Episode #60: Putting People Over profits
GuestS: diane magers, stacy sherman, & Jeannie Walters
In the world of business, it's all too easy to put profits over people and turn relationships into meaningless transactions. How might we flip the script and focus on humanizing business interactions by creating experiences that create significant revenue? Join host Shawn Nason as he examines the business case of creating people-first Experience Ecosystems™ with a panel of experts. Guests include Diane Magers, founder and chief experience officer at Experience Catalysts in Dallas, TX; Stacy Sherman, a keynote speaker, author, and podcaster; and Jeannie Walters, founder and chief experience officer of Experience Investigators.
About Shawn Nason
shawn@mofi.co | ShawnNason.com | @manonfiresocial
Shawn Nason, founder and CEO of MOFI, best-selling author, and former Walt Disney Imagineer, lives his life with a commitment to create radical relationships with everyone he meets. Armed with the gift of discernment, he has the uncanny ability to walk alongside people and organizations as they struggle to connect with their deepest passions and engage their most debilitating demons. He challenges the world around him to be fully present, get real, and lead with empathy.
Prior to launching MOFI, Shawn was the chief experience & transformation officer for Healthways and served as the chief innovation officer for Xavier University. He also spent six years at The Walt Disney Company in various capacities within Walt Disney Imagineering and Disney Cruise Line. He’s an in-demand speaker and coach, the author of two books, Kiss Your Dragons: Radical Relationships, Bold Heartsets, & Changing the World (2021) and The Power of YES! in Innovation (2017), and the host of The Combustion Chronicles podcast.
About mofi
A human-obsessed, maverick-minded design firm ready to rethink your Experience Ecosystem™
hello@mofi.co | mofi.co | @mofisocial
Mavericks think differently. They challenge the status quo and speak up when people and systems need attention. They’re not afraid to dream big, stand up for what is right, and take a few risks along the way.
MOFI helps maverick-minded organizations and leaders reap the rewards of thinking bigger and bolder about experiences, innovation, and culture.
Are you ready to fuel new growth by thinking bigger? Let’s talk.
What We Do:
Customer & Employee Experience—Increase your revenue and market share by aligning, equipping, and empowering the people in your Experience Ecosystem to create game-changing experiences.
Consumer-Centered Innovation—Move at the speed of your customers by harnessing the mindsets and processes of human-centered design to dream up, test, and launch fresh ideas into your business model.
Organizational Transformation—Position your organization for long-term sustainability by shifting the strategies, mindsets, and heartsets of the people who represent your brand in the world.
Episode Takeaways
- Every interaction with a customer has an emotion tied to it, even if it's just a “meh” emotion. These emotions drive behavior, which drives business results.
- Experience professionals need to be able to make a business case for their work, the ROI or ROX.
- Experience professionals are able to helicopter up because they collaborate and become that mortar between the bricks. They get additive business value cases, which means they do everything from fixing something in the sales team to working with marketing and the call center.
- People buy from people. The best way to keep customers—have them want to refer and provide more revenue to the business—is by intentional design of the customer experience.
- Everyone in a company has a CX job whether they realize it or not.
- It's important to get to the metrics that understand how people think and feel, which is where you combine methodology with heart.
- If CX professionals deliver proactive, intentional positive customer experiences, then they're going to ruin fewer days, which means that there's less negativity in the world.
- Most organizations are trying to retrofit the organization with CX, and that's what makes it so hard. They haven't thought about CX and they're trying to shove it into their business practices.
- All areas of the organization benefit from improved customer experience, including the employee experience.
Overheard on the Podcast
Quotes from Diane Magers
"I see a lot of people who are identifying things that need to be fixed... but they don't spend time really thinking about... the emotions they're creating, really designing the experience, finding the right problems to solve."
"I don't know why it is that we as experience professionals think that we can go into asking for money to go fix something without talking about the ROI."
"That deep engagement and understanding and watching somebody develop in supporting them and championing them have been just a blast for me to be able to have those kinds of relationships professionally, ones that last beyond working together because most of the time your relationships at work are all about the people you're around and you're close to."
Overheard on the Podcast
Quotes from Stacy Sherman
"In order for businesses to succeed, it's not just about process. It's not just about price. It's about people. People buy from people. And it's the people that work at the companies that make the experiences happen."
"And I go around my workplace, I have a corporate job, and I go around my workplace, and I say to everyone, 'You have a CX job, whether you realize it or not.'"
"You have to get to the sentiments. You have to get to the metrics that really understand how people think and feel. And that's where you combine the methodology, but also the heart."
Overheard on the Podcast
Quotes from Jeannie Walters
"I really believe that every moment matters. And if we do this well, if we deliver for our customers with proactive, intentional positive customer experiences, then we're going to ruin fewer days. And that means that there's less negativity in the world. And I think that's an incredible thing for all of us to be dedicated to."
"When we talk about that north star, we're really talking about how are we promising that we will show up for our customers."
"There is not one area of the organization that does not benefit from improved customer experience, including the employee experience."
Credits:
Created with images by Fabrizio_65 - "microphone vintage cromatic" • Pexels - "audio microphone condenser microphone" • Tumisu - "podcast microphone wave" • Peggy_Marco - "question question mark help" • congerdesign - "heart red rope" • AbsolutVision - "smiley emoticon anger"