Mark Lowe is an expert in business risk and security. He is based in Genoa, Italy. Mark is a faculty Member of the ASERI Postgraduate School of Economics and International Relations at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan. He is also a columinst in the Italian financial journal Fondia & Sicav.

Risk and security are particularly important for CX executives. Who can forget how impossible it was to contact an airline as the Covid pandemic started? Companies managing customer data also have very detailed private data, including payment details - this has to be kept secure.

Over the past year or so there has been constant disruption. Politics, climate change, and unexpected events... how do companies focused on CX manage risk and security?

Peter Ryan called Mark at his base in Italy to talk about this in our final interview on CX Files this year...

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lowemw/

Jose Paz is the founder and CEO of Startups BPO. He is based in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

Jose has been living and breathing BPO recruitment for many years. In this conversation with Peter Ryan he explores CX recruitment trends in Honduras and the wider nearshore US area.

What are agents expecting when they apply for CX jobs in the 2020s and what is the reality? How can modern CX brands be creating real careers in CX? How is skills-based hiring changing BPO and CX recruitment? How is AI changing the way that companies hire?

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jose-paz-8883b968/

https://www.startupshonduras.com/

Claas van Delden is the Chief Growth Officer at yoummday. He is based in Munich, Germany.

Yoummday is a proprietary technology platform for managing remote workforces - what we have summarized on this podcast in the past as 'Gig CX'. Yoummday has a diverse global talent pool of 15,000+ sales and customer care freelancers available.

Mark Hillary called Claas to talk about the issues around providing support to customers in multiple languages and whether the platform-based appproach is replacing the more traditional multilingual hubs used by BPO companies...

Claas talks about this specific question and outlines how Gig CX really works in this interview.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/claas-van-delden-b7b3b2/

https://www.yoummday.com/en

CX Report 2025: https://business.yoummday.com/en/yoummday-cx-report-2025

Ted Nardin is the VP of Customer Success & Value Add at Teleperformance Jamaica.

Ted has spent years researching CX. He recently joined Teleperformance and Mark saw a LinkedIn update with this new job title focusing on customer success and value add.

Mark called Ted to discuss this idea. How can BPOs put business success on the table and talk to clients about how to add value in the customer relationship - rather than the usual focus on the cost to serve customers?

What more can companies get from all those customer interactions?

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tnardin/

https://teleperformance.com/

John Dinardo is the CEO and president of Nordia, a Canadian CX specialist with over 10,000 employees on the team. Nordia is the largest BPO in Canada.

Peter Ryan and John are both based in Montreal, so this is a local Canadian edition.

Bell Canada created Nordia back in 1999, but a quarter of a century on they are now looking at many new opportuntiies and areas of business. John talked about expansion beyond Canada and also about the complexities of managing customer service processes in both English and French.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/john-dinardo-nordia/

https://www.fr.nordia.ca/

Vidya Ravichandran is the CEO of UnifyCX. She is based in Louisville, Kentucky, USA.

In this conversation with Peter Ryan, Vidya talks about the evolution of GlowTouch Technologies into UnifyCX, how technology is changing the BPO industry, and how CX and BPO is evolving as technology solutions become more integral to customer interactions.

As customers demand more complex solutions the BPO community is adopting or building different tech solutions - using AI in particular. But should BPOs buy off-the-shelf tools or create their own and attempt to lead their sector? In this conversation Vidya talks about how BPO is evolving and how the new brand wants to be seen as a CX leader.

https://www.linkedin.com/in/vidya-ravichandran-53423b2/

https://www.unifycx.com/

The new (July 2024) UK government just announced their budget plans for the year ahead. Several measures look like they could impact the BPO and CX industries. In this special extra edition of the CX Files, Peter Ryan called a few UK-based friends of the podcast to ask for their views on the challenges and opportunities they can see in the latest UK budget...

Featuring a discussion with...

Alistair Niederer, CEO, NeedleRock

https://www.linkedin.com/in/aniederer/

http://www.needlerock.net/

Lian Rowlands, Principal Consultant, Tayma Solutions

https://www.linkedin.com/in/lian-rowlands-a26119/

David Rumble, Managing Partner, On Consultancy

https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-rumble-4a4a09b/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/on-consultancy/

Tanya Scotece is also known as 'Dr T.' She is a Professor and Program Coordinator at Miami Dade College focused on funeral service education. Tanya is also a senior placement specialist with Sunshine Senior Placement, helping familes find an assisted living facility for their loved ones.

Tanya is a licensed funeral director and has direct experience managing a funeral home and crematorium.

The funeral and mortuary environment in the US is heavily regulated and people working in this field need to understand that end of life and funeral care is an environment where a very special level of care is required.

Peter called Tanya to ask about this fascinating area of customer care that is often not discussed because so many people prefer to avoid end of life conversations.

https://www.mdc.edu/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tanya-scotece-ph-d-lfd-cfsp-%E2%80%9Cdr-t%E2%80%9D-a85a6226/