Webinar Summary: Customer-Centric Culture

Cecilia Flatum and Steven Van Belleghem share why successful AI transformation depends on leadership ownership, empowered people, and a deeply rooted customer-centric culture that drives long-term competitive advantage.

Cecilia Flatum of Deloitte: CEO Reflections on AI and Transformation
In the opening session of today's webinar, Cecilia Flatum, CEO of Deloitte Norway, offered a candid look at how AI is reshaping businesses and why leaders must adopt a broader, more customer-centric mindset to stay relevant and competitive in a rapidly shifting market. 
 
Drawing on both personal experience and Deloitte's latest research on AI adoption, Cecilia emphasized a risk she sees across industries: organizations are investing heavily in technology, but too lightly in the people who use it. On average, companies allocate 93% of their AI investment to technology and just 7% to the people who are using it. 


Cecilia Flatum, CEO of Deloitte Norway.

What the Data Reveals: Europe vs. the Nordics
Deloitte's research surveyed 1,800 leaders across Europe to better understand their progress on their AI journeys. When comparing responses from Nordic countries with those from the rest of Europe, the findings revealed consistent gaps across key dimensions of AI implementation and showed that the Nordics lag behind. 

1. From Budget Priority to ROI: In most European companies, AI has moved beyond experimentation to become a budget priority supported by a clear business case. Sixty percent of European leaders expect to see a return on investment within a year. Nordic leaders, however, are more cautious, and only 40% anticipate such a quick payoff. 

2. From IT-Led to Business-Driven AI: Typically, AI initiatives have been owned by IT or operations leaders. This is beginning to shift in Europe, but the Nordics are moving more slowly. One in five European companies is now nominating a Chief AI Officer, compared to just one in ten Nordic companies. This signals a lag in elevating AI ownership to the strategic, business level. 
 
3. From Cost Reduction to Top-Line Growth: Business leaders understand that mindset shapes outcomes, and many are rethinking their motives for implementing AI. While 60% of European leaders are leveraging AI to drive growth, many Nordic organizations are still stuck on efficiency and cost reduction. Just one-third of Nordic leaders report using AI to drive top-line revenue. 

Key Takeaways
Cecilia underscored that meaningful AI transformation requires far more than implementation: 

• CEOs and executive teams must take ownership of their AI Journey rather than relying only on IT or the COO.
• AI must be infused across the entire organization, from the back office to the employee experience to the customer journey.
• True transformation occurs when organizations move from deploying technology to empowering people. 

This shift is what separates followers from decisive leaders. 

A Personal AI Journey
Cecilia shared Deloitte's own experience with AI, from its ambition to its growing pains. 

Despite having strong talent and an appetite to invest, Deloitte's AI journey hasn't been linear. After implementing at a high speed in 2025, they decided they had to slow down and determine whether the organization was really on the right track.

That reflection led to a critical insight: they had been too narrow in their focus. Rather than treating AI as a project, leaders began to ask how it could be infused into everything they do. This shift unlocked new opportunities to evolve both the employee and customer experience. Today, they're using Deloitte's human edge to drive an AI revolution.

Now, with greater clarity, Deloitte is ready to push the gas once again. "We need to be at the forefront of this race," she said. "And I've never, ever felt as much urgency as I do right now."


Steven Van Belleghem: Customer-Centric Culture
Widely regarded as one of the world's leading thinkers in the field of customer experience, Steven Van Belleghem is an entrepreneur, academic, speaker, and author. Through his work with global organizations, Steven helps leaders turn customer obsession from an aspiration into a daily reality.In a recent webinar with Oslo Business Forum, Steven explored how leading companies build customer-centric cultures that actually work—not through sweeping strategies, but through small, intentional behaviors that compound over time. His message was clear: customer focus only becomes a differentiator when it shows up consistently in how people think, decide, and act.

In his research and advisory work, Steven has uncovered a common paradox: nearly every organization wants to be customer-centric, but most struggle with average-to-low execution. The intention may be there, but the behavior often isn't. Steven describes these organizations as "diamonds in the rough." They're full of potential, but in need of practices that turn belief into action.

Steven Van Belleghem, leading authority and bestselling author on customer experience.

Look for the Easy, Cheap, and Smart
The first step toward installing a customer-centric culture is to look for symbols of customer experience. Teams need to believe that the organization is customer-centric, and that belief is reflected in everyday micro-behaviors. 

Leading companies bring customer experience to life by looking for initiatives that are easy, cheap, and smart. These are small practices that are simple to organize, inexpensive to execute, and emotionally meaningful.

Disney is a master of this approach. One example is the well-known "ice cream rule:" if a child drops their ice cream cone in the park, any employee is empowered to replace it for free. Another is the rule that when a child hugs a character, the child—not the cast member—decides when the hug ends.

"You may not be 'big Disney,'" Steven said, "but these examples are cheap, easy to organize, and put a smile on people's faces." He encouraged leaders to start by asking: What behavior do we want from our customers, and what behavior do we need to model to earn it?

Become More Business Empathetic 
Another necessary element of customer-centric cultures is empathy. More than a soft skill, empathy can be instilled as a disciplined business practice.

Steven shared four simple ways organizations can build stronger business empathy:

1.    Observe customers "in the wild," outside of controlled environments.
2.    Learn to read between the lines and interpret their unspoken needs.
3.    Regularly put yourself in the customer's shoes.
4.    Ensure as many employees as possible get close to real customers.

He illustrated this through Brian Chesky, the CEO and founder of Airbnb. Brian and other Airbnb executives spend months living in their own company's rentals, and Brian even rents out his own apartment to experience the platform from the host's perspective. These firsthand experiences consistently lead to small but meaningful improvements.

Steven also highlighted Chewy, a company that pairs operational excellence with deep emotional understanding. When Chewy learns that a customer's pet has passed away, they send a handwritten condolence card and a custom oil painting of the pet. The company spends roughly $200,000 annually on this practice.

Chewy makes a deliberate choice to invest in emotional connection rather than traditional advertising. This, Steven explained, reflects the difference between a corporate mindset focused on measurement and a human mindset driven by emotion. Emotions may be difficult to quantify, but they're central to loyalty.


"What brings in the most value for the company: an investment in emotional connection, or an investment in advertising?"


"This sounds counterintuitive because we've been trained to think in data," Steven said. "But we're forgetting intuition. Add five percent intuition to everything you do because that's what humans do in the wild."

Combine Fast Feedback and Fast Action
Empathy becomes even more powerful when it's paired with speed.

Steven shared an example from Atlantis Resorts and Residences in Dubai, where teams hold daily meetings focused entirely on customer feedback. They review guest questions, identify moments where the answers fell short, and immediately determine whether a new process or improvement could benefit future guests. They often implement changes on the very same day.

This approach combines fast feedback loops with fast action loops, keeping improvements small, practical, and continuous.

Steven challenged leaders to mimic this practice by becoming "friction hunters." Most customers don't leave because of one big failure; they leave because of small frustrations that accumulate over time. Friction hunters look for unnecessary complexity, wasted time, and moments where customers are subtly inconvenienced.

Big mistakes, Steven said, are rarely dangerous. Organizations are forced to fix them, and customers often leave happier than before. Service erosion, however, is very dangerous because it happens slowly. 


"Erosion of your service is dangerous because it happens by small bits and pieces. You don't notice the difference, but your customers do."


"Take small steps," Steven advised. "The accumulation of them will outperform one big change." This mindset naturally leads to a "say yes" culture, another important driver of customer happiness.

Become an 'Open Door Button' Hero
Steven describes a "say yes" culture as an "open door button" culture, named after the familiar elevator buttons that give us a choice to hold the door open or let it close.

He shared a personal story from London, where he was running late for a train and was stuck in a long customs line. A security guard stepped forward and called out for passengers whose trains were departing within the next ten minutes, asking others to step aside. Thanks to that small intervention, Steven made his train.

"That guy was my open door button hero," Steven said. "It was a two-second time investment, and a zero-money investment." Small actions like this turn organizations into diamonds in the rough.

Rethink Customer Loyalty
Steven challenged the traditional concept of customer loyalty, arguing that most "loyalty programs" are transactional by design. These programs may drive behavior, but they don't result in loyalty. 


"We don't have 'customer loyalty' programs, we have 'buy more from us' programs."


True loyalty, Steven believes, is emotional. He realled his experience speaking at Nordic Business Forum with Will Guidara, the former owner of the restaurant Eleven Madison Park. 

Guidara had set out to earn two Michelin stars, a goal the restaurant achieved after just two years in business. Despite that success, it still ranked last on the list of the World's 50 Best Restaurants. In a quest to rise to the top, he developed a new strategy. 

Will and his team embraced a philosophy called "Unreasonable Hospitality." They appointed a "dream weaver," someone responsible for surprising guests in deeply personal ways. By optimizing every touchpoint and consistently delivering small, thoughtful moments, Eleven Madison Park became the number one restaurant in the world.

Steven summed it up simply: "Don't ask 'how can we make customers more loyal?' Ask 'how can we show more loyalty to our customers?'"

Conclusion: Commit to Small Things Done Consistently
Steven closed with a reminder that customer-centric cultures are built through everyday discipline, not grand gestures. He referenced Admiral William H. McRaven of the U.S. Navy, who famously said, "If you want to change the World, start by making your bed every day. If you can't succeed in the small things, how will you succeed in the big things?"

Customer-centricity works the same way. Easy, cheap, and smart actions. Fast feedback and fast action. Empathy, intuition, and a willingness to say yes. When leaders commit to these behaviors consistently, organizations can transform into the kind of diamonds customers remember, trust, and choose again.

Key Takeaways:

• Customer-centricity succeeds through small behaviors, not grand strategies.
• Easy, cheap, and smart actions create belief and empower momentum across teams.
• Empathy becomes a powerful tool when paired with fast feedback and fast action.
• Eliminating friction protects customer trust before erosion sets in.

Questions to Consider:

• What small, symbolic behaviors could signal customer-centricity more clearly in our organization?
• Where are there points of friction that might be eroding customer experience today
• How often do our employees experience the customer journey firsthand? What are their impressions when they do?
• Are we investing in measuring loyalty or in truly demonstrating it?

Steven Van Belleghem will challenge leaders at Oslo Business Forum 2026 to take the next level in "Customer Experience". Join Steven live, 16-17 September 2026, in Oslo. Register your ticket now here.