The Global Xperience
Welcome to The Global Xperience.
We'll be immersing you in the dynamic world of Customer Service and Collections. You will gain access to the secrets of success in the world of customer and employee experience through conversations with keynote speakers, industry mavericks, and CX and debt collections experts and influencers.
Every episode will feature thought leaders, celebrities, advocates and ambassadors in all things experience.
Stay tuned, and hit that subscribe button to stay up to date with critical information to enhance your business from the inside out.
The Global Xperience
Adoption Beats Innovation Every Time | Jeff Janzen | Laivly
Summary:
In this episode, we sit down with Jeff Janzen, VP of Strategic Growth & Partnerships at Laivly, to get past the keynote glitter and into the messy reality of AI in the contact center. Jeff traces Laivly’s evolution from an internal BPO tech team to a standalone platform and explains why the post-GPT era flipped the script from “Do we need AI?” to “Which AI actually works?” We dig into AI-washing, how to vet vendors, and why adoption—not algorithms—is the real bottleneck. Jeff shares how Laivly’s desktop overlay (“Sidd”) avoids heavy integrations, speeds time-to-floor, and frees agents to focus on customers—lifting CSAT, FCR, and cutting handle time. We talk playbooks, leadership buy-in, training for tenure, and the danger of over-planning instead of launching and iterating. The conversation wraps with pragmatic advice on buying AI: get strategic, start small, and prioritize operationalization.
00:00 Why AI isn’t a hard sell anymore
01:13 Welcome & episode framing
02:31 Laivly origin: from BPO team to platform
05:39 The GPT moment & market shift
08:01 AI-washing and how to vet vendors
10:17 Many pilots, few wins—what’s going wrong
11:26 Implementation fears, security, and integration-light deployment
15:32 Adoption phases & top-down leadership buy-in
18:37 Do agents really benefit? Metrics and realities
22:27 Pilot results: AHT down, CSAT/FCR up; agent sentiment
23:23 “Sidd” gets personified: training anecdotes
24:15 Tuning for tenure: Sidd Studio & configurable guidance
27:03 Rapid-fire with Jeff (superpower, snacks, theme song)
29:26 What Laivly wants agents to feel
30:00 Buying AI: common mistakes (strategy vs. over-planning)
32:57 Start now, iterate: avoiding 12–18 month paralysis
34:04 Overlay advantage across mixed CRMs/CCaaS
35:58 Partnership notes & gratitude
36:04 Conclusion and key takeaways
Links:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffjanzen/
Website: https://www.laivly.com/