And across industries, that pressure is showing up in the same places: how to move faster without losing trust, how to create efficiency without eroding the experience, and how to separate what is genuinely transformative from what is simply new. Those were among the biggest undercurrents in this week’s Virtual Executive Roundtable, where leaders came together to talk candidly about what AI is changing within their organizations right now.

What made the conversation so valuable was not that anyone claimed to have it all figured out. It was that the discussion stayed grounded in the tension leaders are actually managing every day. What does agentic AI really mean in practice? Where is it delivering measurable value today? Where do human teams still matter most?

And perhaps most importantly, are organizations using AI to modernize the same old service model or to build something better from the ground up? The conversation made one thing clear: this moment is bigger than automation. It is a very real opportunity for CX leaders to rethink what great service looks like next.

What does “agentic” really mean?

One of the most useful parts of the conversation was the effort to separate true agentic AI from the catch-all language that’s flooding the market. Leaders repeatedly came back to one simple distinction: traditional AI reacts, while agentic AI acts. Traditional AI answers the question, and agentic AI helps complete the task. It is more conversational, more proactive, and better at taking action across systems than simply surfacing information.

That distinction matters because confusion is still slowing organizations down. Several leaders noted that many companies say they are building agentic capabilities when, in reality, they are still enhancing scripted bots. That disconnect is important. If leaders use the same word to describe radically different levels of maturity, it becomes harder to benchmark progress, align teams, and make smart investment decisions.

The industry is still early

A striking theme from the discussion was how low current adoption still is. Estimates in the room placed true agentic AI adoption somewhere below 15%, with some leaders putting it closer to 3%-5%. And yet nobody sounded relaxed about that. Quite the opposite. The tone was urgent. Leaders acknowledged that while the industry is still early, the pace of change is accelerating fast enough that waiting now could create a real competitive gap later.

That is the tension many organizations are sitting in right now. They know they do not have all the answers. They also know they do not have the luxury of standing still. If competitors have already spent the last two years learning, testing, failing, refining, and scaling, what happens to the organizations that are just beginning to ask foundational questions now?

Where leaders are seeing real value today

The conversation stayed grounded in practical use cases, and that was refreshing. Leaders discussed high-volume, repeatable work such as account updates, password resets, and status checks. They also discussed more advanced uses: proactive service interventions, automated quality auditing, and knowledge management that updates in near real time based on live interactions.

One example stood out: instead of simply telling a customer that an order is delayed, an agentic system can recognize that the customer paid for expedited shipping, predict the miss before the customer complains, and proactively issue a refund. That’s not just efficiency; that’s service with foresight.

Leaders also pushed back on a narrow definition of value. This is not only about removing cost or reducing headcount. The more mature conversation is about containment, speed, routing accuracy, reduced friction, better use of human expertise, and stronger experiences overall. In other words, if your scorecard for AI is only labor reduction, are you measuring the wrong thing?

The human-in-the-loop is a strategy

If there was one point the group returned to again and again, it was this: human oversight still matters, especially in emotionally charged moments. Leaders shared examples from industries where the issue is not a simple transaction but a life event, a safety concern, or a vulnerable moment. In those cases, the role of AI is not to replace empathy. It is to recognize when empathy is required and make the handoff smarter, faster, and more informed.

That raises an important leadership challenge. Are organizations training AI only on business rules? Or are they also teaching it context, tone, and the signals that should trigger human intervention? Because the risk is obvious: a system can be technically correct and emotionally disastrous. And in customer experience, that still counts as failure.

A few shared perspectives

• “The old AI is ‘what do you want to know?’ agentic AI is ‘what do you want to do?’”
• “Instead of AI being a helper, AI is now your accountable digital labor. It’s part of your workforce.”
• “Standard AI was reactive… agentic AI is more proactive in how we solve for the customer.”
• “Traditional AI is scripted responses. Agentic AI can go out, pull from multiple sources, and make decisions.”
• “The AI would say your order is confirmed. Agentic AI will predict it won’t arrive on time and refund the expedited shipping in real time.”
• “It’s moving from supervised learning to autonomous decision-making.”
• “Agentic AI isn’t just answering questions; it’s completing the transaction end-to-end.”

This is bigger than automation

The biggest takeaway from the discussion was not that AI is moving quickly. Leaders already know that. It is the organizations making the most meaningful progress who are asking sharper questions as they move. They are not just chasing use cases. They are thinking carefully about trust, orchestration, customer expectations, employee impact, and where human connection still matters most. That is the real work in front of CX leaders now; not simply adopting AI, but shaping how it shows up in the experience in a way that is thoughtful, responsible, and genuinely useful.

What should AI handle? What should stay human? Where can we remove friction? Where should we add reassurance? And how do we use this moment not just to do service cheaper, but to do it better?

These are exactly the kinds of candid, leader-level conversations happening inside our Virtual Executive Roundtables. If you want to hear how your peers are thinking through the opportunities and tradeoffs ahead, and contribute your own perspective to the discussion, join us at a future Virtual Executive Roundtable. It is a chance to step into a smaller, high-value conversation with fellow CX leaders navigating many of the same questions in real time.

Join our mailing list to receive event invites.

The post The New CX Question: What Should AI Own? appeared first on Execs In The Know.

The back-office (claims teams, billing, fulfillment, underwriting, compliance) has rarely been treated as part of the experience engine. Yet as artificial intelligence (AI), automation, and agentic systems reshape operations, CX leaders are realizing something critical: The back office is no longer behind the scenes; it’s center stage.  

In this roundtable, executives unpacked the operational and cultural shifts needed to finally align these historically separate functions. What emerged was a clear call to action, and a glimpse into how the most future-ready organizations are preparing for what comes next. 

Back-Office Modernization Is Now a CX Priority 

One leader put it plainly: “From the customer’s perspective, there is no front office, there is no back office. There’s just the company.” 

Consumers don’t care which department “owns” a task. They care about clarity, speed, and avoiding repetition. Yet many organizations still invest heavily in front-line tools while leaving back-office workflows untouched, creating the very friction customers feel in the form of delays, inconsistencies, and escalations. 

Leaders agreed on several truths: 

• Back-office operations are essential to the end-to-end experience, not hidden support layers. 
• Most executive teams still underestimate the CX impact of back-office modernization. 
• Teams across the enterprise need to see back-office work as part of the customer journey. 
• Fragmented handoffs, not agent performance, are often the root cause of customer dissatisfaction. 

Silos, Systems, and the Alignment Problem 

If there was one shared pain point, it was this: alignment is still the most significant barrier to progress. 

Executives described a familiar scene: HR systems that don’t speak to CRM, fulfillment platforms that operate independently, product teams designing workflows “in a vacuum,” and data scattered across what one participant called “islands of automation.”  

But the most powerful insight came from a simple observation: Sometimes the most impactful transformation starts with a basic cross-functional meeting. 

In one organization, simply bringing together CX, operations, and product teams in the same room revealed a dozen downstream issues, many of which were quickly solvable. It reminded the group that alignment is not only a systems challenge, but also a cultural one.  

As one attendee shared: “Bringing teams together, they’re like, ‘Oh, I didn’t realize it did that.’” Sometimes awareness is the first step toward modernization. 

From Frankenstacks to Unified Data 

Every executive on the roundtable acknowledged a version of the same problem: the “Frankenstack.” Tools bolted together, inconsistent data definitions, and multiple versions of the truth. And with AI moving from experimental to operational, that fragmentation is no longer just inefficient; it’s risky. 

Leaders stressed the need for: 

• A single data layer 
• Consistent data governance 
• Clear prioritization of 30–90 day value wins 
• Unified KPIs that make back-office contributions visible 

The takeaway was clear: AI is only as good as the data it’s fed. One leader summed it up nicely: “Once we have a better view of what’s going on, we can finally measure the value the back office brings.” 

The Human + AI Workforce Is Here 

Perhaps the most forward-looking part of the conversation focused on agentic AI and the idea of a combined workforce: human and AI agents working side by side. 

Leaders shared early wins: 

• 4× throughput increases 
• 100% auditability 
• Manual tasks reduced from 4 hours to 1 
• Entire queues eliminated 

But they also highlighted new responsibilities: 

• Monitoring AI like a team member
• Building clear governance 
• Ensuring transparency and explainability 
• Training employees to work with, not against, AI systems 

As one participant said, “AI will not replace people. But people who do not understand AI will be replaced.” The future of CX isn’t human vs. AI. It’s human + AI + aligned operations. 

CX Leadership Is Shifting from Cost to Value  

The conversation closed with a noticeable shift in mindset: Leaders are moving away from AI for cost-cutting and toward AI for value creation, quality, and growth. Organizations are building value-realization frameworks, taking incremental wins rather than massive transformations, and focusing on internal AI adoption before rolling out customer-facing solutions. 

Their North Star goals for the next 12 months? Unified data, automated back-office workflows, better regulatory processes, and strengthened centers of excellence. The direction is unmistakable: Modern CX leadership is operational leadership. 

Be Part of Conversations Like This 

This is what makes the Execs In The Know community special: leaders openly sharing, challenging, and learning from one another. Just real problems and real solutions. Our Virtual Executive Roundtables are built on that promise: Leaders Learning From Leaders. 

If you want to be part of these candid conversations, connect with top CX executives, and stay ahead of the trends shaping our industry, we invite you to join one of our upcoming virtual or in-person events. In the meantime, explore our recent report in partnership with NiCE, CX Without Silos: Bridging Front- and Back-Office Operations to Elevate CX.

The post Breaking Down the Back Office: What CX Leaders Told Us About the Next Era of Customer Experience  appeared first on Execs In The Know.

In this post, we share the most valuable insights to arise from the session, including results from several poll questions that were presented as a part of the special session.

What is Omnichannel?

In setting up the conversation about omnichannel, it’s important to level-set on exactly what omnichannel is. Simply put, omnichannel is a continuously tracked and integrated brand experience, providing brand ambassadors (in this case, customer care agents) with context for each customer interaction, regardless of channel. Omnichannel tools and solutions provide agents with a continuous, seamless customer history, while also cultivating a consistent brand experience wherever and whenever a consumer interacts with a brand as a part of their customer journey. In other words, if a customer logs in to a customer care chat, the agent who takes that chat has a clear picture of past purchases, past interactions, and may even have Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered tools that can help predict needs and issues, potentially providing proactive solutions.

Omnichannel Metrics — What Matters Most

The session kicked off with Randy Bassett, General Manager, CX Operations Planning and Shared Service at DISH Network, sharing a comprehensive overview of DISH Network’s customer care journey map. One of the critical metrics Randy touched on in discussing DISH Network’s approach to omnichannel was Customer Experience Minutes (CXM). CXM can be defined as the total time a customer spends with any agent on any channel within a 7-day period. In essence, CXM combines three traditional metrics (Average Handle Time [AHT], Repeat Calls, and Call Transfers) into one powerful metric. Using CXM, an organization can track and understand the overall effort of its customers, especially when paired with customer effort scores derived from customer surveying. This is a critical measurement because now more than ever, consumers value their time and expect care solutions to be quick (and easy).

At the conclusion of Randy’s overview of DISH Network’s operations, session attendees were given an opportunity (via a poll) to share which key performance indicators (KPIs) they consider most important in understanding the multi- or omnichannel experience. Here are those results:

Clearly, multi- and omnichannel engagements continue to be dominated by traditional metrics, highlighting the importance of developing new CX KPIs, such as CXM. Although mainstays like Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) and First Contact Resolution (FCR) remain prominent, matching newer indicators like Net Promoter Score (NPS) and Customer Effort Score (CES), its apparent that the industry will need to continue to develop new ways of examining new experiences.

From Key Measurements to Tackling New (and Existing) Challenges

Although the conversations started with KPIs, talk quickly swung toward challenges, something everyone in the session could relate to. The discussion opened with another poll question with the following results:

In addition to the challenges highlighted in the poll question, other challenges surfaced as a part of the discussion. These included:

• Data integration, particularly in the presence of legacy systems
• Finding unified measurements that work across channels
• Hiring and/or training agents that can both handle more complex issues, and operate across channels

Although there is no single silver bullet to address all these challenges, several key considerations were discussed during the session.

First and foremost, it was suggested that brands need to start by knowing their own customers — knowing their expectations, channel preferences, and appetite for adopting new solutions and technologies. Can customers do the things they want to do on all the various channels offered? Are their most preferred channels even available?

Second, brands need to seek to understand not only the customer experience but also the agent experience. What are the top agent pain points? What does agent effort look like? Do the tools and technologies work as they should, especially considering many operations have been moved from office to home?

Third, it’s important not to restrict performance comparisons to a brand’s immediate competitive space. In other words, don’t just look at what the competition is doing. Instead, look closely at what the best CX brands are doing across all industries because at the end of the day, that’s what consumers are doing. They are not segmenting by industry but are instead constructing their expectations from what they are experiencing wherever they are doing business.

To capitalize on that last point, an additional poll question was put forth by one of the participants in the session.

The question was this:

Which is more important?

A) Being available in any channel the customer wants to engage in

B) Present a recommended channel for each issue type based on past performance

Option “A” was selected by a margin of 3-to-1, emphasizing the fact that choice is now the gold standard. It’s not enough to direct a customer to what works. Instead, brands must let the customer choose, while simultaneously making sure everything works. This is part and parcel of competing not only with the competition but with the best across all businesses.

Undoubtedly, there are some tough acts to follow in the world of CX, but it’s a necessary path to achieving a true omnichannel experience.

________________________________________

Are you a CX leader looking to learn from your peers, as well as top industry experts? We invite you to visit our Events Page to learn more and consider joining us for our next featured event, Virtual Customer Response Summit October, which will even include a keynote session from DISH Network’s Randy Bassett, featured in this blog. Or, if you’d like to be considered for inclusion in a future Executive Virtual Roundtable session, please reach out to Chad McDaniel.

Interested in sponsoring your own Executive Virtual Roundtable or other special activity? Visit our Supplier Engagement portal to learn how you can get involved in the Execs In The Know community.

The post Advancing Omnichannel: Better Metrics and Solutions appeared first on Execs In The Know.