What has been your business/work highlight of 2024 so far?

Joining loveholidays in January in a newly created Director of Customer Strategy role and being a female addition to the leadership team has been a full-circle moment for me, having started my career over 15 years ago as a contact centre agent at Thomas Cook.

Leading the Customer Strategy for our post-booking experience across our European markets is the best job ever and bringing a vision to life that reimagines what this can be like for our customers is so rewarding.

Encouraging everyone to think about the customer at every decision point is a duty I take seriously and also have fun with. Bringing customer connection into meeting rooms and sharing my experiences from when I was an agent gives an often-overlooked perspective a lot of focus and compassion.

Who is your business hero and why?

Whitney Wolfe Herd is one of my business heroes. Her courage and strength in overcoming the challenges she faced during her time at Tinder to founding Bumble are profound. I can’t imagine the immense resolve it took to navigate through those experiences, overcoming imposter syndrome and other barriers to establish her value and authenticity with a platform where the value of other women—could be recognised and heard. Her success in fostering a culture of empowerment and respect in a highly competitive, typically male-dominated industry is the goal and something I reflect on any time I have a tough day.

What’s the biggest business mistake you’ve made and what did you learn from it?

My biggest mistake was staying too long in a position where my contributions and values were not fully recognised or appreciated. This chips away at your self-esteem and can take time to rebuild. It has taught me the importance of keeping your elbows out and seeking people & environments that celebrate the value of your experience, insights and skills.

What’s the most inspirational book you’ve ever read and why?

The Frictionless Organization” by Bill Price, whom I had the pleasure of meeting at ASAPP, has been an inspirational read for me. Bill’s clear and compelling approach coupled with his insights from Amazon into reducing customer friction and how to get there is a cornerstone in my approach to service design and customer experience strategy.

What’s the biggest challenge you face in your role in 2024?

This has to be assembling a dream team and embedding the value of customer strategy authentically throughout loveholidays and seeing real positive customer outcomes from it. Integrating with diverse functions and aligning with them on a unified customer-centric approach will be a key focus.

What technology will have the greatest impact on your business this year and why?

It would be weird if I didn’t say Generative AI right? I’m really passionate about a ‘human-in-the-loop’ approach, where AI compliments humans; rather than replacing them. It’s exciting to see how much richness and value can be created from the two working in harmony together to result in more effective and authentic customer engagements.