Customer Experience

Graham Kingma  is the founding Principal of Imagen Business Solutions.  Graham is a long-time customer experience advocate and someone who is passionate about leadership, customer measurement, operational excellence and social media.  From managing the strategic design and creation of customer operations for Grocery Gateway, Wind Mobile and The Shopping Channel to his forward-looking sales & customer experience strategy design work at TD Bank (both Canada & US), Graham brings a unique blend of start-up and corporate experience to this work. www.imagenbusinesssolutions.com 

We have a very special show for you today. I have invited back two previous guests, Dr. Graeme Codrington and Dean Van Leeuwen. With research and a shared passion for understanding how businesses become successful, Graeme and Dean founded TomorrowToday International, a company that is helping shape the future of work through appreciation for and strategizing of the multi-generational strengths that exist in today's workplace. And a new guest to our show is Anna Elwood, the Director of Operations at ZocDoc where she and her team focus on creating a best-in-class experience for ZocDoc patient and doctor users. ZocDoc was one of the 16 finalists in this year's Innovation Award at the CXPA Insights Exchange in San Diego.  Few will deny the existence of multi-generational differences in the workplace today. With Graeme and Dean's expertise and Anna's experience, we will explore together, just what it is that makes this youthful successful company what it is today.

Wonder how networking at it's best really works?  Lynne Waymon, the CEO of Contacts Count is our expert today.  For 20 years her international training and speaking firm has worked with people from all walks of life.  Today she'll give you tips on how to put the tools of networking to work in the service of business and career goals. You can find out more about her work at www.ContactsCount.com  

Discovering What Makes Your Brand Live in the Minds of Customers For 23 years, Suzanne has been passionately serving clients by creating corporate identity design solutions packaged with powerful strategic branding consulting and training. Her knowledge and experience has played a significant role in her clients’ successes. She has experience in industries such as Public Relations, Commercial Printing, Graphic Design, Marketing and Branding, Speaking and Training. Joining a progressive marketing and training firm, she helped design and facilitate marketing workshops across the U.S. for small business entrepreneurs. As creative project manager for a global consulting firm, she helped manage the acquisition of several other brands from the internal and external levels, including the comprehensive development of the official graphic standards manual. The turning point in Suzanne’s career in the creative communication arena came when she launched her own design firm in 2000, I.D. By Design. Within 3 years of designing powerful corporate identity systems Suzanne had a clarifying realization from listening to her clients’ real needs and growth objectives. They weren’t just looking for an icon to represent their brand – they were silently screaming for a way to establish and sustain their competitive advantage; long-term. As author of The 6 Myths of Small Business Branding e-book/workbook, she is helping to pave the evolutionary highway

  Harvard Business Review, CNBC and Fast Company have called Bill Jensen today’s foremost expert on work complexity and cutting through clutter to what really matters. He is an internationally-acclaimed speaker who is known for provocative ideas, extremely useful content, and his passion for making it easier for everyone to work smarter. He’s CEO of The Jensen Group, whose mission is: To make it easier to get stuff done. He has spent the past two decades studying business’s ability to design work. (Much of what he has found horrifies him.) Bill’s first book is called “Simplicity”, followed by “Simplicity Handbook: 32 Ways to Do Less and Accomplish More” and his latest book is called “Hacking Work”. All of which have become some of today’s most important business books.

Ingrid Lindberg was named Customer Experience Officer of CIGNA Corporation in January, 2008. She is responsible for developing and overseeing the implementation of a corporate-wide customer experience strategy, which addresses all matters related to how CIGNA engages and serves the individuals covered by CIGNA benefit plans. Her leadership has earned the CIGNA Customer Experience Office national and international recognition. Notably, Ingrid and her team earned the Gold Medal award at the 2009 Gartner Customer Relationship Management Summit for their exemplary customer strategy as well as a customer experience excellence award. The effort has led to an improvement in customer understanding of their benefits in excess of 100 percent, a 50 percent reduction in the number of printed materials customers receive, and the use of simpler language that doesn’t rely on insurance jargon. It also led CIGNA to become the first in its industry to offer 24 hour-a-day, seven day-a-week customer service for all its medical, dental and pharmacy plans. 

  As editorial director of 1to1 Media, Ginger Conlon is responsible for the direction and day-to-day editorial operations of two award-winning publications: executive journal Customer Strategist and the online business publication 1to1 Magazine, its e-newsletter, blog, and other website content. Additionally, she serves on the board of the Customer Experience Professionals Association. Conlon has covered the industry for 25 years, regularly speaks at industry events, and has contributed to several books on customer strategy.

  Lynda has a passionate love of people and their development to be our future leaders. With 35  years of business experience behind her, she is a master networker, innovator and big-picture thinker and is putting her unique skills to work as CEO of Refirement Network, a business involved in helping organisations and Baby Boomers understand the opportunities and challenges the future holds for this particular demographic group. Her work focuses around helping Baby Boomers plan for their next season of life and identify where they can still add value in business and society. She partners with organisations to develop business strategies designed to retain the necessary skills, experience and wisdom of the Boomers that is at risk if they leave prematurely. Refirement Network hosts conferences, workshops and other public events, is involved in educating organisations and Baby Boomers through the media, assists companies with Baby Boomer strategy and wisdom preservation, and conducts life coaching for the retirement years. She can be reached via her website www.refiremenrnetwork.com

    Terrence L. Gargiulo, MMHS, is an eight-time author, international speaker, organizational development consultant, and group-process facilitator specializing in the use of stories. He holds a master of management in human services from the Florence Heller School, at Brandeis University, and is a recipient of Inc. Magazine’s Marketing Master Award and the 2008 HR Leadership Award from the Asia Pacific HRM Congress.Highlights of some of his past and present clients include, GM, HP, DTE Energy, MicroStrategy, Fidelity, Federal Reserve Bank, Ceridian, Countrywide Financial, Washington Mutual, Dreyers Ice Cream, UNUM, US Coast Guard, Boston University, Raytheon, City of Lowell, Arthur D. Little, KANA Communications, Merck-Medco, Coca-Cola, Harvard Business School, and Cambridge Savings Bank. Terrence’s books include, Making Stories: A Practical Guide for Organizational Leaders and Human Resource Specialists (translated into Chinese), The Strategic Use of Stories in Organizational Communication and Learning, On Cloud Nine: Weathering Many Generations in the Workplace (translated into Korean and Spanish), Stories at Work: Using Stories to Improve Communications and Build Relationships, Building Business Acumen for Trainers: Skills to Empower the Training Function, Once Upon a Time: Using Story-based Activities to Develop Breakthrough Communication Skills, In the Land of Difficult People: 24 Timeless Tales Reveal How to Tame Beasts at Work, The Trainer’s Portable Mentor.   Terrence is a frequent speaker at international and national conferences including the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD), International Society for Performance Improvement (ISPI), & Academy of Management.

For two decades, Mike Wittenstein, Experience Designer and Managing Principal at Storyminers, has helped business leaders around the world differentiate their brands by dramatically improving their customer experience.  Mike is a sought-after speaker and consultant.  He works in the hospitality, retail, technology, healthcare, and entertainment industries, as well as other service categories. He has helped retailers like Party City, Kinko’s, Best Buy, Alternative Apparel and SOHO Office, to elevate their customer experience, while making it a lot more engaging - and even fun - for all involved.  He has given clients like Apple, IBM, McDonald's, and iPay Technologies a looking glass view into how their company is perceived by everyday customers. As an e-Visionary at IBM, Mike launched that company's first global experience design consulting practice.  He was also co-founder and CEO of Galileo, a technology communications company nationally recognized for innovation and creativity. His captivating stories teach companies how to move their products and services from commodities to objects of desire.  And he regularly wows audiences with his friendly, smart and witty style, as they learn how to turn everyday customers into enthusiastic brand advocates.

  Anand Pillai is currently the Sr. Vice President and Global Head - Talent Transformation, Intrapreneurship Development & EFCS Transformation Initiatives. He is a key member of the Blue Ocean Task Force at HCL Technologies and is driving the competency of “Blue Ocean Thinking” in the company. Anand has held various roles in HCL, in the past 12 years beginning with Regional director- Canadian Operations for HCL Technologies Inc., and was based In Toronto, Canada. He has been nominated to the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on New Models of Leadership 2011, given his thought leadership in this field of leadership & innovation. With more than 27 years of rich experience in the corporate world, Anand has handled challenging assignments in general  management and as head of sales operations in companies such as Honeywell, Tata Unisys, Hughes Network Systems and Bay Networks.

Anand Pillai is currently the Sr. Vice President and Global Head - Talent Transformation, Intrapreneurship Development & EFCS Transformation Initiatives. He is a key member of the Blue Ocean Task Force at HCL Technologies and is driving the competency of “Blue Ocean Thinking” in the company. Anand has held various roles in HCL, in the past 12 years beginning with Regional director- Canadian Operations for HCL Technologies Inc., and was based In Toronto, Canada. He has been nominated to the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on New Models of Leadership 2011, given his thought leadership in this field of leadership & innovation. With more than 27 years of rich experience in the corporate world, Anand has handled challenging assignments in general management and as head of sales operations in companies such as Honeywell, Tata Unisys, Hughes Network Systems and Bay Networks.

  Fred Taylor began his career as a Customer Service Agent with Southwest Airlines in 1997 and quickly progressed to more challenging leadership positions in frontline operations. Then in 2001, he was plucked from the Frontlines by Colleen Barrett, then President and CEO of Southwest, and asked to take on new responsibilities for coordinating the Company’s proactive Customer communications.  Fred has revolutionized Southwest Airlines Customer Service, communications, and goodwill initiatives by creating the PCS Team (Proactive Customer Service team). The results of their proactive work have been (and continue to be) featured in over 50 print, television, and Internet media including: Business Week, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune,Dallas Morning News, Houston Chronicle, NBC, CBS, and FOX.

  R "Ray" Wang currently is a Principal Analyst and CEO at Constellation Research Group. He previously was a founding partner and research analyst for enterprise strategy at Altimeter Groupand the author of the popular enterprise software blog "A Software Insider’s Point of View".With viewership in the millions of page views a year, his blog provides insight into how disruptive technologies and new business models impact the enterprise. A background in emerging business and technology trends, enterprise apps strategy, technology selection, and contract negotiations provides clients and readers with the bridge between business leadership and technology adoption. Buyers seek Ray’s research in disruptive technologies and their impact on business processes, business models, and organizational design. Business topics focus on harnessing innovation, creating next generation business and IT leadership, and applying the new rules of business. Technology topics include SaaS/Cloud solutions, Social CRM, Next Gen ERP and apps, business process transformation, Project Based Solutions, Order Management, Master Data Management, and middleware technologies. For technology sellers, Ray provides strategic guidance in go-to-market strategies; reviews and designs software licensing, pricing, support, and maintenance policies; delivers competitive assessments; evaluates software partner ecosystems, and researches business processes such as the perfect order and customer experience for the enterprise and SMB markets.

  Nate Curran is the Director of Operations Support at GoDaddy.com. Nate is responsible for the strategic initiatives surrounding workforce management, quality control and professional development at Go Daddy's Customer Care Centers. Since the start of his Go Daddy career in 2001, Nate has held a variety of positions within the company, working for some time as a Domain Aftermarket Analyst and later as the General Manager of Domain Registration Services.  He has been in the customer service and marketing industry for 13 years, working with Fortune 500 companies such as Wells Fargo, Prudential and General Electric. Nate received a Bachelor of Science in History and in Political Science from Loras College, and an MBA from the University of Phoenix. When not at work, he enjoys spending time outdoors and with his family and friends.