The Hidden Interview Clue: A Tip to Spotting Data-Ready Cultures

As a CDO, how can you predict at the interview stage if a company is the right fit for you??

Will you be able to make a long-term impact and create a growth story or be back on the job market in less than 2 years like so many CDOs? (it's not me saying this, it's the statistics).

So, how do you know if you’re making the right call???

It starts before you even accept the role.?

The truth is that the biggest part of a CDO's job is change management but you can’t persuade people to change if they don’t want to. Even if you have an executive sponsor and support from the executive committee, that's often not enough.???

There needs to be a willingness to change, on the business and technology side. Because becoming data centric is not about building a data warehouse on the backend, it’s the business culture.

So how do you know going in if there's a critical mass of people ready for change?

Let me give you an example. Remember that warehouse club I wrote about earlier this week? (You can click here to read that)

My experience there as a new customer was that in their culture customer experience didn’t really matter. They believe there's enough value in what the store provides that they don't need to reduce friction or make the experience more seamless. They're successful enough without it.

In a situation like that, your efforts won't survive the reality of people not wanting to change.

Now, it's impractical (or even impossible) to become a customer of every company you interview for.?

So how do you know? Here's my trick:?

When you're interviewing, is there a head of customer experience, and is that person actually interviewing you?

If they are, pay close attention to the conversation. How do they see the customer experience job?

Are they viewing it as a data-driven, end-to-end reduction of friction in every customer journey? Or are they just focused on adding bells and whistles to the website and tracking eyeballs?

If it's the first, then there's a good chance you'd be able to make the type of transformative impact you're looking to make.?

If not...it’s possibly a red flag.

Customer experience is your crystal ball for predicting your potential impact and the data readiness of the organization.

Have you found other ways to gauge a company's readiness for data-driven change??

What's been your experience??

Share your thoughts in the comments below.?

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