Rick Denton: 0:05

You're listening to CX Passport, the show about creating great customer experiences with a dash of travel talk. Each episode wel talk with our guests about grea CX, travel...and just like he best journeys, explore ew directions we never anticipat d. I'm your host Rick Denton. I elieve the best meals are served outside and require a pa sport. Let's get Today's guest Stephen Grygar comes from an iconic American brand Greyhound. When I was first introduced to Stephen, my mind filled with images from movies and songs about stepping on or off that Greyhound bus, that moment in movies, but also in real life swells with emotion, and usually marks a key moment of transition, of connection of growth of adventure. Talk about an experience delivering those experiences in the real world requires a similar emotional involvement, but also requires business intelligence process data, and a desire to put the customer at the center of decisions. That's why I'm so excited to talk with Stephen today to learn about his cx approach. And you know, we'll hear about his travel experiences too. Steven, welcome to cx passport.

Stephen Grygar: 1:19

Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.

Rick Denton: 1:21

Stephen, you've told me before that great cx comes down to the basics. Now it's a phrase we hear often. But what does that mean to you?

Stephen Grygar: 1:30

To me, the basics are reason simplicity. And a lot of times it starts with your corporate strategy. I think a lot of times a CX, and as professionals, you know, we kind of, we kind of leave the corporate strategy to somebody else, right, that's somebody else's job. But the reality is, if there's not a comprehensive end to end kind of KPI structure in place at the corporate strategy level, a lot of times your cx and dx will be worse off, you know. So for example, you're trying to sell a product, right, and you're pouring more money into marketing to boost sales or automation to reduce cost, but not enough r&d and you're falling behind, eventually, that's going to catch up to your CX is going to hurt your he acts and the whole thing will kind of spiral from there. And so not that it's easy for us as cx cx professionals to really point out holes in some KPI layers, but I think it's something that's very necessary, because we see it from the customer's perspective. And we can see those things coming. And so kind of leaning into that a little bit to ensure that there's a strong KPI set is really critical. And then from there, it's about really simplifying the business. I think a lot of times, we try to overcomplicate things that are actually more simple than they should be. And I learned once that one of my stops along the road, that they said every month, we'll do 123 things really, really well. And so they shrunk it from 10. So the entire organization planned out and did one to three things a month. And really acceleration that we saw there was phenomenal. It really, it actually boosted EAX more in which they actually in turn into even more sales. And so, you know, that was one of the key things. But I think the catch of that, though, is a lot of times we try to focus on those 123 things. And I've talked about this before my industry professionals, and it seems to be kind of universal, is those 123 things are often kind of sales focused. And sometimes they also include exceptions. And so the next thing you know is by the end of the year, you have 12 new exceptions, or rotating exceptions, and you're confusing your workforce. And what's important now they have to learn the ins and outs of all the things you've developed, versus having a simple to execute product that then gives your employees the space to have personal, empathetic, you know, conversations with the customers and be present. It's like when you go to the coffee shop, do you just wanted to say what you'd like to drink, bring it go? Or do you like it when they asked you kind of a fun question or make a remark or recommend something you haven't tried before. It's that little bit of extra time. But if that person feels rushed or confused or bogged down, they won't spend that time. And so, you know, how do we incorporate from a strategic planning perspective? How do we even back it out a little bit in say, hey, sometimes those 123 things need to include a CFCs initiative, because we know that if we can deliver the product better than this sales will multiply from there.

Rick Denton: 4:26

There's a there's so much there that I really like the the idea of simplifying it for the employee in order to make it to create the space for them. I like to create the space for them to be able to deliver a better experience a better service, whatever that looks like in that moment. I think it's so important and you've seen this at companies complexity is very rarely complexity is a choice. Oftentimes complexity is just the long term building of wise choices along the way. That just stack into a suite of complexity, that suddenly the employee is burdened under this set of expectations or rules or guidelines or the challenges that they need to face in the day just because individual decisions over time added up. I'm curious when you talk about one to three things per month or per period of time, is there, how do you keep that sustained going forward? So if it's something particularly valuable that you're measuring and focusing on that month? Is there a risk that then the next month that is forgotten? And then how do you mitigate that risk of keeping the, you know, attention or whatever thing you were hoping to achieve with focusing on that sustained going forward?

Stephen Grygar: 5:45

But it's a fantastic question. I think that's one that we could say just I think everybody continues to struggle with along the way. And so I think, for me, the way I think about this is yes, it actually is very hard to maintain it. And there's different practices out there, right, you hear a lot of, you know, put yourself in the customers shoes and send them out to do interviews, I actually think that works really well, because it makes it personal, not only to the frontline employee, but all the way up through the top. And so once you make a personal connection on something, I think people are more likely to stick with it. But I actually have a little bit of a different twist on that, too. I was lucky enough in my career, to spend a couple of years working for a technology consulting firm. And so within that I was more on the strategy side, but definitely involved in some development Burke. And within that, one of the things that's kind of been open to my eyes that have been starting to run my team this way actually hit Greyhound as well is software development used to be these huge monolithic systems that you just kept putting duct tape and baling wire around, and trying to keep them going for the assumptions in the new process, right. But the new way of thinking you think of things in a software world is to break them down into components, right, it's just set them up into things that can be easily unplugged to replug in because people change, competition changes, customer expectations change. And we need to be able to create a process where we're able to kind of take something that's existing and then update that and put it back in versus saying it versus kind of one opting ourselves randomly throughout the process. And so for me, it's kind of taking that same kind of Agile component based methodology that software is doing and finding a way to try to fit that more into the CX x world. Yeah, it really tried to drive home a Hey, we're gonna create a very simple process for you and this month we're updating it in this way but then trying to retrain and continue to emphasize just simplicity of the actual throughput to again ultimately if we can try about the complexity make that room for that personal touch which is ultimately the winning the winning formula

Rick Denton: 7:55

Yeah, so again, the theme that of simplicity right even even as you might change the focus to the next month how do we keep it simple that it's sort of an additive that agile idea and that approach hits hits my head and in a good way I like like what you're saying there that you're sort of building on your minimum viable product you're adding to it as you go along. You've said something to me that that caught my ears in an interesting way earlier and it was you talked about matching hurry with Hurry and then how that affects customer experience especially expectations. It that's a new kind of thought for me I'd love to you to explore that a little bit help me understand what did you mean by matching hurry with Hurry and how that affects cx?

Stephen Grygar: 8:40

Yeah, I think it's, it's well documented in a lot of circles, where we talk about the Amazon effect, or the Uber effect, or the McDonald's effect, right? It's the I want something now and it's ever increasingly faster, right? I can read something online and it's here within 45 minutes, it seems these days. And so you know, I think what happens though in a lot of industries is that's not true across every industry. And maybe it shouldn't be the customer expectations across every industry. But I think it's created this atmosphere that every company needs to digitize and automate their way into being as fast as possible and as quick convenient as possible into what they're trying to do. And in my in my way, I've actually had very interesting conversation for people across broad kind of demographic age ranges, things like that. And a lot of people are like what's happening to the personalized world? Right You know, marketing talks a lot about these days about one to one personalization, but I feel like in some ways from a customer service and an operational way we're trying to automate our way or hurry our way to match the hurry of the customer. And so you know, I think to me It also just because you know, briefly back to just where our society is kind of going as itself right into you know, I read a really I picked up a book by a guy named john McEnroe called the ruthless the elimination of hurry in that he cites a Harvard Business study that said, Hey, you know, you know, in the past, you know, wealth used to be marked by leisure. And now wealth is marked by buisiness. In so in so many ways, I find it in myself, right? It's this rush to get things done to get through the line of fastest to buy the product to get home, do whatever I need to do doo doo doo doo. In the hard part, those thing, companies are seeing our society go that way. And they're saying, Yes, I want to fulfill as fast as possible. But I'm wondering if eventually somebody's going to break out and realize that it's the personal touch, it's enjoying the ride. And I think in a lot of ways, the travel industry, it'd be beautiful to see us start to kind of more head in that direction of not matching hurry with hurry. Because the thing I think I hear the most, so it makes me sad, and I do it myself is how many people to hear, say, Hey, I just got back home from vacation. I need a vacation from my vacation.

Rick Denton: 11:03

Oh, yeah, no, I definitely have said that. And heard it and said it and felt it. Sure.

Stephen Grygar: 11:09

Yeah. So I mean, for me, it's it's a lot about that, you know, especially in a transportation travel industry, but I think it's I think it's relevant across many, how do we get to that to that place, right. And I know it's, quote, more expensive, a lot of times right to have more personal touch. But again, I think if you think through the journey, and think strategically, a certain point in the journey to emphasize that personalization, and just empathetic touch, and help our customers, our passengers, slow down and enjoy the ride, I think will be a better brand for it. Yeah,

Rick Denton: 11:41

there's something there. There's something really interesting there in that there. There are times where no, I need my Hurry, I need to get to whatever destination it is. But I can think of so I recently My son is a rising sophomore at Arizona State. And he and I have had the opportunity to drive back and forth from Tempe, where it's located. And sure we fly we actually had to drive to take stuff, right? That's a kind of a normal thing. But it was sort of enjoyable to take those 15 hours we did actually we stopped off into the Petrified Forest we we had different adventures along the way. And even in that passage of time, he was we did this thing where he played an album of his music. And then I played an album of my music, we got to learn each other's music better. And so that that journey, that pacing, that lack of hurry allowed us to explore things that we hadn't really explored before. And I'll be interested to see how travel industries travel providers find that balance between those who need to hurry. No, I have to get to this meeting in Houston. And so by golly, that bus better arrive on time, versus No, I'm here for the journey. And how can we we make that happen. And I it, as you mentioned, it kind of all goes down to those customer experiences and the customer expectations of those experiences.

Stephen Grygar: 12:57

And as they get to that point, I think we'll always have to, you know, especially in transportation being on time is by far right, being safe. And being on time is one too, right? And the customer expectation. And so I wouldn't advocate saying, Hey, you know what, we're going to give ourselves some leeway. And I know that's not what you meant. But I think it's more about how do we help somebody when they're on board? relax a little more. Yeah, right, or whatever it is. And it's funny, because I think a lot of times, it's like, we'll give them onboard entertainment, and that's what they want. But sometimes I wonder to your point, if we'd be better off if we just had no entertainment, and we are so stuck to each other. Now, I can't advocate that. No, I'm not advocating for that as a brand. But because but all that to say I think there's definitely points within the customer journey that I haven't we haven't quite figured it out yet. But that's one of the things I want to be looking at going forward. Right is, you know, maybe it's just while you're on a layover, right, or a connection, right? Yeah, who knows, whatever it is, we're going to try to find ways, at least my personal goal is this is not a company project by any means at this point, right? But it's to look for ways to just help our customers just enjoy the ride.

Rick Denton: 14:07

Well, let's talk about that a bit. You've had travels you've had ride. So let's talk about your travels a little bit. You said something insightful to me earlier. And it was the quote, travel is all about Same, same different. unpack that for me.

Stephen Grygar: 14:23

Yeah, so I was backpacking in Thailand. And so I worked for an airline and I know a lot of people on your podcast have talked about the joys of staying by travel and I was one of those lucky individuals. And so I spent a little time in Thailand and you go to the markets and you see shirts with same same but different kind of plaster all over them. Admittedly, over time, I've kind of forgotten what the original use was. So I had to look it up. And why Google said it's, you know, when you get to the market, some of the knockoff goods are only as good as the real one. So it's Same, same but different. I don't know if that's the origin. who really knows but the interesting part for me is what I found I love taking pictures like most people, I thought I was better at it than I am. Because they're not great now that I look back, but I used to have them all over my wall in my apartment. And everyone, everyone smile, I'd have a friend come in, and I'd say, Hey, where do you think that pictures from? into, you know, most of the time, and I think a lot of times because we're almost a US centric and thought they would say if it's Australia, and it's the rocks, they would say, Utah, or if it's the beach, they'd say, Florida, right? And so I started to kind of get to this, you know, golly, a lot of the world is kind of the same, but very different. And then Frankly, I started kind of connected over time, right? And so not to get too nerdy, but, you know, in a way or you know, DNA is 99.9%, the same, right, right. You know, in for me, you know, as a religious man, I also believe that we're all made in the image of God. And so, you know, I kind of carry that forward, which says, Hey, we're all made the same, but it's that little bit of difference that makes us truly unique. And for me, that's beautiful. Yeah. And getting to know that and to celebrate other people and their cultures is why I think we all like to travel, right? I love going to dinner and meeting people from different backgrounds who think remarkably different than I do. And just knowing their story into this, the beauty of our differences to me, you know, I think across just how the earth was made, but also who we are, we are so much the same. And I don't think our differences by any means are bad, what makes the world beautiful.

Rick Denton: 16:37

What a great sentiment, Steven, I'm really appreciated that so. But with those travels with all the same, same difference, sometimes it's nice to be able to relax a little bit. So why don't you join me a little change of pace here. Let's join me in the first class lounge. We will move quickly here and hopefully have some fun. What is a dream travel location from your past?

Stephen Grygar: 16:57

Yeah, so my brother and I were backpacking adventures that we went to Australia. And we were there we always skipped and say from one big thing. And our one big thing this time is we took a boat, or a sailboat out to the woods Sunday beach. In this beach there I can't even describe it. The sand is 98% silicone, which I think it's the only place in the world, it's even close to that percentage, which essentially means it feels like flour. Oh, wow. Like literally flour going through your hands. And it's so special in turquoise. And of course you take the boat out and we slept on the deck under the stars. And it was one of those things that I always said, if we're ever family. I want to take my family here one day. And so I hope I get to do that. No, that sounds

Rick Denton: 17:39

delightful. I really enjoyed that. So with that when in your past what is a dream travel location you've not been to yet.

Stephen Grygar: 17:47

So I think you're gonna pick up on a theme. I love a good beach. And so for me, I haven't been yet to Greece or Croatia. So that reason to me What a beautiful mixture of history in nature. And so I'm so excited to get there one day

Rick Denton: 18:03

Nice. Nice. Yeah, that'll be a good destination. I need to hit that one too. I'm looking forward to it. So what is a favorite thing to eat?

Stephen Grygar: 18:13

So I'm not sure about this. I was born and raised a Texan and so brisket and Tex Mex are my perfect place and so the mixture of those things are called fajitas and so I can eat those almost every day.

Rick Denton: 18:28

We should never record a podcast that discusses food around lunchtime because now that I mean I'm visualizing a good plate of fajitas Alright, well it here this will this will help us what is the thing your parents forced you to eat but you hate it as a kid?

Stephen Grygar: 18:41

Yeah, so my dad was actually a nighttime pharmacist, I like a 24 hour grocery store calm and so we have quite a bit of time on his hand into very often. I feel like almost every day he'd come home with some kind of produce fruit vegetable from that we've never tried before. So I think I've tried everything they've ever put in a grocery store. If for some reason the one that sticks out to me is Kiwi. It just never suited me.

Rick Denton: 19:07

Well, I know that that's one that so my dad It was a favorite of his. But similar I have kind of a love hate relationship with it. I'll enjoy it sometimes. But then, and I can imagine as a kid, it's particularly an odd fruit for sure. So what is one travel item you will not leave home without?

Stephen Grygar: 19:28

Yeah, this question made me laugh when I was thinking about it. So back in the day, I used to use every always have a downloaded version of Google Maps with the stars pre populated, because when I travel, all the data was expensive and I wanted to be prepared. But those days are long gone. So now I guess I would just say my headphones because you know now maybe a little older. I get a little bit of motion sickness actually when flying and so this can help calm me down.

Rick Denton: 20:00

Some recent guests of cx passport also came from the travel industry. And I'd encourage folks to check out Misty in Episode 14 Lorena, in Episode 17. And both spoke of that unique effort associated with driving cx across the multiple divisions, the orgs, both inside of the company and outside of the company, there's just something particularly unique to travel, how it has so many moving parts? How are you driving that unified customer understanding, and then action, the important part across your organization?

Stephen Grygar: 20:33

Yeah, I think I'm very much a KPI driven individual. And so I believe, as I kind of talked about earlier, if you have the right metrics, and you cascade those down, right, it gives everybody kind of their piece of the overall puzzle. And so for me, it's about really unearthing a lot of those really key insights to help kind of people focus into me and doing that, and piecing that together and showing you in most houses, statistically, it impacts your customer experience, complete experience scores, that then creates more of a pull from the organization, it's no longer Hey, you and your job need to figure out how to help the customer be happier, I'm gonna push these, you know, frameworks on you to do it, it's more of a, hey, I found a couple of ways a couple of insights that can help you and your department perform better, and hopefully, you know, actually, and yes, impact the customer experience at the same time. And so for me, it's about kind of that pull, not push in that it's creating almost like a shared service model. Right? My team is almost like a finance organization, I'm here to kind of help everybody do their best to to help our customers really just enjoy our product.

Rick Denton: 21:48

Do you find so that makes a ton of sense, right? You have the KPIs, it shows a direct linkage. So I've got this number, if I make this change that changes that number in this way, and thus it affects the customer experience in that way. Do you find that you're having to balance though that numeric side? So the quantitative I always get this backwards? The quantitative side of it? How are you bringing the qualitative, the emotional side of it into these this influence that you drive to improve customer experience across the organization?

Stephen Grygar: 22:18

Yeah, I think it all just comes down to storytelling, right? It's the age old way. And so nothing really too special there. And I think different. It's interesting. Throughout my career, I've seen that different organizations have a different level of storytelling, right? Some organizations almost completely communicate in stories, and others communicate in process that you have to then try to add a story to, right. And so sometimes that's a unique challenge, depending on kind of what your company really emphasizes going forward. But I think, you know, for cx dx, just the obvious answer for us just always trying to bring in those personal stories. And then as I said earlier, trying to connect your people to actual customers, right? Because that actually submits that insight.

Rick Denton: 23:03

That makes certainly makes a lot of sense. And it's it's come up before in podcasts. And I think it's just because there's such a truism that the, the more you can get the actual customer interacting with the actual employee, whether it's happening in the in the moment, or even if it's asynchronous, through storytelling, or listening, somehow being able to bring the customer into that. And I think that it's what's triggering this next. We talked about hurry earlier that hurry conversation about that. And I know that a lot of companies address that through digital solutions. But just like we're talking here about how do we have storytelling and those kind of things. So with travel being so personal and such a human experience? How do you keep that humanity in place when you're using or exploring or bringing new digital solutions to bear?

Stephen Grygar: 23:51

Yeah, that's a great question. I think it's something that everybody really struggles with. And as we think about digitization, you know, to me, the best practices are definitely automate automation for customer service. It's about the flexion and moving things to online portals. And that's just a reality of where the industry in the world is going in business. And frankly, I've talked to enough customers that they wish they could just call somebody and talk to somebody, right. And so I think, you know, we'll see over time how that all plays out. But I think at the time being, you know, in this kind of current environment where cost is so key, especially for the travel industry, I think it's just about being authentic in those channels. Okay, right into it's about how we set up the deflection portals or how we do talk to people when we respond to them via chat or email or even on the phone. And then really, it's about how we talk to our own employees. You know, as I said earlier, I don't think that digitization is harmful or bad. I think we just need to choose our spots to be personal and so if you can Take a deconstruct your entire customer journey and pick the most impactful spots to have that personal touch and you win those moments. That's what the customer has got to remember in the end.

Rick Denton: 25:10

Yeah, and there's times that we want that. As a customer, I, I appreciate it. I recently did a chat interaction with a financial services company. Now there was something particularly comical about it that I did share on LinkedIn. But the positive side of it was right up front, it said, you're chatting with the city bot. And it was nice to know that they're not hiding a trying to use some sort of natural language and make me think that it's a human, because we know it's not. And so I actually appreciated the honesty of saying this is the bot. And then when it was time for me to ask for an agent, then it was clear that I was being connected to human. So that honesty in the language with how the company treated me, I actually appreciated and there are times that I'm quite fine interacting in a digital solution. I mean, my goodness, my check in process for flights is almost 100%, or I prefer it to be 100%. Digital, and it has been that way. And it is delightful. So I like what you've said there about how bringing humanity into it in the language choices and how we just speak to both our customers and to our employees, influences how those digital solutions are felt as a the humanity of those digital solutions. So So Stephen, thinking about the digital solutions to humanity, and even our conversation about Hurry, in the in, even hurry earlier in the episode. How do you see being able to manage that digital, the humanity the Hurry, all in the vein of customer expectations, either for the future of Greyhound, or for the future of the travel industry, in general,

Stephen Grygar: 26:47

an experience I had a couple of days ago, I think really feeds into this. And so we went to our local big box retailer, and essentially they have a pickup you know, drive up two hours shorter, and they have it ready for you. And so this time, our store, frankly, is one of the fastest in the country, they're always running 45 minutes you drive up there waiting for you're on the corner, it is a fantastic experience. But this time, we really, really needed it. And so we've got a toddler, she needed something. And so, you know, we put the order in, we're waiting, we're waiting, you're checking every 10 minutes. And this time, it took two hours, hmm. And so then I drive up, I'm already kind of frustrated, they're not at the curb, like what is going on, and all sudden I'm frustrated. And the problem is, is that they promised, they promised me two hours. And they met that expectation, right? It's my own sense of hurry. It's my own sense, you know, of expectations that they reset in my own mind, but delivering so exceptionally for so long. That makes me feel like that. And the funny thing is, if they'd prompt me with a push, I might rate them poorly. And then that location gets dinged for meeting the standard. Right. And so I think that's one of those things that I watch in myself. And I wonder how that's gonna play out in across many industries, including travel, right, as you know, and it's something that you could try to measure, right? Not what do we promise but what are we consistently delivering the deviations against that and an advanced analytics kind of way and, and I think that's somewhere we should go. But I think ultimately for us, for me, at least is I'm gonna go back to what I said earlier for the transportation industry. It's how do we help our passengers enjoy the ride, you know, ultimately, we deliver a consistently good travel experience for people should relax. And then other times they're going on vacation, we want them to come back refreshed. And so I think if we can do that, that will set us apart as Greyhound. And I think you'll see many companies in the industry try to follow that lead.

Rick Denton: 28:52

But isn't that so true? how a company can reset our expectations and deliver on what they said they would deliver on and yet we're disappointed. And I think what you're saying about how to address that going forward and help folks enjoy the ride is so valuable. Steven, it's been really great talking with you. I've enjoyed this I've learned quite a bit. I like how we talked a lot about hurry. I didn't expect us to really talk about that. But I'm glad we spent some time talking about how hurry influences the customer's experience influences that and what a company does to address that hurry. The idea of Hey, enjoy the ride in the midst of that hurry find a way to take that out of their human their customer experience. I appreciated the conversation around talking about the basics of customer experience and certainly enjoyed hearing you describe your travel experiences because they have created some a little desire in me I'm looking forward to that flower base to sand in my hand and I think that would be an incredibly delightful beach to be a part of. So Steven, it has been wonderful talking with you. I thank you for being a guest here on six passport. I've enjoyed it thoroughly. And I wish you the best of the rest of your day. And thank you so much.

Stephen Grygar: 30:07

Yeah, thank you. This has been great.

Rick Denton: 30:12

Thanks for joining us this week on CX Passport. Make sure to visit our website cxpassport.com where you can hit subscribe so you'll never miss a show. While you're at it, you can check out the rest of the EX4CX website. If you're looking to get real about customer experience, EX4CX is available to help you increase revenue by starting to listen to your customers and create great experiences for every customer every time. Thanks for listening to CX Passport and be sure to tune in for our next episode. Until next time, I'm Rick Denton, and I believe the best meals are served outside and require a passport.