In this episode of The CX Iconoclast, Richard Owen hosts Bill Staikos, a CX and EX leader with more than 20 years of experience helping organizations move beyond dashboards and into delivering tangible business outcomes. Drawing on his unique perspective from both the vendor and buyer sides of the industry, Bill discusses why too many companies are still stuck in outdated models of customer experience - focused on surveys and metrics - rather than designing solutions with customers at the center. The conversation covers the pitfalls of “product-led growth” thinking, the impact of AI on both customer experience and the workforce, and why the best companies are those that operationalize CX in partnership with technology, operations, and employee experience.

Bill and Richard comment on the growing gap between companies that innovate and those that stagnate, with Bill arguing that success will come from action-oriented, integrated approaches rather than overcomplicated frameworks. They discuss the risks of shortsighted cost-cutting in the AI era, the importance of moral responsibility toward employees, and the opportunity for AI to help organizations finally break free from decades of CX mediocrity. Packed with candid insights, industry anecdotes, and a challenge to rethink old paradigms, this conversation offers practical and thought-provoking guidance for leaders who want to achieve meaningful change in customer and employee experiences alike.

With over 20 years of expertise in CX & EX, Bill is the founder and managing partner of Be Customer Led, a consultancy that helps companies stop guessing what customers want, start building around what customers actually do, and drive real business outcomes. His expertise has focused on developing and growing teams that deliver CX strategy and execution plans to achieve real business outcomes (not just delivering NPS dashboards), deliver a change management platform to make these outcomes sustainable, and activate leadership participation.

He is also the founder of two podcasts, with his latest, The Multimodal Experience, focusing on how advanced capabilities and technology, from AI and spatial computing to extended reality and wearables, will change the way we engage with and buy from brands every day and how we operate within the companies we work for.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ocxcognition/

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In this episode of the CX Iconoclast podcast, Richard Owen speaks with Tey Bannerman, a McKinsey partner focused on deploying AI in large enterprises to improve customer retention and growth. Bannerman emphasizes that AI should solve real human and business problems rather than just serve as a technological novelty. He critiques the reflexive use of AI for cost-cutting and job elimination, urging companies to instead prioritize long-term value creation and enhanced customer experience. He shares a compelling case study of a B2B payments company that shifted from cost-cutting to a customer-centric strategy using predictive analytics to reduce churn, highlighting the importance of engaging frontline employees in AI design and adoption.

Their conversation also covers the dual challenges of employee resistance and leadership skepticism when adopting AI. Bannerman notes that fear of job loss and poorly designed tools can undermine adoption unless employees are engaged as co-creators. At the executive level, the challenge is often a cultural reliance on instinct over data, especially when dealing with AI-generated predictions. Bannerman advocates a balanced approach where leadership combines intuition with data to scale decision-making. As he says, "Predictive data gives leaders scale. Intuition alone can’t reach 100,000 customers."

Both he and Owen agree that the way AI is communicated, taught, and integrated - especially through accessible, language-based interfaces - will determine whether organizations succeed or fall behind in what they call one of the most transformative shifts in business history.

Tey Bannerman is a Partner at McKinsey & Company and the former Head of McKinsey Design Europe, where he blends software engineering, human-centered design, and strategic leadership to help major organizations implement AI solutions that deliver real business value. With over two decades of experience, spanning roles as a code‑writing software engineer, startup product designer, and digital agency leader, he has led AI‑powered transformation projects across sectors including banking, retail, fashion, and fintech, always anchored in human needs, ethical design, and tangible outcomes, rather than chasing technological novelty

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

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What if your KPIs could talk back—and guide your business forward? In this episode, Richard Owen and Brian Curry of OCX Cognition, and MIT’s Michael Schrage explore how AI is transforming not just customer experience metrics, but the very nature of leadership and organizational capability. They suggest why so many companies stick with legacy KPIs despite major shifts in tech, and how conversational AI and “chat-modified” metrics are helping innovative leaders turn passive data into proactive guidance. Schrage introduces the revolutionary idea of building digital twins of your KPIs—giving organizations a GPS for where they are and where they should go next.

Michael, Brian and Richard make a critical distinction between insights and actionable insights, cover the cultural silos that hold companies back, and explain how AI-enabled measurement can drive faster decisions, and customer-led growth. With real-world examples and global perspective, Schrage challenges leaders to move beyond dashboards to dynamic dialogue with their data. Whether you're leading a digital transformation or just beginning to explore AI, this episode offers a compelling roadmap for turning metrics into momentum.

Michael Schrage is a research fellow at the MIT Sloan School of Management's Initiative on the Digital Economy and a visiting fellow at Imperial College London’s Innovation & Entrepreneurship program. His work focuses on the intersection of innovation, AI, and digital transformation, particularly how organizations use experimentation, modeling, and analytics to drive business growth. Schrage has advised Fortune 500 companies, startups, and government agencies on innovation strategy and has authored several influential books, including Who Do You Want Your Customers to Become? and The Innovator’s Hypothesis. His insights on AI, behavioral economics, and digital experimentation make him a leading voice in business and technology

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

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What happens when leading-edge academic research meets real-world customer dynamics? In this episode, OCX Cognition CEO Richard Owen welcomes Chris Forman, Professor of Strategy, Innovation, and Technology at Cornell’s Dyson School, to discuss how technology adoption, data integration, and organizational readiness shape B2B outcomes. Together, they clarify the critical differences between collecting data and using it—and why even sophisticated firms often struggle to translate tech investments into competitive advantage.

From early-stage AI to platform lock-in, from Salesforce implementation challenges to the dynamics of central versus local decision-making, Chris brings the data-backed clarity of academic insight to questions every CX and strategy leader should be asking. Whether you're working your way through enterprise-wide digital transformation or trying to turn customer intelligence into action, this conversation offers both a grounding in research and a playbook for growth.

Chris Forman is the Peter and Stephanie Nolan Professor of Strategy, Innovation, and Technology at Cornell University’s Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management. He earned his Ph.D. in managerial economics and strategy from Northwestern University (2002) and holds a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to joining Cornell, Chris served on the faculty at Carnegie Mellon University’s Tepper School, Georgia Tech’s Scheller College, and was an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon. He also worked as an associate economist at Lehman Brothers. His award‑winning research spans company-level IT value, digital platforms, enterprise software ecosystems, and the strategic adoption of AI.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

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In this episode of CX Iconoclast, OCX Cognition CEO Richard Owen sits down with Murli Buluswar, Head of Analytics at Citi’s U.S. Personal Bank, to explore how AI is reshaping customer insight and experience at enterprise scale. Murli shares his journey from early interest in behavioral science and analytics to leading cutting-edge initiatives that bring such innovation to life. From sharing intelligence across teams to improving operational risk detection and enabling hyper-personalization, he tells us how generative and agentic AI are turning customer intelligence into real business impact—faster, smarter, and at scale.

The discussion is not just about technology, and focuses on the human and cultural transformations that AI demands. Murli emphasizes that while data and tools are part of the equation, 70% comes down to people: rethinking roles, changing how decisions are made, and redefining what really matters in the age of machine learning. This is a must-listen for CX and CS leaders, Chief Data Officers, and transformation champions ready to move from AI curiosity to AI-powered growth. As Murli puts it, the choice is simple—be the driver of change, or risk being disrupted by it.

Murli Buluswar is a highly-experienced analytics and AI leader currently serving as Head of U.S. Consumer Analytics at Citi's Personal Bank, overseeing a team of 400+ professionals and steering data-driven decision‑making across a 30 million+ customer base. He describes himself as an “intrapreneurial” strategist with boardroom influence, Murli excels at transforming mature financial services into digitally intelligent organizations. He has built internal data science teams that deliver real commercial impact and lead cultural evolution through data and AI. He now champions hyper-personalization and real-time customer intelligence at Citi—embedding AI-driven models into the core of customer experience, risk management, and digital marketing.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

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In this episode of CX Iconoclast, Richard Owen sits down with Dean Eckles, MIT professor and former Facebook data scientist, to explore the real-world dynamics of misinformation—and what actually works to stop it. Eckles shares insights from his landmark research showing that correcting false content on social media doesn’t always reduce misinformation. In fact, it can sometimes make things worse, prompting users to double down and share even more toxic content. But there’s good news: features like Community Notes, when designed to provide neutral context from a broad base of users, can significantly reduce the viral spread of low-quality information—especially among more passive, less entrenched audiences.

The conversation shifts to how businesses can close the data gap. Eckles describes how platforms like Meta leverage rich behavioral data to adjust for survey bias, offering a blueprint for companies that want more accurate customer insights. But most organizations aren’t sitting on massive data lakes—and that’s where predictive AI and synthetic data can help fill in the blanks. Richard and Dean also tackle a key leadership challenge: how to get executives to trust data over instinct. The goal? Not perfection, but progress. Use AI to narrow the decision space, eliminate high-risk choices, and create meaningful lift—whether you’re in the boardroom or on the front lines. It’s not about man versus machine. It’s about smarter decisions, powered by both.

Dean Eckles is a social scientist and statistician. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dean is the William F. Pounds Professor in the MIT Sloan School of Management and associate director of the Institute for Data, Systems & Society in the Schwarzman College of Computing. Much of his research examines how interactive technologies affect human behavior, especially by mediating social influence. Dean also works on methods for inferring cause–effect relationships and on applied statistics more generally. Dean’s empirical work uses observational studies and field experiments involving hundreds of millions of people.

His papers appear in Journal of the American Statistical Association, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Nature, Operations Research, Management Science, and other peer-reviewed journals and proceedings in statistics, computer science, and marketing. He is a co-organizer of the Conference on Digital Experimentation (CODE@MIT). He was previously a scientist at Facebook and Nokia. Dean completed five degrees, including his PhD, at Stanford University.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

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In this CX Iconoclast episode, Richard Owen speaks with Bruce Temkin, a pioneering figure in customer experience, about his new initiative: Humanity at Scale. Temkin explains that despite decades of progress in CX and EX, many leaders still perceive a trade-off between focusing on people and achieving business results. His goal is to eliminate this false dichotomy by helping leaders understand that truly human-centric organizations—those that embrace how people naturally think, feel, and behave—are in fact more productive, adaptable, and capable of long-term success. Drawing on principles from neuroscience and behavioral economics, Temkin argues that organizations need to shift from rule-heavy, process-centric structures to environments that empower creativity and human connection.

While covering the societal and organizational implications of AI, Temkin acknowledges the disruptive potential but remains optimistic that like past technological revolutions, AI can elevate standards of living and open new opportunities—if it’s applied thoughtfully. He cautions, however, that businesses often default to short-term cost-cutting, such as automating human interaction in contact centers, rather than leveraging AI to enhance productivity and employee fulfillment. Temkin also introduces the concept of “bias denialism,” encouraging leaders to accept that all data and decisions are inherently biased. Recognizing and working with that bias, he argues, is essential to truly human-centered leadership. His ultimate ambition is to spark a movement that inspires leaders, shares practical practices, and promotes AI applications that serve humanity rather than diminish it.

Bruce Temkin is a luminary in human experience management and large-scale transformation. Known as the “Godfather of Customer Experience,” he helped define the fields of CX, EX, and XM, co-founded the Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA), and led the Qualtrics XM Institute. With a rare ability to simplify complexity and guide leaders through disruption and change, Bruce’s work bridges behavioral science, disruptive technologies, and organizational culture to drive human-centric strategies that deliver sustainable results at scale.. He now leads Temkinsight, where he publishes the Humanity at Scale newsletter and hosts the Humanity at Scale: Redefining Leadership podcast—spotlighting bold thinkers who are reshaping leadership around empathy, purpose, and trust. He believes that leading in a human-centric way isn’t just a better approach—it’s the only path to sustainable success.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ocxcognition/

Connect with Richard Owen on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/richard-owen-98ba3

If you have never heard of the Department of Disruptive Capabilities, this is the place to be! In this episode, OCX Cognition CEO Richard Owen sits down with MIT Senior Lecturer and renowned efficiency expert Steve Spear to explore what makes the world’s most innovative organizations tick. Drawing on his experience with Toyota, the U.S. Navy, and Fortune 500 leaders, Steve unpacks the mechanics of high-velocity learning—why relentless experimentation, rapid problem-solving, and dynamic adaptation separate market leaders from the rest.


Richard and Steve focus on the intersection of AI, operational excellence, and customer retention. How can B2B organizations apply Toyota-style innovation to drive growth? Why do traditional process improvement models fall short in today’s data-driven world? And what lessons can healthcare organizations, banks, and many other types of companies learn from the playbooks Steve helped implement in manufacturing and in the US Navy? Get ready for a great discussion that challenges conventional wisdom and unlocks new ways to scale efficiency and impact.

Dr. Steve Spear DBA MS MS is founder of the business process software firm, See to Solve, senior lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management where he’s active in the exec program, and impactful author of Wiring the Winning Organization and The High Velocity Edge and landmark articles such as “Decoding the DNA of the Toyota Production System” and “Fixing Healthcare from the Inside, Today”. He’s worked with leaders across many verticals to bring ideas into actual practice including manufacturing and heavy industry, high tech, utilities, biotech and pharma, medical care and other social services. He’s been advisor the US Army’s Rapid Equipping Force, to a host of commands in the Navy including two CNOs and other senior leaders, the Disruptive Capabilities Office (nee Unmanned Task Force), and NAVSEA’s public shipyards, where he’s helping reduce durations on CNO availabilities.

Find out how predictive CX analytics can help your business: https://ocxcognition.com/

Follow us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/ocxcognition/

Connect with Richard Owen on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/richard-owen-98ba3