INTELLIGENT TECHNOLOGY
The future of customer experience: Rethinking metrics and roles in the age of AI
Iain Banks, CEO of Ventrica
They’ ll need to evaluate the reliability of AI itself. They’ ll need to measure trust, ensuring customers feel comfortable with how automation is used and how their data is handled. And most importantly, they’ ll need to connect customer service outcomes to business value.
For years, customer experience( CX) has been defined – and sometimes confined – by three metrics: customer satisfaction( CSAT), net promoter score( NPS) and customer effort score( CES). They’ ve dominated dashboards, reports and boardroom conversations. But as AI reshapes how customer service is delivered, these measures are starting to look outdated.
Why? Because CX is no longer just about whether an issue has been resolved or how quickly. It’ s about the partnership between humans and AI and how this can now create a better relationship with the customer; an emotive one, driven by loyalty, empathy and long-term value. This not only places pressure on businesses to adapt, but employees must also upskill with
the ability to use emotion, AI and data to service modern customer needs.
The traditional measures still have their place, but they were designed for a different era. Customer Satisfaction can tell you where an interaction met expectations, but it doesn’ t typically measure why a customer felt satisfied and if they’ ll return. Net Promoter Score can capture brand affinity, but it misses nuance in a world where AI might resolve a problem quickly but fail to connect emotionally. Customer Effort Score shows how easy a process was, but‘ effort’ takes on a new meaning when AI automates tasks that once required patience and persistence.
The bigger issue is that too many businesses mistake these metrics as the source of truth for the success of their operations. They optimise for the score but not for the experiences and emotional relationships they’ re building for customers. In a world where CX is increasingly delivered by AI, that gap can widen.
The future of CV won’ t mean discarding CSAT, NPS and CES altogether, but layering them with new signals that better reflect customer emotion. Businesses will need to measure not just efficiency, but empathy: do customers feel understood, not just served?
As AI handles more routine queries, the role of the human agent is being redefined. The script-following agent of the past is giving way to professionals whose strength lies in empathy, creativity and strategic thinking. When an angry customer needs reassurance, or when a complex problem requires judgment, it will be the human touch that matters most.
New roles are also emerging. Those in customer services that really want to excel will also need to be become data analysts, making sense of AI data being logged from calls, chats and emails and training AI systems to become smarter and more responsive.
AI in customer service is not the end of the road for CX professionals – it’ s a turning point. The companies that thrive will be those that measure more intelligently, moving beyond blunt scores to capture empathy, trust and long-term value. And the professionals who succeed will be those who embrace AI as a partner rather than a rival, blending the best of human connection with the speed and scale of technology. x www. intelligentcxo. com
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