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Pat:
We've profiled various companys' approaches to CX and some for EX, but how does employee experience work for one of the "happiest places on Earth?"

Francesca:
I thought that it would be interesting to see how any small or medium company could implement their way of working, making their own environment Disney-like without having a big budget.

Pat:
An inside look at the employee experience at a Disney theme park and how you can adapt some of its principles on this episode of The CX Leader Podcast.

Announcer:
The CX Leader Podcast with Steve Walker is produced by Walker, an experience management firm that helps our clients accelerate their XM success. You can find out more at Walkerinfo.com.

Pat:
Hello, everyone. I'm Pat Gibbons. I'm the guest host today of The CX Leader Podcast and thank you for listening. On The CX Leader Podcast we explore topics and themes to help leaders like you leverage all the benefits of customer experience and help your customers and prospects want to do more business with you. I'm sure many of our listeners at one point in time have experienced a visit to a theme park. But let's be honest, the theme park experience is provided by the Walt Disney Company are arguably some of the best. But it's not easy creating the magical world that guests have come to enjoy and making certain your employees or in this case, "cast members" provide that magical experience. All this means that it's essential that the employees experience is a high priority. My guest on the podcast today is Francesca Tempestini, a former cast member at Disneyland Paris, and one of the contributing authors of a new book, "Customer Experience 3," which features 28 international customer experience professionals sharing their current best-thinking, strategies, and insights for achieving impact and visibility using world class best practice CX principles. Francesca, thanks for being on The CX Leader Podcast.

Francesca:
Hello Patrick. Thank you for having me.

Pat:
Well, it's wonderful to have you and we were talking beforehand. I believe you are the first guest that we have had call in from Italy.

Francesca:
Yay!

Pat:
Yay! All right. [Laughing] Well, you know, I noticed in the book that one of the descriptions, and I'll quote it here, that you are an enthusiastic disseminator of the Disney approach and a customer experience lover. OK, with that statement, you got to give us a little background. Tell us about a little of your career and how do you arrive to be both an enthusiastic disseminator of the Disney approach and a customer experience lover?

Francesca:
Absolutely. But first, let me correct you: that book, it's made by 27 professionals and one lover, which is me. [laughing]

Pat:
Ah, OK, I stand corrected.

Francesca:
Well, the Disney approach? As a cast member, of course, I was born let's say my Disney career was born with those principles in my blood, meaning that whenever any cast member in the world goes and starts his career at the Disney company, he starts with the tradition, which is a two day training in which they are all the principles of the company and the expectation are presented to the future cast member. So those includes as well some behaviors that say not only behaviors with customers, but behaviors with the theme as well. So expectation of what any employee has to produce, let's say, with the teammates. So that came very normal to me, very natural because I was actually brought to live in that way. And at the same time, and since these principles are normal, that's the really coincides with my thinking. I found them very useful in a way. And so I let's say that I approach the Disney approach without even knowing that it was a specific approach. To me, it was a normal way of working something that you would find anywhere in any company in the world, which is not a case.

Pat:
You do realize that's not always the case, right?

Francesca:
Yes, I realize that later when I left the company and I stepped into the muggle world and I start having other kinds of jobs and I still say, OK, no, this is not like Disney. No, this is not like Disney. And at first I thought I was just complaining too much and I said, OK, yeah, you cannot compare everything to Disney. That's something different. That's entertainment. That's another world. And as well, my people I talk to my employee, employers were telling me the same. This is not Disney. This is not Kansas anymore. You're not in Kansas anymore. So…

Pat:
Spoken like a true Italian, right? [laughing].

Francesca:
You know that that was "Wizard of Oz", of course. And so I. I thought that the two things were different, that you had the Disney way of working at Disney approach and then you had a normal life way of working. And many years later, because I have been on ten years and this Disney World, many years later, I encountered customer experience and I saw that many of the principals, especially going toward employee experiences, coincide with the Disney approach to work. So I lighten up, OK? And I started to be enthusiastic again because I thought that it was fantastic, that I was not crazy, that I could actually see some Disney pieces in my everyday life. And I actually wanted to bring that side of magical side in my work. And when I saw that that this was possible and other companies were applying, I was I thought that it would be interesting to see how any small or medium company could implement their way of working, making their own environment Disney-like without having a big budget, which is I think it's one of the big issues, normally. If you want to have compare your job with Apple or Zappos or Disney, the first thing that an employer thinks is OK, budget difference in the budget. So I thought I saw that. No, it's not. That's not everything that takes. You have some other things that you can actually start doing when you want to make a change.

Pat:
Yeah, well, so let me kind of go back and hit a couple of things. One, a clarification just for some. Most people probably know this, but when you say you were a cast member at Disney, some may say, oh, well, what character did you play? But that's not what a cast member is, right?

Francesca:
I'm a princess, but that's in my everyday life. [laughing] No, no, no. I actually I did many things in my five years there. And that said that most of the time I spend it in guest relations and guest care and guest service. So three departments which are all related to taking care of the customers. Of course, every job in Disney has as a pinpoint, taking care of the customer, any job, even backstage, even in the offices where customers are not face to face with you, but in those departments in which I worked, I actually faced them and they came to me whenever they had a problem or whenever they were happy about something or whenever they wanted me to help them figure something out. Like from the most common thing, I have an allergy and I don't know what I can go eat or it's raining cats and dogs. And that's very strange. And Paris, isn't it? It's raining cats and dogs. And what kind of overrides can I do? Or even more serious matters. So that was my activity there.

Pat:
Yeah. Yeah. So cast members are what Disney refers to as their employees.

Francesca:
Correct. Yes. Yes. I'm sorry I talk too much, but yes, basically.

Pat:
No, no, no. That's that's all good. That's that's what I wanted to know. So obviously, you know, you contributed to a book on customer experience and this is The CX Leader Podcast. But really, a lot of your passion is around employee experience. Obviously, they're connected. How are they connected for you? How did you kind of come around to that to see, you know, how vital it is that employee experience is such a big part of customer experience?

Francesca:
Well, employees are part of the equation of a business success. You cannot have a business flourish without taking employees into consideration. And this doesn't mean that you have to pay them more. It's not all about money. It's a question of considering them part of the equilibrium that you have to have when you take any decision in into account. So what I saw is that any company that will happen in the past with what was that product was the first element of the marketing that was considered whenever you had a discussion about a decision to take in a business. And often the human factor, the employee factor was not really in the picture. This is something that with times in the states has happened before that in Italy, with times this way of thinking came to change and now it's more evident than ever because maybe it's a lot easier to want to to realize that most of the companies that work and which I do not consider employees in the first place, face some limitation, because what will happen is that the person that takes care of your customers is the employee. Without a customer, you don't have any business. So if you if your employees are not only with you on the same page on the your values and present company in the proper way to the customer, you have a problem basically. So you better face it.

Pat:
And I like your your thought about kind of this evolution from a product-minded kind of product-centric company to customer and employee and so forth. Because, you know, we've also done some research on that. And we've found that, you know, the products are things that can be duplicated pretty quickly and all that. But if you create a really incredible customer experience that's hard to duplicate and that gives you an edge for your competitors. But then it's pretty easy then to make the connection to say, well, we can't create that unless we have a great employee experience. And it sounds like certainly you've you found that to be true?

Francesca:
Yes, absolutely, of course, then probably this will be different according to the size of the company and the product. In my own company – well, it's on my own – in the company where I'm working at moment, which which is a small company, I see this very often because my my actual role is I am an export manager. So I work in CX undercover because I'm trying to introduce CX an employee, ex-students elements in my company without having that as a role. OK, and what happened is that being an export manager, I am I do talk with clients. I do talk to distributors and to agents and to final customers a lot and to installers and features. And I see it happen to me. The many came back after some years saying, you know, I like your product. It's very nice. Yes. So I would try to switch and try something else. And I'm coming back to you because you helped me solve that problem or because we had a connection. Because I remember you. Because in that particular moment you were there. And even if it was seven o'clock in the morning, my life experience, I mean, many people come back to us because they remember us and not not really the brand, not the product. And the can actually overview. And if the product is a little bit more expensive rather than another or a little bit less performing as well. But if they know that they can rely on you, they like that. And we are all customers today. We are. We are everywhere. We do buy things right. We do know that unless it's something that you buy at the supermarket and you go away, but if it's something that you keep buying again and again or you if you have to give your own advice to someone, you will take into consideration how you were treated, not only when everything was OK, but when you had the problem.

Pat:
Absolutely. No, I mean, customers today are much more discerning and they will look at the entire experience, you know, not just the product and how it works and all that. If if there are two products and they like the way somebody treats them better or they like what they stand for or, you know, there's lots of things that go into customer decisions today.

Pat:
You know, I think I also read that your experience as an employee coming on to Disney, that all along the way there were, you know, things that they just did differently. You know, they're on board. Maybe you can talk a little bit about those things and maybe how that's influenced you and some of your other roles.

Francesca:
Yes. Well, the very first job that I got after Disney, which was not my actual one. So it's a disclaimer if anyone from a company is listening. I'm not talking about you guys. Well, the first job was the last very much with me because my introduction was, hello, everyone. Three people. This is Francesca. This is going to be her desk. And she's going to take care of customers over the phone and say hello. And everyone said hello.

Pat:
What a nice, warm welcome.

Francesca:
So it was it felt a little bit weird. And then, of course, then you start adding all the other elements, like even not nice walls or not neat floors and but or even more consistent problems, like I was answering the phone for this transport company, which was it was a bus service. And they have busses everywhere in Italy. And I had to take calls from places I didn't even know existed. So I had to come to advise people on what bus to take. And I had no idea which region we were talking about. So. And I felt bad asking my clients, OK, but my clients were people over the phone. Where are you actually calling from? Because they were expecting me to know. And I was frustrated because I didn't have any map around me. So it was very strange. And so, of course, my first thought, OK, was in Disney, this would never happen because I've been in many different departments there. Sometimes I will be gone just for one day to help them out in a day in which they had a lot of they knew they had a lot of people or less personnel. And every time it started with the introduction of the most important things I had to know about that place. Who are you going to work with? What do we do here? How do we do it? If you have a problem, to whom do you have to talk to? Basic things important, because sometimes I worked in places for like five hours and the person that comes to you will pretend from you will expect from you the same information and the same quality of information than anyone else. And sometimes if you are there, it's because they don't have any choice. So there's no one else to us to. So you better know.

Pat:
Yeah, well, and I assume that that, you know, when you are prepared, when the rules are laid out, when the information is complete, it just gives you a certain level of confidence which that comes through to the customer, right?

Francesca:
Yes, absolutely. And it reflects because if imagine I was in this restaurant helping for one day and it was a very busy morning with breakfast. And people would ask me all kind of questions and I had no one to turn it if every time I had to stop and go looking for someone. Because one of the golden rule is Disney is always give an answer to the person. If I had to stop and go looking for someone, that would take forever. So it was in my manager interest to spend 10 minutes of his time that morning and tell me everything. And coming back to your question, what was the difference? Well, it was the main difference. Just not giving the employees the tools to work, giving the tools. It sounds something ridiculously obvious, but it's not. Apparently it's not. It happens often that someone comes to work and a new person and for some reason sometimes is rivalry. So others don't share information or that's just because it happened with them, with this employee before. So they think it's normal, that that's the normal way of of proceeding. There might be many factors in all of them go back to company culture. It is something very easy to do that's, well, easy if you have the mind that you want to do it. Otherwise, it's not easy if you decide that you want to work in a proper way for your own benefit. I'm talking as a manager. You will, you have to decide, as you said, which rules you want your employees to follow, which examples you have to get. Give them the tools, but you have to talk. They do not read your mind, so all of these pieces of information have to be clear and they have to have a person to whom they can ask the missing information because they're going to be many, of course. Yeah. So, yeah, yeah. Those are the the first basic steps.

Pat:
Yeah. And, you know, I noticed you made a comment earlier that I appreciated that you don't have to be a big, huge company to be able to do this. And I will admit, I'm one of those skeptics when I see all the same companies, you know, Southwest Airlines and Zappos and Amazon as the examples. You know, sometimes you feel like, well, my company can't can't do that. But I think it sounds like you have some thoughts on the little things that make a big difference that any company can put into place.

Francesca:
Yes, this is exactly what I noticed. And I actually kept note of them over the years. So as a way of having fun and sometimes to think about the good old days at Disney, but I didn't know that one day those notes would come useful to me and here they are. So, yes, the small things, even introducing a person to the the other people you happened. Yes. And as I look at this time, it happens in the current place in which I'm working. So I have to be fair, not everything it's always being everywhere. So it happened that I walked in the break room one day and I saw talking to a person sitting there and I said, OK, who do you have to visit? Who with whom do you have an appointment? No, I worked here. What? Yes, of course. Ever since. Well, has been six months. What? Yeah. We are a small company. We are not. We just happened to be working on on another floor. But it's not a I mean, it's two floors me on the floors of a building. So that kind of thing now cannot at first of all, because what he was doing was actually something I could have used his skills and capability and the same way around. So not knowing that that person was there was awkward for both of us. And there was actually a lack of, let's say, of he was not being useful at the end top potential that he had and me and the same way he didn't know that for anything that was related to to the French market, to the free market, it was me. And how could you not work in a company, not even knowing what your few colleagues are doing?

Pat:
Right. Right. It's you're right. It comes down to some of the basics. And, you know, that involves onboarding and everything after that. So, Francheska, it sounds like, you know, one of the things that you have found that is really important is mapping the journey of the employee. Maybe you can talk a little bit about that.

Francesca:
You have to consider your employees as your first customers and what you will do for a customer will be journey mapping. So if you want to improve in your customer experience route, so you will have to consider the the all the touch points that you have. And Disney does that very well. I remember very well the welcome letter they sent me before I even signed the contract and which was the very first pick last point and even the last one left after I left. So journey mapping with employees is the same. You have to you have you better listen to what is their journey with you because you want your place to be desirable. You can hire high if you are able as a company to to have people be willing to come work with you. So it is the other way around. If you go, it's like in a courtship away. So if they are both if it's a relation, I mean it's a business relation, but it's still a relation and we are human. So everything works in the same way if you want. So you have to have the other willing to be with you. And that's the same thing for an employee. So you better state what you are and what you can do for the employee. And if you want to attract people. Again, it doesn't have to be big numbers that big salary or but just be friendly. That will be a nice start, a friendly place to work. It's already a nice place to work. And then from there to go to great place to work. Of course, you will have to to work on your way. And but considering the pain points of of the employees and working on them and the touch points and listening to their to what they have to say to making sure they have the possibility to talk to you but not talk to the wall, you will it should make them feel considered. The nice thing is if you have a place in which you can actually throw those ideas and then you have your people able to extrapolate something nice out of it, well, that's a friendly place at work and that's a place that could actually be a great place to work.

Pat:
Well, we have come to that point in the program where we ask for what we call take home value. It's the one tip that you've got that people can turn around and hopefully use in their business today, tomorrow, right away. In other words. So, Francesca, what is your take home value tip?

Francesca:
Well, I think that it's very important for the customer experience people when they are dealing with employees to keep to help them sparkle. If that person has been hired, someone has seen something in him or her, which might have been a way with time, you have to help that sparkle to come back. And that's for your own benefit. Since you're paying him.

Pat:
That's great. Help that person sparkle. That's that's definitely something that sticks with you. And I hope it sticks with all our listeners as well. Francesca Tempestini is a contributing author for the new book "Customer Experience 3." You can find it on Amazon and other major book retailers, and we'll have a link to it on our website, cxleaderpodcast.com. It's a great read with wonderful advice from CX pros. I highly recommend you check it out. So, Francesca, thanks again for being a guest on The CX Leader Podcast.

Francesca:
It's been an honor and thank you for having me, Patrick.

Pat:
And if people want to continue the conversation, I know they can find you on LinkedIn and they can send your message that way.

Francesca:
Absolutely. I accept everyone and I like to engage conversation with everyone. So if you write to me, be sure that I will talk to you.

Pat:
I am not surprised at all about that. You've been a wonderful guest and I love the energy that you approach your work and your passions. If you want to talk about anything you've heard on this podcast or how Walker can help you in your customer experience programs, feel free to email us at podcast@walkerinfo.com and be sure to check out our website, cxleaderpodcast.com to subscribe to the show and find all our previous episodes, podcast, series, contact information so you can let us know how we're doing. We have over 160 great episodes. The CX Leader Podcast is a production of Walker. We're an experience management firm that helps companies accelerate their XM success. You can read more about us at Walkerinfo.com. Thank you for listening and we'll see you next time.

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