Customer Experience Program

Learn to Make Customer Experience Your Differentiator

Companies providing excellent customer experiences set themselves apart from the competition. They understand how they deliver to their customers can be as or more important than what they deliver. The Customer Experience Program offered through UCSB PaCE may be one of the most important investments your company can make.

Download the Customer Experience Brochure

About the CX Program

Learn what it takes to create brand experiences to drive loyalty, achieve higher revenue gains, and reduce costs. Develop deeper insights and integrate innovative strategies to help your organization see the world through your customer's eyes.

The UCSB PaCE Customer Experience Program is designed by industry experts for professionals seeking practical tools for this fast-growing discipline. From your initial CX maturity assessment, vision development and goal setting, persona and journey design, to empathy stories and cultural engagement, be ready to roll-up your sleeves and apply your new skills in this hands-on, interactive course.

Program Details

8 Modules Online ($4,995)
Rolling Admission - Start Anytime

Self-paced
CX portfolio & all course materials
Hands-on projects
Interactive discussion boards
Earn 3.2 CEU's upon successful completion

4 Day In-person ($4,995)
Currently on Hold - Dates TBD

Breakfast & lunch
CX portfolio & all course materials
Hands-on projects
Networking events
Earn 3.2 CEU's upon successful completion

Curriculum

The Customer Experience Program meets the same high academic standards of the UCSB graduate programs, with a challenging interdisciplinary curriculum designed to prepare you to analyze, create, and deliver unique customer experiences.

Each module builds your skills, helps you develop strategies, and provides you a full CX Ultimate Toolkit with OVER 60 workshop booklets, team-focused activities, templates, assessments, and planning guides, and culture posters. All to help YOU on the road to immediate success.

We develop CX professionals that do extraordinary things for their organizations. Throughout the program, you're encouraged to work on your own projects. By the end of the program, you'll have completed your Customer Experience Portfolio, with real solutions to apply immediately to the challenges in your workplace.

Module 1 - Customer Experience Introduction

Define the concept of Customer Experience. Find out what makes a beloved company and the essential elements that endear these brands to us.

Identify Customer Experience leaders and laggards.
Discuss what sets these types of experiences apart from others, making you less likely to advocate for a certain brand.
Create your comparison scorecard to identify critical elements that set leaders apart from the rest.

Module 2 - Customer Experience Strategy for Success

Learn why Customer Experience isn’t a project with a start and end date, and why this isn’t a state of mind – it’s a state of your organization and it starts at the top. Integrating Customer Experience into business strategy, and skillfully executing, leads to enormous rewards. You’ll achieve higher customer engagement, reduced churn, increased revenue, and greater employee satisfaction.

Develop insights into what a customer-centric organization looks like and how to get there.
Discover elements that comprise an effective and strategic customer experience plan.
Create critical goals and roadmap to help reach your customer experience vision.

Module 3 - Your Customers, Their Journey

Customer Experience Journey Maps are arguably the most important instrument for capturing your customer’s true interactions, emotionally and cognitively, with your company’s brand. Discover your customers and their experiences, and use these strategic tools for communications, analysis, planning, management, and innovation.

Develop insightful customer personas and stories that promote cultural empathy and impact decisions.
Identify critical customer views of interactions throughout multi-channel touchpoints.
Use journey maps to capture experiences and emotions and improve the lives of your customers.

Module 4 - Accelerate & Improve Decisions with Data

Customer Experience initiatives fizzle quickly if you don’t connect the dots between your customers’ perceptions, touch points, service delivery, cost savings and ROI. Customer churn rates, share of wallet, Net Promoter Scores, average handling times, and cost of acquisition, can and need to tie to your bottom line.

Explore leading practices that drive ongoing business improvements.
Link customer perceptions with operational costs and profitability.
Discover the most relevant, actionable metrics for your organization to drive desired business results.

Module 5 - Customer-Focused Innovation

Customer-Focused Innovation is the perfect blend of theory, practice, strategy and invention. Innovating on behalf of your customers doesn’t start with a problem statement – it starts with your customer. Learn to use empathy techniques to break through the culture barrier at your company and close the “knowing-doing” gap.

Apply creative strategies that support innovation.
Gain insights to understand the needs of your customers.
Work to improve customer experience while adding value they’ll rave about.

Module 6 - Principles of Customer Relationship Building

Customer Experience is multi-faceted and relies on the strong relationships you build with your customers. Use the Customer Relationship Development Model to identify and define core elements to build relationships and improve overall experiences. Through collaboration and ideation, you create a maturity matrix specifically for your business.

Apply modern relationship building models.
Develop your own Customer Experience-based Customer Relationship Maturity Matrix.
Discover essential elements and apply the Technology Framework for CRM and Customer Experience.

Module 7 - Customer-First Culture

Great customer experience start with great employee experience. Educate yourself and your workforce on how to foster a customer-first culture that positions you for the greatest, longest-term success. This isn’t “blowing up” the culture you already have – it’s embracing what you have and collaborating to make a difference for your customers.

Accept the reality that your customer experience will never exceed your employee experience.
Engage the hearts and minds of your people.
Determine how to work together to deliver your brand promise and great customer experiences.

Module 8 - Navigating Politics of Change

Change is hard, people are resistant, and the market is becoming more fiercely competitive every day. Organizations must quickly evolve or be left behind. It takes a special leader to navigate these waters and get your entire organization marching to the same drummer. Arm yourself with these indispensable leadership skills.

Discover how to drive adoption across your entire organization.
Successfully jump start your role by gaining quick wins and bring others along with you.
Become a successful change-agent for experience-first thinking and inspire change.

Capstone Project: Your Customer Experience Strategic Plan

The program culminates in your very own strategic plan for your organization. To achieve the highest return-on-investment, you're encouraged to add to the capstone throughout the program. By following your strategic plan, you'll operationalize and infuse customer experience ideals into your cultural DNA. As an added bonus, by the end of the class you'll have completed your very own professional Customer Experience portfolio.

Meet the CX Program Instructors

Carol Buehrens, Customer Experience Expert and Program Instructor

Carol Buehrens
Carol is the author of ‘Happy RAVING Customers!’ and is a leading CX expert. She has a wealth of skills and expertise to draw from, constructing customer experiences for over 30 years for major companies such as Liberty Mutual, Northrop, McDonnell-Douglas, Bechtel, GE, Mercury Marine, and ICW Group Insurance Companies.

Carol’s passion for improving customer experience has resulted in numerous awards, including the prestigious “CX Innovation Award” from the Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA), ICW Group CEO Award, the Liberty Mutual Star Award, and is listed in the World's Top 30 Customer Service Professionals.

A Founding Member and Expert Panel Member of the international Customer Experience Professional Association (CXPA), Carol is also an active member of the San Diego Customer Experience Special Interest Group (CX SIG), and Professor at California State University Fullerton and University of California San Diego.

Michael Truett, Customer Experience Program Instructor

Michael Truett
Michael is known for creating, improving and executing collaborative Design Thinking sessions and Customer Experience frameworks across diverse industries at different stages of growth. He has worked with companies such as Spotify, The New York Times, Dow Jones, Tech start-ups, and Telecom providers globally.

Erich Deitz, Customer Experience Program Instructor

Erich Dietz
Erich is the Vice President of Worldwide Strategic Accounts for InMoment. He has over 15 years of executive experience spanning consulting, business development, and solutions architecture. He is also a designated CXPA Expert and regular contributor to the community’s Google+ Hangouts and other events.

JP Saini, Customer Experience Program Instructor

JP Saini
As Chief Information Officer for TRC, JP focuses on leveraging technology to digitally transform business and support profitable growth through improving customer experiences. JP is passionate about the mix of CX and technology and the impact of ensuring infrastructure is reliable, maintainable, scalable, flexible, and secure for all customers.

Stephene Klein
Stephene Klein is a trailblazer whose academic and professional journeys stand as a testament to her relentless pursuit of excellence. She holds three master's degrees - an MBA, MPH, and MPHA - from Everglades University, Boca Raton, FL, where she graduated summa cum laude, marking her place at the pinnacle of her class with an unrivaled 4.0 GPA. This academic titan not only delivered the Graduate Commencement keynote address, inspiring a crowd of over 1,000 attendees, but she is also a notable faculty member guiding the next generation of leaders. Her profound insights and wealth of knowledge have shaped countless C-suite executives, fostering excellence and innovation on a global scale.

Outside of academia, Stephene has consistently made a global impact. She is a Gold Medalist, Storytelling Writing Award Winner (2024), and the recipient of the Global Vision Award for Brand Strategy (2023). She was also the featured cover story of South Florida Magazine (2021), and has etched her place in the global business echelons. Her dynamic role at Zschool, saw her spearhead over 500+ Advisory Board meetings, annually, shaping the strategic direction for over 10,000 CxOs and senior executives worldwide.

With 20+ years of award-winning business development and engagement marketing experience, coupled with 15+ years of senior leadership roles, Stephene consistently drives sustainable revenue growth for leading global companies. Her extensive experience across multiple domains, including sales, marketing, and partnerships, and her well-established global network, position her as a catalyst for success in complex business environments.

Tiffany Craft
Tiffany Craft is a visionary leader in international business expansion, strategy, marketing, and advertising. With a proven track record of driving growth in global markets, she has successfully guided brands such as Calvin Klein, to thrive across diverse regions, including Latin America, Asia and Europe. Her expertise lies in crafting innovative strategies that align with cultural nuances and deliver measurable results, such as achieving significant increases in international revenue.

A pioneer in the social media space, Tiffany has been at the forefront of building impactful partnerships within online communities. She excels in fostering collaborations with retail, media and entertainment providers and leveraging user-generated content to enhance brand visibility and engagement. These initiatives have cultivated authentic, loyal audiences while setting new standards for digital marketing.

Tiffany's strategic vision is complemented by her creativity and data-driven approach to advertising. Her ability to merge traditional media with cutting-edge digital strategies has resulted in award-winning campaigns that resonate globally. She believes that strategic AI integration is also essential for organizations to unlock new efficiencies, gain actionable insights, and maintain a competitive edge in an increasingly data-driven world.

Beyond her professional achievements, Tiffany is dedicated to mentoring future leaders and advancing inclusion within a broad range of industry sectors. As a sought-after speaker, she frequently shares her insights on global marketing trends, digital transformation, and the evolving role of partnerships in building communities.

"As Vice President of Advisory Experience at Zschool, I lead a team of advisors, who are actively collaborating with faculty in shaping curriculum across multiple disciplines, ensuring it reflects the latest trends and best practices in organizational leadership. By incorporating diverse areas of expertise, we create a comprehensive learning experience that equips future leaders with the skills necessary to drive innovation and impact within their organizations."

With her passion for innovation and proven leadership, Tiffany continues to redefine success in international business and marketing, making her a trailblazer in the industry.

What others say about the CX Program. . .

"Becoming a CX expert doesn't happen automatically or overnight. It requires on-the-job training AND taking a course at a reputable university. That's exactly what I did and recommend you take the same program offered by UCSB PaCE. Read about my #CX class experience and how you can differentiate your brand, too!"
- Stacy Sherman, MBA, CUA, Customer Experience Leader

"The program has done a great job of putting customer experience front and center for our organization. The concepts and lectures in the program are engaging and easy to follow, and the worksheets allow me to easily apply the concepts to my daily work. I recommend the program for anyone looking to bring customer experience to the forefront of their business."
- Jenny Baranowski, Awards Director, SIIA

"The course has been great for me and my company. It has given us new ways of thinking, allowed us to look at different ways of doing things and pull from successes in other industries that have translated into successes in our business that we wouldn’t have explored before."
- Brett Fish, Cognizant, Senior Director Business Development

Download the Customer Experience Brochure