Top 10 Interviews of 2024

Read our top 10 interviews to discover strategies, lessons, and inspirations that will help shape your next move in 2025.

This year, we’ve seen CX leaders, customer service pioneers, and technology experts redefine how businesses interact with their customers, adapt to emerging challenges, and leverage the transformative power of Generative AI (GenAI). From evolving CX metrics to measuring ROI, the conversations around CX have shifted towards creating more meaningful, data-driven, and personalised experiences.

In this compilation, we bring you the most impactful interviews of the year with ten industry luminaries. These thought leaders have shared invaluable perspectives on topics ranging from integrating AI responsibly and optimising customer journeys, to redefining the metrics that matter in CX.

Whether it’s Andrea Yildiz shedding light on the untapped potential for small businesses in CX, Jeff Sheehan’s insights into the ROI-driven evolution of CX leadership, or Jonny Fry’s balanced approach to using AI without losing the human touch—these voices provide a roadmap for CX professionals navigating today’s fast-changing landscape.

Through these interviews, you’ll discover the diverse strategies and philosophies shaping customer interactions, the role of advanced analytics like speech recognition, and the importance of aligning data and metrics with actionable outcomes.

Dive into these compelling discussions to explore how the world of CX is evolving and what it means for businesses and customers alike.

Andrea Yildiz, Author and Brand Strategist

“CX could be enhanced with the tiniest process changes and financial efforts: Just a missing piece of information given at the right moment within the customer journey can make a huge difference. Small business owners are too preoccupied with their daily chores in order to zoom out and take on a bird’s eye perspective of their business to realise what could make their customers’ lives easier. Small business owners have so many advantages over big companies, when it comes to CX.”

Full interview: Can Small Businesses Excel as CX Champions?

Cory Gallagher, a Call Center Outsourcing and Technology Expert

“Speech analytics can have a transformational impact on customer interactions by providing immediate insights into the customers’ sentiment, tone, and intent during conversations. Whether inbound or outbound or sales or service organisation it equips the CSR with insights that take time to be developed. To have the ability to tailor responses or create more personalised customer experiences can make all the difference. If developed and deployed well, I can envision improved NPS scores and increased customer loyalty.

Full interview: Contact Centres are a People-Centric Industry, But for How Long?

Jeff Sheehan, Author and Managing Director at CX JS Consulting

“There is a notable shift in Customer Experience Management (CXM) from relying on surveys and scores to focusing on business cases that demonstrate ROI for CX projects. This change demands that CX leaders become business change agents, equipped with the data necessary to drive improvements from a business perspective. The traditional role of CX teams, which involved managing CX tools and platforms and distributing data for business units to interpret, is evolving. Now, more tangible value is expected.”

Full interview: Making Customers Happy is a Fallacy

Jeff Toister, Author of The Service Culture Handbook

“Customer-focused leaders do three things to build a customer-focused culture. First, they create a CX vision. Look at the most customer-focused companies. Nearly all of them have some statement, whether it’s a mission, purpose statement, or brand promise, that acts as the CX vision. It acts as a compass to point employees in the right direction.The next step is to engage employees with the vision. Finally, customer-focused leaders align everything they do with the vision. They use it to guide strategy, set goals, and model it in their daily actions.”

Full interview: There is an Economic Advantage to Being Customer-Obsessed

Jonathan Moran, Head of MarTech Solutions Marketing at SAS

“Query customers or use voice of the customer related data to prioritise and improve upon the customer experience. We see many brands creating internal programmes and initiatives that do not account for the customer and the experience that they receive. Instead, they set up marketing or customer interaction programmes that look at what the brand can or cannot provide, instead of what the customer wants. Ask customers what works and what doesn’t, and then create an action plan to address any customer experience related deficiencies.”

Full interview: Establish Baseline Metrics for CX Improvement

Jonny Fry, Group Head of Digital Assets Strategy at ClearBank

“Is AI Information or is it artificial intelligence? And I think one of the things that we have to be careful of is not to lose that authenticity when using AI and dealing with customers because it’s being generated potentially by a different set of programs, algorithms and inputs. Which sometimes can come across quite stifled and stunted. So I think it’s a real challenge not to use that human touch because at the end of the day, we’re looking for a genuine user experience with customers.”

Full interview: CX Dialogues: Jonny Fry, Group Head of Digital Assets Strategy at ClearBank

Julie Atherton, Founder of Small Wonder

“There is a big challenge around clarity of purpose. Paid social media is easy to turn off and on as needed, just like other forms of advertising, but organic requires an ongoing business commitment. It’s important to have a monitoring system to ensure they know what people are saying about them on social media and a tested crisis management plan which can be activated as needed.”

Full interview: Identify The Difficult Conversations from An Outright Crisis

Mark Hillary, Author and CX and Technology Analyst

“Understand your customers and what matters to them. In the past year, many CX directors have been exploring AI solutions, yet they don’t even have the existing tech running at a level that would deliver great service. Don’t get caught up looking for the next big thing just because of FOMO or a fear of the ground shifting. It can happen, but it is much more likely that your customers are tired of your brand for more basic reasons. Nobody is switching to a new phone company just because they have great AI chatbots.”

Full interview: Several CX Metrics Don’t Work in The Modern CS Environment

Stephen Yap, Research Director at CCMA

“There isn’t a one-size-fits-all answer to measuring customer satisfaction. There isn’t a golden rule that applies to every single organisation. It’s not so much about which are the right KPIs and metrics, but it’s about what you do with them and your ability to take action as a result. If you focus on that, you will end up with the right KPIs and metrics. So it’s about what you do with them. Is it really clear to the people who have to drive action all the way from the front line in the contact centre to your strategic people to your product?”

Full interview: CX Dialogues: Stephen Yap, Research Director at CCMA

Steve Webster, Global Ecommerce Director at Barbour

“Be realistic. How much personal data do you really require to personalise an experience? If you can gauge intent from on-site behaviour, then is any additional consumer data required? What is the consumer benefit? My advice would be to weigh the consumer benefit against the data requirements. If the level of privacy that the consumer has to forfeit outweighs the benefit to them, don’t do it. And, be upfront and honest with how you’ll use that data.”

Full interview: Weigh the Consumer Benefit Against the Data Requirements