Ep. 237: Murli Buluswar | From Analytics to Outcomes: Creating Data-Driven Insights at Citi
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Release Date: 08/15/2024
Ep. 249: Scott Taber | Why Four Seasons Turned Guests Away
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 249: When “revenge travel” brought guests roaring back to Four Seasons Hotels, they capped occupancy, turning away guests and revenue. Scott Taber, senior vice president of global hospitality, describes the Four Seasons philosophy: No points, no perks. Just great properties, individual recognition, personal service, and an emphasis on making sure the first five minutes after check-in are spectacular. That belief was put to the test when the world started traveling again and labor gaps persisted at the end of the pandemic. The company had a choice: chase revenue or protect intimacy....
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Ep. 248: Utibe Bassey | Restoring Power, Recharging Customer Experience
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 248: At Dominion Energy, keeping the lights on isn’t just a priority—it’s the single biggest driver of customer experience. But as customer expectations continue to evolve, the bar keeps rising. Customers don’t just want to know when their power will be back, they want to know why it is out. And they expect that experience to be as seamless, informed, and intuitive as downloading and using their favorite mobile apps. Meeting those expectations requires transparency, empathy, and a companywide commitment to service. In this episode, Utibe Bassey, vice president of customer...
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Ep. 247: Mari Cross | These B2B Customers Don’t Buy Features. They Buy Outcomes.
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 247: What if customers achieve real results—but don’t know it? Most vendors sell functionality. Mari Cross wants customers to see impact—in their own numbers, in real time. Mari Cross, Chief Customer Officer at Infor, is dismantling a common illusion: that delivering software features equals delivering value. Infor sells enterprise resource planning (ERP) tools, but Mari's focus is on proving business outcomes. She built a system where customers define the results that matter, track them through the product itself, and act on them with confidence. Her team isn’t there to rescue...
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Ep. 246: Deon Nicholas | A Glimpse of the AI Future—It’s Here Today
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 246: The AI future of customer service is already here—and it’s better than most people think. In this episode, Deon Nicholas, President and Executive Chairman of Forethought, joins host Rob Markey to show us how some companies are already using AI to resolve customer issues end-to-end in ways we could barely imagine just a couple of years ago. Deon introduces us to agentic AI: an emerging class of intelligent agents that take real action, integrate across enterprise systems, and adapt to each customer’s needs. Drawing on his experience building Forethought’s platform, Deon...
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Ep. 245: Eduardo Roma | When Effortless Digital Isn’t Enough: Competing on Customer Relationships
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 245: What happens when digital transformation becomes table stakes—and customer relationships become the real differentiator? Eduardo Roma, Global Head of Customer Experience Transformation at Bain, believes companies that spent years optimizing transactions and digitizing every interaction are now unprepared for what matters most: becoming more humanized. The human element is now critical, and efficiency can’t be mistaken for real connection. Eduardo outlines three forces reshaping customer experience: Digital is now table stakes, customer power has surged to new heights, and...
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Ep. 244: Eric Almquist | The Value Experience: Why Adding Elements of Value Adds Company Value
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 244: What defines a differentiated customer experience? It starts with a clear framework for measuring intangible value and making calculated trade-offs. In this special tribute show, we revisit our 2016 conversation with Eric Almquist, a former partner at Bain & Company, on the Elements of Value. This framework transforms how businesses understand loyalty, brand equity, and growth. Inspired by Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, Eric made value practical, categorizing 30 elements into functional, emotional, life-changing, and social impact levels. His research connected the dots...
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Ep. 243: Cutler Andrews | When an 8% Donor Base Funds a University: Unlocking Hidden Alumni Engagement Opportunities
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 243: At Emory University, 99% of donations come from just 8% of donors. It’s a small alumni minority funding almost the majority of the university. This raises a big question: How do you cultivate loyalty among everyone else? In this episode, Emory’s Chief Experience Officer, Cutler Andrews, describes how they’re dismantling silos—by merging alumni relations, donor relations, and events—to offer a cohesive experience. They’re seeing success. Within five years, Emory’s engagement nearly doubled from 28,000 to 54,000 participating alumni. Learn how Emory’s four engagement...
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Ep. 242: Kunal Madhok | The Black Box Fallacy: Why Wells Fargo Doesn't Trust an AI It Can't Explain
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 242: Wells Fargo has established a clear position on artificial intelligence: If you can't explain how an AI model works, you shouldn't deploy it. This stance challenges the common assumption that black box algorithms are acceptable costs of advanced AI capabilities. In this episode, Kunal Madhok, Head of Data, Analytics, and AI for Wells Fargo's consumer business, reveals how the bank has operationalized this philosophy to enhance customer experiences while maintaining rigorous standards for model explainability and ethical deployment. The stakes for financial...
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Ep. 241: Abhii Parakh & Mike Estep | Flawless Over Flashy: Prudential's Unconventional Path to Customer Experience Leadership
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 241: When is mastering the basics a differentiator? In an industry where complexity is the norm, Prudential Group Insurance has made a counterintuitive strategic choice. While many companies chase innovation through digital transformation and enhanced features, Prudential has discovered that operational excellence—the "absence of noise"—can be a more powerful differentiator. Abhii Parakh and Mike Estep reveal why group insurance demands a fundamentally different approach to customer experience than high-touch industries like hospitality or travel. For Prudential, success...
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Ep. 240: Caroline Lombardi | The Evolution of the Chief Customer Officer: From Scorekeeper to CEO Successor
Customer Confidential: Untold Stories of Earned Growth
Episode 240: How has the Chief Customer Officer (CCO) role evolved over time? Traditionally focused on tracking metrics, CCOs now play a proactive and forward-facing role in driving business innovation. In this episode, Caroline Lombardi, Global Head of the Hospitality & Leisure Practice at Egon Zehnder, explores the CCO role’s dramatic evolution. Customer experience—no longer just about tracking satisfaction or retention—has become a valuable springboard for boosting revenue and gaining a competitive edge. Successful CCOs are skilled in holistic customer experiences, from call...
info_outlineHow does democratizing intelligence enhance productivity and drive smarter decision-making?
Murli Buluswar, Citigroup’s Head of Analytics for the US Personal Bank, joins host Rob Markey to explore Citi’s strategies for democratizing intelligence. Murli emphasizes building a conversational intelligence platform that enables proactive and reactive insights to reduce friction between curiosity, insight, and decision-making. This approach enhances organizational efficiency, boosts productivity, and sparks more complex problem-solving.
Taking a scientific approach, Citi treats customer experience as a key growth strategy. Murli shares how small improvements in customer experience can boost long-term retention and how investing in marketing to existing customers offers quick returns.
Citi's in-house Journey Analytics engine integrates financial transactions, customer information, external data, and internal algorithms to identify opportunities that enhance the customer experience. This innovative approach to decision-making—a mere dream five years ago—is now a reality, delivering significant customer value and better business results.
Guest: Murli Buluswar, Head of Analytics, US Personal Banking, Citigroup
Host: Rob Markey, Partner, Bain & Company
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Time-stamped list of topics covered:
- (1:07) High-level business overview for context
- (1:53) The democratization of intelligence
- (4:49) Clarifying Murli’s role vs. that of a chief data and analytics officer
- (6:25) The transformation and aggregation of disaggregated teams within Citi—and the need for a global solution
- (11:42) Customer health index
- (19:59) Framework to examine actions, forecast outcomes, and bring more intentionality to decision-making
- (32:30) Automated aberration detection
- (37:25) Career reflections and parting thoughts
Time-stamped list of notable quotes
- (4:21) “We are building a conversational intelligence platform that allows people to interact with data. There's both the proactive identification of things we might not have conceptualized. And there's the—dare I say—reactive component of, ‘I have a question and I want to ask the engine.’”
- (6:00) “That's why this notion of democratization of intelligence is important to me. If I can enable the organization to whet its curiosity and its appetite independently, and then rely on my team as we get to the third and fourth layer of sophistication, then I've improved productivity and have freed up time and energy to focus on higher-order problem-solving.”
- (7:19) “Perhaps about 80% of the team was focused on followership, 20% on partnership, and maybe essentially next to 0% on leadership.”
- (10:30) “We ended up building a software tool that essentially democratized decision-making across finance, product marketing, and my team.”