I’m off again. This weekend I’ll be heading to London for the Customer Alpha event, where I’ll be delivering the keynote for the conference. “Customer Alpha is a leading customer experience event bringing together a cross-industry community of professionals who never stop striving to better understand and deliver for customers.” How cool is that! I’m excited to be there, and talking about my concept of The UN-WOW. The basic idea is that rather than just focusing on those WOW moments, we need to focus on how to deliver value and connection in those basic day-to-day interactions where people don’t want to be WOW’ed.

A lot of focus on the WOW is around the idea that things only qualify as experiences when they hit that WOW level. So if you are an experience designer, odds are you are going to shoot for that WOW. But that can be a big hill to climb, and it misses the other types of opportunities that exist which don’t involve those dramatically staged moments. Also, staged can feel inauthentic and not organic. To be staged can also feel performative. Performance can also involve a script. The words being spoken are yours, but ones written for you by someone else.

Thus, the UN-WOW is in part a call for the small moments that create connection and a sense of authenticity.

Today’s guest on Experience by Design also has thoughts on the role of making connections in human moments as part of customer experience. Natalie Beckerman, Executive Vice President and Chief Business Officer at iQor, has experience across many different industries, organizations, and continents. Regardless of where she has been, she has seen the same problems which involve the pursuit of efficiency at the cost of humanity. Part of this lies in not using technology in a way that enhances experiences.

Seeing this problem led her to write her new best selling book, “When Did You Stop Caring: The Call to Reignite Humanity in a World Obsessed with Efficiency.” In her book, she calls for companies to do better for customers and workers by focusing on what matters: people. Using examples from her career and research, she lays out why it makes sense to start caring not only because it is the right thing to do, but because businesses that care do better.

We talk about her career and her book. We also talk about her work with Customer Contact Week, which hosts events around the world. This includes CCW UK which takes place May 11-13, or next week!

Natalie shares her athletic past, including playing on the US National Field Hockey Team and being an All-American at Northwestern University. Along with her Masters degree in Sports Psychology, Natalie links how optimizing performance should be not just about the outcome, but also the impacts that processes, systems, and cultures have on the people who are part of it.

We also celebrate her induction into the Rancocas Valley Regional High School Athletic Hall of Fame.

Learn more:

Natalie Beckerman on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nataliedbeckerman1/

“When did You Stop Caring”: https://www.amazon.com/When-Did-You-Stop-Caring/dp/1969508442

iQor: https://www.iqor.com/

Customer Contact Week: https://www.customercontactweek.com/

This last week of being back from Florence has given me a chance to reflect a bit on he experience of not just being in a foreign country, but being in a completely different kind of physical environment. By that I mean, the city of Florence, or more specifically a city where I was walking everywhere. The origins of Florence date back to around 59 BCE. From that time, the city has continuously grown and evolved to what it is today.

When you look at a map of Florence, you see a lot of twisty and windy streets that are built with cobblestones and buildings that run almost right up against them. From an accessibility standpoint, it presents a lot of challenges as I saw people being pushed in wheelchairs with great effort (or pulling suitcases for that matter). But beyond that, there is a quaintness and opportunity to be in a place where there are more people moving around than cars. Moving freely in a way that was unencumbered by traffic, being able to explore and discover, feeling a certain kind of vibrancy rooted in antiquity but lived in modernity.

And now I am back in the exurbs, which has its own kind of design, whether it be intentional or just organic. Like Florence, homes and streets get built at different times. Some structures are destroyed and then rebuilt, green spaces created, land getting preserved, other land getting constructed. It is not just a dance of history, but also the presence or absence of intentional design.

To talk about designing cities, I welcome Itai Palti to the Experience by Design studios. Itai has a background in architecture and working as an architect. He also is the founder of the Centre for Conscious Design, “an international collective promoting the emergence of healthy built environments using Conscious Design principles.” Together they promote the Conscious Cities Movement, “a global movement that reimagines the built environment as an extension of ourselves and our communities.”

We talk about how architecture can be about community empowerment, creating environments and structures that bring people together rather than drive them apart. Itai talks about the decline of serendipitous connections, especially in cultures that de-emphasize community and prioritize solitude. Between those poles is the need to find compromise in how we build lived environments.

Itai also discussed the importance of using scientific insights into architectural design. We explore how architects need to balance client demands with their desire to create socially impactful design. Accomplishing this goal requires that more than architects be involved, leveraging the expertise from all disciplines to come together in constructive dialogue to combine knowledge to create better cities and communities. Thus, we talk about systems design as well, and how the built environment is a key element in experience design.

After being in Florence for only a few days, which was enough time to enjoy a walkable environment, that is something I can attest to.

Itai Palti on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/itaipalti/

The Center for Conscious Design: https://theccd.org/

Conscious Cities Movement: https://theccd.org/conscious-cities/

I am back from my trip to Florence, and am covered in history. It is impossible to go to Florence and not be. Unless you are a college student who is doing study abroad and only know about Rafael, Donatello, Michelangelo, and Leonardo from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon and movie. It was kind of crazy to be able to walk around and casually see works of art from the 1300s. It is easy to say things like “Florence is the birthplace of the Renaissance,” but when you see it in person, it makes quite the impression. Staring at a Giotti or a Botticelli or a Caravaggio leaves a mark. Being able to walk streets or sit in piazzas, thinking about the centuries of footsteps that preceded puts one life in a certain perspective.

Speaking of perspective, I don’t know if anything quite prepares you for standing in front of David looming over the crowds. Perfectly proportionate but on a whole other scale.

It wasn’t just the past that was impressive, but the present as well. The artists who were working on the streets, showing their beautiful works in front of other beautiful works while people walked by in beautiful fashion. Beauty upon beauty upon beauty. While there, I even had the chance to take in a Mark Rothko exhibit, who interestingly enough was influenced by Renaissance art and visited Florence many times.

So much art, so many museums, so many ways to tell the story of this history.

This is why it is good timing to have Will Humphrey of the agency Sugar Creative on Experience by Design. Will started out as a fine artist, having his work exhibited as any artist would. His education combines degrees in Graphic Design and Communication as well as Molecular Genetics. Today he is the Director of Creative and Innovation at Sugar. At Sugar, he is part of a creative force that combines augmented reality, virtual reality, storytelling, and history together to bring the past into the present.

We talk about Sugar’s project on the American Revolution that will allow users to experience pivotal historical moments through interactive experiences. Will shared the inspiration he received from his grandfather, who developed anti-aircraft balloons during the Battle of Britain. We share our appreciation of video games, especially those with historical features and lessons, such as Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. Will talks about how they are working with Ubisoft to combine gaming and history to make for immersive learning experiences.

Will shares insights from his work on geolocated experiences, highlighting the value of immersing oneself in a set of ideas and understanding the physical and historical context of a place. We also discussed how physical transformations, such as landfill in Boston, affect our understanding of history and the importance of considering the nature of a space in designing experiences.

We cover a lot of ground in this chat, which is about as much ground as I covered walking around Florence and its many museums.

Will Humphrey on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/willhumphreyuk/

Sugar Creative: https://www.sugar.agency/