one thing that has helped him to move on to delivering hundreds of successful presentations since.
Shawn Vij was just out of business school and he was given the responsibility of the accounting for a project. He spotted something shady in the books and began to ask questions. He must have asked too many questions because his boss terminated him. That’s when Shawn’s outlook took a turn for the worst.
Sean Hawkins worked for a company that had been acquired twice in a short period of time. Sean had to navigate the delicate balance of being transparent where he could while upholding his responsibly to the organization. Sean learned that one investment he made really paid off in the end.
Erik Seversen had a horrible string of hiring the wrong person. That’s when he needed to do something different. He decided to totally change the interview process and his leadership style. Erik started focusing more on using emotional intelligence to move forward and applying it to his new English as a second language startup.
Tim Perek carried his journey map and personas into a c-suite meeting with all of his research and data. He walked them through all of the ideation and through the prioritization. Then his moment of truth came when an executive asked a key question. That’s when Tim learned the key to delivering value with his customer experience program.
Steven Stein started a small business with his wife. He was responsible for doing many of jobs necessary to grow the company. But to grow, Steven had to learn a valuable lesson. He did and today they employ more than 170 people throughout the world and he’s become a leading expert on psychological assessments and emotional intelligence.
Jeff McManus started a new job in a new town and was trying to understand and learn everything. One night while driving home after his night class, Jeff wrecked his car after falling asleep at the wheel. In the hospital, he realized things needed to change. That’s when Jeff came to realize that he must totally shift his thinking. That’s when he enabled himself to move onward and upward faster.
Brian Biro was down on himself. He had a drive to be the best at whatever he did. He was very intense and was no fun to play with. That’s when he decided to change one word and it helped him to move onward and upward faster.
