Who Should Own the Customer Journey and Experience?

Unless your company has a Chief Customer Officer, Head of Customer Experience or similar roles, it can quickly become an internal battle when deciding who should own the customer journey and experience that no CEO/Founder really wants to fight.

Who owns CX?

Product vs. Sales & Marketing vs. Customer Success & Support

Several teams might assume they play the most important part in CX:

• They’ll hear Product say that they should because they play the most critical role in the experience. After all, a customer came because of the product THEY designed.
• Sales and Marketing will surely suggest they they should own it, coupled with a well-crafted pitch. After all, this is what they do best and there would be no customers if it wasn’t for THEIR efforts.
• Then, there’s Customer Success & Support. Why wouldn’t the team who deals with the customer the most own something so important? After all, THEY know the customers better than anyone.

The reality is that all these teams are right. There would be no product experience if it wasn’t for Product. No sales if it wasn’t for Sales and Marketing. And no customer retention if it wasn’t for Customer Success and Support.

CX is a cross-functional topic

While specific teams may have more direct influence on CX than others, the key to successfully architecting a customer journey and experience relies on the cross-functional nature.

Every team that touches a customer should be involved in crafting the journey. They need to own the part of the journey that they directly impact.

Find your keeper

The best way to do this is to define a “keeper” (not owner, which is an important distinction) of the journey and experience.

Keeper = caretaker vs. owner = authority.

This “keeper” should be a trusted, strong, peace-keeping leader and team. They will be responsible for keeping documentation up to date, leading cross-functional meetings, ensuring everyone is on the same page and socializing the journey/experience among the entire company. They won’t act as the controller of the journey and dictate to others what they should be doing. Rather, they will be the helpful guides to keep this moving.

When needed, get external help

If this sounds too daunting within the political game of your organization, brining in an outside partner is a great solution. At Rethink Labs, we take an un-biased, customer-focused approach that doesn’t look at what one of your teams is or isn’t doing, but rather the great experience your customer is failing to have because of how things are operating today. We’re here to help you navigate these sticky situations. In fact, we welcome them!

Schedule time with us today if you’re struggling to get your teams aligned around the customer journey and experience. We’ll help you fix it fast.

The whole is greater than than the sum of it’s parts,

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