Experts of Experience
The Real Reason Your Customer Experience Is Broken (And It's Not What You Think)
18 Feb 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
So you think that our definition of experience has maybe kind of pulled away from the actual human experience at the heart of this?
Chapter 2: What is the main issue with customer experience?
I hate pointing fingers, but I tend to blame vendors, especially technology vendors. Because if you remember back in the days where CRM came out, the idea was exactly that, customer relationship management. What are the nuances of the relationship expectation for each customer segment? All the way to today, you can't say the word CRM without saying technology blank.
Chapter 3: How do expectations redefine customer experience?
And I think that over time that has happened with the idea of experience. It started out with a very simple idea that whether I'm doing something one-on-one with an individual or with a company or with a brand, by experience, I mean experience. the things that I do to get from point A to point B in a way that is functional, accessible, effective, and connected for me as an individual, right? Yep.
But now, unfortunately, you say experience, people think methodologies, rating systems, technology for managing the customer experience or CX, and we've lost a lot of that human component and what it means to real people.
One of my favorite quotes is that expectations are the thief of joy. But today's guest might argue something a little bit different. He might argue that expectations are also your gateway to joy. Joining me on mic is JC Quintana, a longtime customer experience leader, author, and speaker who spent over two decades helping organizations rethink how they build relationships with their customers.
He's advised teams all over the world, and today he shares what he's learned about human psychology that will dramatically transform how you think about experience-building and expectation setting, and honestly, just relationship building and human communication in general.
Chapter 4: What is the Dialogue 7 framework and its importance?
I mean, there are literally things he shared in this episode that I'm simultaneously going to be applying to my business relationships, as well as my at-home relationships with my partner, with my kids, with my family. So there are so many gems in this episode that you're absolutely going to love. For those of you who are new here, you're watching Experts of Experience. I'm your host, Lacey Pease.
And we release new episodes every single month. So if you don't want to miss those episodes, be sure to hit subscribe and you'll get notified every time a new one drops.
Chapter 5: Why does culture matter in customer experience?
Thanks so much for tuning in today. And without further ado, here's JC Quintana. JC, welcome to Experts of Experience.
Great to see you, Lacey.
Great to have you on. It's the first interview of the year.
Chapter 6: How do transparency and trust differ in business relationships?
So I'm so thrilled to be able to do this with you.
It's fantastic. I'm looking forward to it and to the year as well. I think 2026 is going to be great.
I honestly feel like this conversation we're about to have is a great way for people to start the year when they're thinking about business.
Chapter 7: What common expectations do businesses often overlook?
Like what assumptions have I been making about how my buyers think, how my employees think that I should maybe tear down before we even get into the year? That's true. It's going to be a great conversation for that.
We don't like calling it that. We don't like calling it assumptions, but that's really what they are.
Yes. Yes, for sure. So, JC, you've worked at a lot of different companies over the year. Whenever people come to you and say, you know, our customer experience isn't working or maybe even our employee experience is having some gaps.
Chapter 8: How is AI impacting employee anxiety regarding customer experience?
What do you first think is actually broken?
The idea of what experience is itself, our definition of experience, I think, is broken. And what I mean by that is that we've spent so much time, and you have to give Forrester a lot of credit for going back to this very idea of what experience means.
And if you ask any company what experience means, they'll go through, talk about touch points and customer interactions and how to make them better. But if you ask them, how are you doing that in a way that provides feedback
real functionality, reduces effort, increases accessibility, connects emotionally, a lot of people don't realize that that really is at the very core what an engineer experience is.
So you think that just like our definition of experience has maybe kind of pulled away from the actual human experience at the heart of this?
I agree. And, you know, I hate pointing fingers, but I think that I tend to blame vendors, especially technology vendors for that. Because if you remember back in the days where CRM came out, the idea of CRM was exactly that, customer relationship management. How do I manage the relationship? What are the nuances of relationship? the relationship expectation for each customer segment.
And then slowly, all the way to today, you can't say the word CRM without saying technology blank. That manages our contacts and stuff, right? I'm not going to advertise any given one of them, but you know the ones that I'm talking about.
For sure, yeah.
And I think that over time, that has happened with the idea of experience. It started out with a very simple idea that whether I'm doing something individually, one-on-one with an individual or with a company or with a brand, by experience, I mean the things that I do to get from point A to point B in a way that is functional, accessible, effective, and connected for me as an individual, right?
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