Coming at this space from an Experience Design background as I do, I was most interested in what Bruce Temkin had to say about the ‘evolution of cx management’. He presented the following chronological model:

CX intrigue 2005 -2009

• Organisations have applications, infrastructure in place.
• CRMs don’t deliver anticipated value.

CX exuberance 2008 – 2013

• The term CX gets ’slapped’ on top of titles.
• 60% of companies think they will be customer experience leaders in 3 years (the maturity model indicates this is a much longer journey)
• Shows that ambitions are emerging, but that organisations are not realistic about the implications.

CX professionalism 2011 -2015

• People are starting to have clear practices and procedures around customer experience
• A set of consistent practices is being collectively pushed into the community (via the CXPA of course ;)
• VOC programs, journey mapping become standard process.
• Close loop systems are in place to re-contact customers and learn.

CX Mastery 2014 +

• Real time customer satisfaction analytics are able to project NPS, customer trends and other metrics.
• Employee engagement becomes increasingly important as the connection between staff and the ability to drive sustainable customer experience is acknowledged.
• The human resource sector becomes committed to employee engagement.

Temkin’s rally cry to the community was to practise a core set of repeatable processes and procedures; for the differences in practise that have existed to date to become standardised if the ‘era of CX’ is to continue. In support of this vision the CXPA is developing a vendor neutral certification program they hope will be recognised as a legitimate professional standard globally.

I should mention the format of the breakfast. The talk was followed by a Q&A and group discussion. It was valuable gaining insight into so many organisations so quickly and hearing about the various surveys, processes and incentives in place. I have a whole page of notes but if your are intrigued, you may just have to come along to the next event.

If you want to read more of Bruce Temkin’s work check out his blog Customer Experience Matters.

And if you are looking for more in depth information on conversation for design research read Ethnography for Marketers.

Part of the City Talks series presented by the City of Sydney and UTS spotlight.

The hash tag was the ever parochial #tbldownunder. The official ones were #sydcitytalk and #UTSengage

What people said

There were several introductions including Clover Moore’s rundown of the City’s contribution to supporting innovation which was quite impressive, and there were (too many) panelists, but everyone was there for Tim Berners-Lee.

He delivered his presentation with a frenetic energy. Was there a thread? A theme? Not quite, although his historical tech overview did turn into an invitation to contribute to code and be vigilant of those who seek to control our data and our privacy. I think an implied warning of proprietors who want to lock down devices too. When asked by Adam Spencer of proposed Australian government controls Tim Berners-Lee asked what does the restriction of intent access in Egypt imply for everyone else? How much power are we going to give our governments to block sites? What of censorship, of spying? What becomes of trust in government if they choose to exercise such power? Just as the independence of the press is vital, so too is the independence of the Internet, he said. He answered so many questions with a question but in a way for the audience to take responsibility for the web we want.

Then came the panel discussion on the future and the past: a discussion of technologies that will demand increased bandwidth, technologies we can envision (3D, holograms) to those we can’t yet anticipate, a rally cry for entrepreneurs, a question about the role of devices changing how we behave, the inevitable changes to print media and the until now protected free-to-air TV industry…

I’m a bit ambivalent about questions being fielded from the twittersphere. Not that I’m not into the channel, it just makes public discussions ad-hoc; ideas don’t build. So the following notes are correspondingly unrelated.

• Tim Berners Lee posited the future of journalists as curators of quality content to counter the deluge of information.
• He suggested new payment protocols to reward those that provide good information.
• We heard about the emerging “Sydney model” for entrepreneurship. It was compared but in no great detail to communities in Berlin, Brazil, South Korea and Singapore. Sydney incubators are covering various industries and are beginning to consult government.
• Be grateful! Map data is free In Australia courtesy of the government, something we don’t even notice.
• Current solutions to threats of cyber terrorism and cyber crimes have not countered the risks they introduce by the private data they promise to store on our behalf.
• Close to my heart was a concern around the filtering of news content by cookies from the Fairfax panelist. We have to be sure that news does not begin to be filtered for us, narrowing the information served, attempting to bias information.
• Further to points on data and privacy were the right to know what data is being stored about us, a quandary about who owns reputation data on peer to peer sites, the subject or the service provider?
• And although no one used the words user experience the discussion did talk about the role of design. We have to be clear where data is coming from and where our data is going to. This has implications for geotagged messages, bank phishing scams, tagged photos on social networks. UX conventions need to emerge to make it easier, more predictable and safer for users.

And after all that the night ended with a light show and some enthusiastic and appreciative applause.

Meet up flavour

Cheery friendly crowd ready to network and chat. Markedly more guys than gals. Devs, designers, developers… was there an investor or two in the room?

Speakers pitched their business ventures, spruiked projects and shared thoughts on topics they were passionate about as follows.

1. Mobile payments … Company mopay, come from gaming and dating industries, multiple payment flows and skins. Mopay.com. Q&A Merchants get paid within 21 days.
2. Hyperlocal with the “neighbourhood networks” platform. From usyd. Services, location for communities. Users can block neighbours, Define areas based on radius e.g. Item borrowing, catering, dating. The radius likely narrower for borrowing. Www.neighbourhoodnetworks.com.au. Incorporate data sets from gov like post codes and municipality.
3. WeSync. App for couples to communicate and understand each other better. Sets rewards and brownie points. People can register moods, moments, rewards. Launched 2 weeks ago. QA we sync is about hacking personal relationships, future plans for parent and business versions. Peso ally I think this is gamifying rather than hacking relationships.
4. Re-Placement speaker! BYOD organically been occurring in the corporate space. New terms! MDM Mobile device management. Is the slice of pie in SaAAS or BYOD? And of course something available for any scenario…more interesting is who owns the model? Ok clearly my notes didn’t cover this very well but you get the terrain hopefully.
5. Dan from Razorfish…and some other iOS dev company. What is the best way of outsourcing mobile development? Experience levels vary. Dos and dont’s of outsourcing development. If you give em a spec they will build it pixel perfect. But the data model/code can come back crooked. Have a domain expert in the field (windows, android, iOS) to own the “scaffolding” decisions, the data model. Might be somewhat costly at first , but it tends to be more effective than separating interaction design to data models. Q&A is your time saved or spent in quality assurance after build? Indecision is the real killer (references chaos review?). Fit for purpose = scope.
6. App village. “Community innovator” bringing together investors with app developers. Everyone has had an app idea. App village is about facilitating the process of development, finding and marketing. Experts assess submitted ideas. Research idea and target market to uncover features. Unique royalty based model. Project manage the whole process. Source ideas, designers, developers, and even consumers of apps. New apps coming out…bear hugs and food frenzie. Www.theappvillage.com. They own the IP but the idea owner earns the royalties. Revenue model is they take 40% of the royalties. 10% to the investor, 10% to the idea owner…and sorry I didn’t grab the rest.
7. Flash IZ. Payment (another presentation) has evolved over time. Innovators are challenging cash. Customers: people e.g. from Emerging economies who have access to smart phones but not access to credit. First world customers who just want to leave their cards and cash at home.
8. A 16 yo entrepreneur. Ok I feel inadequate now. This guy has launched a voice based taxi app and spoke about the process of making his idea a reality, and the companies he partnered with. 8 months of development, 8 employees. taxi 24/7. Has 17,000 users. If you want to follow the career of this young gun keep an eye on Zeryab Cheema. Is the product the app or the Voice SDK?
9. Ian Lyons. A polemic re email on mobile. The mobile phone is a one thumb browsing device. Most emails and newsletters are optimised for desktop experiences. But you don’t have to pinch and zoom emails from real people. Easy to forget how simple you have to make the design. Subject lines? The simpler, more casual the better as proven by the Obama campaign. Send mobile optimised emails! Responsive to the rescue. Sydney festival examples. Plug for campaign monitor and mail chimp’s new features.
10. Roger @Rog42. Top 20 iphone Apps for motor cyclists. Apps for sharing experiences, knowledge and location amongst others.

The winner tonight? Stock images and PowerPoint smart graphics. Also super passionate Ian Lyons and super charming @rog42 talking biking and life…just lovely.

, which I have written about before. If you do any type of UX research, particularly observational research, but have not had formal research training I think you will find them both worthwhile reads. This is my summary of advice from both these texts on debriefing after a contextual inquiry.

Note I said debrief, because I think proper analysis of notes is still important. I’ve found it valuable to push myself after a research session to go beyond first impressions. They yield the obvious and the superficial. Deep insight comes with further thought and scrutiny and by sharing your thoughts with others. And that’s the fun stuff anyway.