CX Files

Peter Ryan speaks with Tugs Smith and Adrian Smith, co-founders of ATAC Global CX in Oshawa, Ontario, about the launch of the Certified Remote Service Agent certification. The discussion explores why remote contact center work now needs a trusted global standard, how agents can prove they are ready to handle real customer interactions from home, and why resumes and interviews are no longer enough....

Your contact center may be one of the most valuable targets in the enterprise supply chain. Peter Ryan speaks with Muhammad Yahya Patel, Cybersecurity Advisor at Huntress, about why cybersecurity has become a critical issue for CX leaders, contact centers, and BPO providers. He is based in Blackburn in the UK. Muhammad Yahya Patel explains why CX operations are attractive targets for cybercriminal...

Donald Berryman is the Founder & Managing Director at ProfectusCX. He is based in Florida, USA. Don writes a LinkedIn newsletter called The CX Advisor Perspective. He recently published several newsletters focused on how the enterprise to BPO relationship needs to develop - to bridge new AI technology use and also to change how BPOs charge for their services. Mark Hillary called Don to explore the...

Lara Klick is the Founder and President of Klick Advisors LLC. She is based in Tampa Bay, Florida, USA. Klick Advisors is a trust-centered consulting practice that helps healthcare leaders and teams navigate high-stakes moments with clarity, empathy, and courage. Lara heard our episode from March where Melanie Disse explored why companies ask for feedback, but don't use it. She suggested that this...

The BPO Industry Isn't Dying. But It May Need to Reinvent Itself Faster Than Anyone Expected. Yuma AI CEO Guillaume Luccisano argues that customer experience providers must evolve from labor arbitrage specialists into AI orchestrators and systems integrators—or risk becoming irrelevant. For years, critics of the business process outsourcing industry have predicted its demise. First it was robotic...

David Rickard is a partner at Everest Group. He is based in the UK. David recently visited Ethiopia for the Elevate Africa event. In this conversation with Peter Ryan David gives his take on Ethiopia and Africa more generally for CX and BPO.  https://www.linkedin.com/in/dwrickard/ https://www.everestgrp.com/ https://www.weelevateafrica.org/ --- Africa has been talked about as "the next big thing"...

The annual CXOutsourcers Mindshare event took place in Ottawa, Canada, earlier in May 2026 (May 18-20). Peter Ryan took a microphone onto the conference floor to capture ideas and comments from the delegates in Canada for this CX-focused event. https://cxoutsourcers.com/ In this episode of CX Files you will hear comments from: Sean Duncombe - COO, Neuroframe (USA) https://www.linkedin.com/in/seand...

What makes a customer love a brand? It is a simple question, but it quickly becomes complicated. People often reach for the obvious examples. Apple customers lining up overnight for the latest iPhone. Harry Potter fans queuing in costume outside bookshops. Lego fans who pass their love of the brand from one generation to the next. Jonas Berggren, Chief Client Officer EMEA at Transcom, explores thi...

Stephanie Reeves Millner is a Global EVP at TP. She is based in Phoenix, Arizona, USA. It is worth noting from the start of this podcast episode that Stephanie is talking in a personal capacity in this interview. CX and BPO processes are usually seen as a cost to most businesses. Stephanie argues that there are a number of strategies that can be used to drive up revenue, protect existing revenue,...

Andrew Hall is the founder and CEO of Ethenta. He is based in Portugal. The "DREAM" service from Ethenta  is a strategic framework designed to help organizations transition from traditional hierarchies to intelligent, agentic networks . It is aimed at enabling "+65% Productivity" through "Enterprise Agentic AI Transformation" Mark Hillary called Andrew to ask about Agentic AI and how a focus on AI...

Nathan Muniz is the founder and owner of 247Secretary.com. The business is based in Florida, USA, but has contact center operations in the Philippines. Nathan talked to Mark Hillary from the floor of his contact center on his approach to telling the world about his business. He walks the floor and talks to real people doing their job. No studio. No scripts. No "AI transformation" buzzwords. Just r...

Gary Slade is the Chief Commerical Officer at TP EMEA. He has many years of BPO and CX experience and he previously led the UK/Ireland operation at TP as CEO. In this conversation with Mark Hillary, Gary is talking about BPO stability and how this is becoming an important new measurement that companies need to focus on. If you are looking for a BPO partner then how do you know if they will still b...

In this episode of CX Files, Peter Ryan speaks with Sarah Leff about Interact CC's expansion into South Africa's Eastern Cape, exploring why the region is emerging as a compelling alternative to traditional CX hubs like Cape Town and Johannesburg. Leff explains that while South Africa has long been a natural partner for UK-based customer experience delivery - thanks to cultural alignment, language...

Chris Chance is the Senior Vice President for East Africa at CCI Global. He is based between Kenya, Rwanda, and Ethiopia. CCI Global is headquartered in the UAR, but has extensive operations across Africa - they aim to be the largest and most respected BPO in Africa through a combination of offering innovative services with a focus on impact sourcing and community uplift. In this conversation with...

Steve Sullivan is the founder of Channel Doctors. He is based in Bournemouth in the UK. Channel Doctors is a specialist advisory company focused on CX, contact centers, and especially issues such as data protection and GDPR. Peter Ryan called Steve after seeing a LinkedIn post on managing customer rage. Are customers more angry today and how are companies dealing with it? How can it be managed in...

Melanie Disse is the Principal Consultant and Tech Adviser to Melanie Disse Consulting. Melanie Disse Consulting is a CX & VoC consulting firm helping businesses leverage CX as a   key competitive differentiator to drive business performance through understanding customer   experiences. Melanie is based in Auckland, New Zealand. In this conversation with Peter Ryan, Melanie outlines how companies...

Gareth Bray is Business Development Director and WhatsApp Guru at Premier CX. He is based in Odiham, Hampshire, UK. Over 100 billion WhatsApp messages are sent daily by users - that's more than a million messages on the platform every second. Between 1 to 3 billion of these daily messages is a customer talking to a business. Gareth was on the Meta team when they launched WhatsApp in Europe so he h...

CCW 2026 took place at the end of February 2026 in Berlin. Peter Ryan was there on the conference floor. He took a microphone and tried to capture several comments and ideas from the delegates - what was the conference about and what were the key themes that people in CX are focused on in 2026? https://www.ccw.eu/en/ CCW conference delegates who spoke to Peter Ryan: Monika Röhr-Łukasik Axendi http...

Michel Stevens is Course Director at the CXM Academy. He is also a managing partner at goCX. He is based in Antwerp, Belbium. The CXM Academy aims to  build training for   the real world - interactive and culturally relevant.  In this conversation with Peter Ryan, Michel talks about CX events. Why are so many of them so repetitive? Why are they flooded with the same speakers talking about the same...

Roger Barlow is Director of LATAM Translations. He is based in São Paulo, Brazil. Roger is British and has lived in Brazil since 1998. Since 2001 he has focused on helping Brazilian companies engage with a global audience. This involves a significant amount of translation from and to Portuguese. Multilingual CX is a subject we have often covered on CX Files so Mark decided to call up  Roger becaus...

Michael Gray is the Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer at Spacial Working. He is based in London, UK. Spacial Working is focused on helping companies to create a flexible work environment that embraces both working from home and working in offices. The aim is to create a flexible arrangement that works well for the company and employees. The media often reports that WFH is finished and most empl...

Jacqui Turner founded the Turner Corner Leadership Academy. She is based at Great Malvern, which is close to Stratford-Upon-Avon in the UK. The academy is focused on customer service training, leadership programmes and coaching interventions. Training followed by coaching with Jacqui's team has been proven to make training much more effective, in terms of staff productivity, performance and busine...

Rob Joubert is the founder and CEO of Boomerang BPO. He is based in Cape Town, South Africa. 2025 was the 20th anniversary year for Boomerang, so at the end of the year Peter Ryan called Rob to talk about BPO and CX trends and what it takes to build a successful BPO operation from the ground up. 20 years into the journey, what has Rob learned about what clients want from a BPO partner in the 2020s...

Last November, Leigh Hopwood, CEO of the CCMA (Contact Centre Management Association), was on the CX Files talking about the 25th anniversary of the European Contact Center and Customer Service Awards (ECCCSAs). https://cxfiles.libsyn.com/cxfiles/leigh-hopwood-ccma-25-years-of-the-ecccsas At those awards on November 25th 2025, The Best Customer Service Into Europe award was won (gold) by TUI worki...

This special live episode was recorded on January 21, 2026 live in London, UK. This is the 400th episode of the podcast. Lian Rowlands quizzed Peter and Mark about the origin of CX Files and what they plan for the future of the podcast... Thanks to everyone who attended the live event in London last night - it was great to see so many friends of the podcast out in person! https://www.linkedin.com/...