Navigating the Customer Experience Yanique Grant, Customer Experience Strategist, Entrepreneur

Robert Scarperi, Bob has been a leader in professional services, SaaS, financial services, ad tech mar tech, and management consulting for 32 years. His company, Revenue Vision Partners is the industry's leading data-driven revenue growth consulting firm.
Questions
· Could you share with our listeners, just a little bit about how you got from where you were to where you are today?
· You wrote a book called Data and Diagnosis-Driven Selling with three other gentlemen. So, could you take a minute to kind of just go through maybe three overarching themes that the book focuses on? And just how do you believe this can really help an organization to deliver a great customer experience?
· Now, I'd like for you to share with us what's the one online tool, resource, website or application that you absolutely can't live without in your business?
· Can you also share with us maybe one or two books that you have read, it could be a book that you read a very long time ago, or even one that you've read recently, but it has had a great impact on your development and even your continued growth.
· Now, Bob, could you also share with our listeners, what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about, either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
· Where can listeners find you online?
· Now, Bob, before we wrap up, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share. I'm not sure if you have one of these but a quote that you would tend to revert to if for any reason you are faced with some form of adversity, or challenge, but that quote will help to get you refocused, get you back on track, and just help you if for any reason you got the real or you got off track.
Highlights
Bob’s Journey 
Me: Now, we always like to give our listeners an opportunity to hear from the guest, in their own words, a little bit about your journey. And it has been quite a long journey, 32 years is a good amount of time to have under your belt in all of these wonderful areas. So, could you share with our listeners, just a little bit about how you got from where you were to where you are today?
 
Bob shared that right around the time he was finishing college, he had a really strong pull to get into sales, he was extremely lucky to have had a best friend's father was the top sales guy at Automatic Data Processing, ADP, which is sort of known to be one of the best and strongest sales driven cultures in the Fortune 100. 
And right from the very beginning, all of their structure, rigor, process, intensity really meshed with his personality and his sort of competitive nature. And so, he was lucky enough to have some early success, he’s very, very grateful for how much faith they had in him from an early age, giving him opportunities to run sales teams and move and get to experience new geographies and have really great experiences in such a phenomenally well-run company. 
And then without going into too much detail, of course, his journey took him through a number of different industries, early days of ad tech, he worked for a long time as an equity sales and trading person at AllianceBernstein. He was lucky enough also to have some leadership positions, run sales teams internationally. 
And then toward the last 10 years of his career, he had three Chief Revenue Officer roles in high growth technology companies where he really started to embrace being a leader who prided himself on installing a systematic data driven approach. 
And toward the end of that decade, he decided he really wanted to do that as a consultant for a portfolio of companies so that he could be really working through various kind of company challenges in different industries with private equity firms as their partner. So, that's what brought him to where he is now.
 
About Bob’s Book – Data and Diagnosis-Driven Selling and Three Overarching Themes That Can Help Organizations

Rachel Stanley came to Banzai in 2019 with over 10 years of SaaS onboarding, training, implementation, consulting, e-Learning, customer success, adoption and support experience. When Rachel joined Banzai, Customer Success was the only customer-facing job function. 
Since then, Rachel has added Onboarding, Support and Customer Marketing successfully creating a Customer Experience organization that has driven best-in-industry customer satisfaction and grown Banzai’s Net Retention Rate (NRR) significantly. Rachel is passionate about building high functioning teams that consistently hit their objectives. Previously, Rachel has held roles at Amazon and ACS Technologies. Rachel lives in the Seattle area.
 
Questions
· Now, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share a little bit about their journey. So, could you share with our listeners, how it is that you got from where you were to where you are today?
· Now, could you tell our listeners a little bit about Banzai and what you guys do?
· Banzai focus is really on events and your target is really your marketers are your customers. What would you say are some of your customers main pain points? How is it that you're able to overcome some of those and successfully have a high retention rate because ideally, that's what all organizations aim for, to keep the customers that they have for a lifetime.
· Now, seeing that you've been in the Customer Success space for quite some time now, what are some of the emerging trends that you are seeing in the Customer Success space that you believe if that trend continues in a positive way will help to enhance customer experience?
· Now, Rachel, can you also share with us what's the one online tool, resource, website or application that you absolutely cannot live without in your business?
· Could you also share with us maybe one or two books that you've read, it could be a book that you read recently, or even one that you read a very long time ago, but it has had a great impact on you, and maybe even your development and just your continued growth?
· Could you also share with our listeners, what's the one thing that is going on in your life right now that you are really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
· Now, our listeners would have tapped into this episode, and they're quite intrigued with you, Rachel and they'd like to know how they can reach out to you online where can they find you online?
· Now, before we wrap our episodes up, we always like to ask our guests if you have a quote or a saying maybe something that you revert to or use if during times of adversity or challenge, this quote kind of helps to just get you back on track or get you back refocused. Do you have one of those?
Highlights 
Rachel’s Journey
Me: Now, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share a little bit about their journey. So, could you share with our listeners, how it is that you got from where you were to where you are today?
 
Rachel shared that beginning of her career, she was actually an office manager for many years and an Executive Assistant. So, her customer base was very internal. And then she took the opportunity at ACS Technologies to apply for, she was an Executive Assistant office manager and applied for a onboarding, like specialist or an onboarding role. And so, that was her introduction into customer facing. And from there, it just kind of took off. She went from onboarding to an actual, like implementation consultants, than she ended up leading that team. And so, they mainly focus on training and implementation professional services. 
And then coming into Banzai, was really when she wanted to break into customer success, it was still kind of new back then, it's really developed over the years. But at Banzai in the last five years, she’s just grown so much, thankfully, there's so many resources like this podcast out

Jason Feifer is the editor in chief of Entrepreneur Magazine, a nonstop optimism machine, and a widely recognized authority on business and how people navigate change. He is the author of the best-selling book Build For Tomorrow, a startup advisor, and host of the podcast Help Wanted and Problem Solvers. LinkedIn name him a “Top Voice in Entrepreneurship”. 
Jason has also had decades-long career in national media, which included working as an editor at Men’s Health, Fast Company, Maxim, and Boston magazine, and writing about business and technology for the Washington Post, Slate, New York Magazine, and others. 
 
Questions
We always like to give our guests an opportunity to just share in their own words, a little bit about their journey, and how they got from wherever they were to where they are today. So, could you share that with us? So, Build For Tomorrow, a book that focuses on startup advisory, and I just kind of want you to take a little time to share with our listeners, what the book is about? Who is the book targeted towards? And how do you believe the book has been helping others in their different careers and businesses? Now the book focuses on four phases of this change. The first is the panic, then you have the adaptation and the new normal and then that phase where we're never going back. So, could you just elaborate just a little bit, maybe give an example of each just to kind of cement that information across to our listeners. What are three-character traits that you found has to really be intrinsic to organizations or persons who lead organizations to help them really be customer centric? Now, could you share with our listeners, what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business? Can you also share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people. Where can listeners find you online? Now, before we wrap our episodes up, we always like to ask our guests, do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote if for any reason you get derailed or you get off track, the quote kind of helps to get you back on track. Do you have one of those? Highlights 
Jason’s Journey
Me: We always like to give our guests an opportunity to just share in their own words, a little bit about their journey, and how they got from where they were to where they are today. So, could you share that with us?
 
Jason shared that in brief, he started in media, he was a community newspaper reporter fresh out of college. Eventually, he got into magazines, he moved to New York City to work for Men's Health magazine, pretty different from Entrepreneur, and bounced around to a lot of different national magazines until he got to Entrepreneur. 
And at first, he really treated Entrepreneur like a media project. His job was to do what he had done everywhere else, which was to be an editor and to tell great stories and to think about the media brand. 
But over time, two things happen. Number one is that people because of the title, Editor in Chief of Entrepreneur Magazine, they started to treat him as an authority in entrepreneurship, which frankly, he was uncomfortable with for a while because his background was in media, until he came to realize that so much of business is not about the fundamentals of business, but it's really about the fundamentals of human thinking, and logic and reinvention, and the kinds of things that he had put himself through in his own career. 
He thinks that we all have to recognize what our incredible skill is, and it's going to be different for everybody. His belief is that every human being has the same fundamental skill, and that is pattern recognition. 
The difference among us is that some of us are better at recognizing different kinds of patter

Steve Cockram is an inspirational communicator, serial entrepreneur, confidant to elite leaders around the world and co-creator of the world's premier “Leadership Toolkit”.
He has co-authored The 100X Leader, 5 Voices and The 5 Gears with his business partner, Jeremie Kubicek. Their new book, The Communication Code, released in November of 2023.  
Questions
·      So, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share in their own words, a little bit about their journey, how you got from where you were to where you are today?
·      Your book, The Communication Code, you wrote it with your business partner, Jeremie Kubicek, could you share with us a little bit about that book, maybe three overarching themes or tenets that the book focuses on? And kind of who is the book geared towards?
·      Now, you mentioned the five C's in terms of communication code, if I wanted to know or one of our listeners wanted to know what's my primary communication code? How do I know? Is there like a test that you can do? 
·      What do you think is critical in customer experience? If we were to look at the different code, channels that you spoke to us about the five C's, do you think they're all critical? Or do you think there may be one or two that definitely must occur in that interaction?
·  When you're explaining to me the five C's just now and you said in terms of communicating, you have to be really good at asking questions. How can you improve on the ability or the competence of asking the right types of questions? Because that's critical to the whole communication process, if you're not asking the right questions, then you're not going to get the right responses to get to the solution.
·    Now, Steve, could you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your own business?
·     Now, could you share with our listeners as well, Steve, what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
·      Where can listeners find you online?
·     Now, before we wrap our episodes up, Steve, we always like to ask our guests, do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote if for any reason you got derailed or you got off track, the quote kind of helps to get you back on track. Do you have one of those?
Highlights
Steve’s Journey
Me: So, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share in their own words, a little bit about their journey, how you got from where you were to where you are today?
 
Steve shared what an interesting question that is, nobody ever in their right mind have done all the things he’s done in the last 30 years. So, he'll give the highlights. He was a school teacher, an entrepreneur, a nightclub owner, a pastor, a coach, consultant, and been running Giant really with Jeremie for the last 11 years. So, he always say if you were to meet his friends at the age of 30, and ask who would be the least likely guru on relational intelligence? Probably, he would be in everyone's top three. 
So, everything they've learned usually has come out of their own personal failure and trying to work out why human beings behave the way they do. And also, how can they help people do relationships better in every area of their life? That's really been the heart and the joy of the last few years.
  
About Steve’s Book – The Communication Code
Me: So, your new book that was mentioned in reading your bio, The Communication Code, you wrote it with your business partner, Jeremie Kubicek, could you share with us a little bit about that book, maybe three overarching themes or tenets that the book focuses on? And kind of who is the book geared towards?
  
Steve shared that they kind of say

Darby Vannier, with over 20 years of experience, is a seasoned leader adept at building and growing organizations. As President & CEO of Indispensable Leadership Group, he excels as an executive coach, consultant, speaker, and fractional COO, focusing on strategic and leadership development. He has led effective teams of more than a 100 employees, coached others into their own leadership positions, and created stability during challenging organizational transitions. Darby built his career on the philosophy that developing the right people is the key to success. 
Learn more at www.beindispensable.com.
 
Questions
·      Even though we read a very short snippet of your journey, your little bio, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share in their own words, a little bit about how you got from where you are to where you are today.
·      Your book titled, The Indispensable Leader. So, could you share with our listeners a little bit about that book? What was your intention when you wrote the book? What is the book about? Who is the book geared towards and kind of what was your sentiment when you were putting it all together?
·      Which role do you think is more effective, the manager’s role or the leader’s role?
·     Now in the book, you also talk about, which I found this part really fascinating that you should be curious, and you should engage curiosity. Explained to us a little bit about what you meant when you said, engage or encourage curiosity and being curious as a leader.
·      In the book, you also mentioned the whole conscious competence model. So, I'd love for you to kind of just explain that to the audience as well, the four phases and then the example that you gave to reinforce the concept.
·      Could you also share with our listeners, what is the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your business?
·    Can you also share with our listeners, maybe one or two books that you've read, it could be a book that you read recently, or even one that you read a very long time ago, but it had a great impact on you.
·      Can you also share with us what's the one thing in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
·      Now, before we wrap our episodes up, we always like to ask our guests, do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge you will tend to revert to this quote if for any reason you get derailed or you get off track, and the quote kind of helps to get you back on track.
·      Where can listeners find you online?
Highlights
Darby’s Journey
Me: Now Darby, even though we read a very short snippet of your journey, your little bio, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share in their own words, a little bit about how you got from where you were to where you are today.
 
Darby shared that it’s kind of a diverse career actually. So, he started off in retail, actually kind of in the entertainment industry, working as a manager at a 22-screen movie theatre, which is an interesting industry, especially back at that time when it was before digital movies and everything, and everything came in on natural celluloid film and everything. 
So, yeah, 22 screen movie theatre, they would serve 1000’s of people a day and that was an interesting experience getting started because it definitely was jumping right into that retail type environment, bringing in at that point, you're talking about most of their employees were high school or college aged students and, and so that's just a different level of team member that you're managing. 
From there, he kind of jumped even further into retail, he actually became a store manager for Kinkos at the time, so the print shop at Kinkos, which is now FedEx Office, but at the time, it was stil

Barry Klein is Vice president of Success and Enablement at Austin-Based Talroo, the data driven job and hiring event advertising platform that helps businesses reach the candidates they need to build their essential workforce. Barry provides leadership to Talroo’s team of Customer Success Analysts who have both revenue and customer service responsibilities for multiple verticals. 
Passionate about establishing “customers” as “partners”, he focuses on long-term relationships, lifetime value and establishing raving fans. With more than 30 years of experience in customer-facing and executive roles, including Vice President of Sales Engineering for Vignette Corp, Barry also spent several years running his own small business and consultancy. Barry holds a BS in Computer Science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
 
Questions
·    We always like to hear from our guests in their own words, how did you get from where you were to where you are today?
· Can you share with our listeners a little bit about why you believe recruitment is so important as it relates to customer service delivery?
· In terms of how do we hire well and focus on cultural alignment? And I imagine this begins in the interview process. What are three main things that you believe if you're tasked with that responsibility for an organization, where would you put your focus, maybe three top areas that you put your focus on if we're trying to get cultural alignment?
· Now, could you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business?
· Could you also share with our listeners maybe one or two books that you've read, it could be a book that you read recently, or one that you read a very long time ago, but it has had a great impact on you.
· Can you share with us also, what's one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? Either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people.
·  Where can listeners find you online?
·  Before we wrap our episodes up, we always like to ask our guests do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge you will tend to revert to this quote if for any reason you got derailed or there was an obstacle or hurdle that was presented to you and it caused you to not be on track but when you thought of that quote or when you recited that quote, it kind of got you back on track. Do you have one of those?
 
Highlights
Barry’s Journey 
Me: Now, we always like to give our guests an opportunity to share in their own words a little bit about their journey. So, I know we read your bio that gives us formally how it is that you got to where you are today, but we always like to hear from our guests in their own words, how did you get from where you were to where you are today?
  
Barry stated that he appreciates Yanique asking and thanked her for mentioning his alma mater, RPI. As he said, he was a Computer Science Major and he was in college in the late 80s. So, the world of programming was very different than it would be today. But he wrote a lot of codes, in fact, when he went to his parent’s house years after he graduated, and he saw the Dot Matrix Paper printouts of the code he had written, he was like, who wrote this, he couldn't in a million years, he couldn't have recreated that code.  
But by the time he graduated college, he knew that while he enjoyed coding very much, and it was why he went to get a computer science degree, he done enough. And what he became intrigued about was the intersection of the technology and people.
And his first roles out of college were not really tech support per se but sort of high-end engineering support for customers who are developing with their platform and that led him closer to customers. 
And what he found he really enjoy and what he imagines he’s best that if he has to choose his be