Why employee empowerment is essential for a customer-centric culture

In Episode 5 of CX Minutes, host Sabina Persson welcomes Nate Brown— Co-Founder of CX Accelerator, Head of CX Advisory at Metric Sherpa and recently recognized as one of ICMI’s Top 25 Thought Leaders of 2025. This episode uncovers Nate’s key insights into how empowering your employees and cultivating genuine internal engagement directly fuels a powerful, customer-centric culture.

CX Minutes with Nate Brown, CX Accelerator / Metric Sherpa and our host Sabina Persson, Custellence.

What’s covered in this episode

Guest insights

• Defining customer-centric culture
• Employee experience fuels customer experience
• Empowering teams through leadership and autonomy
• Strategic advantage of a customer-centric approach

Quick links

• Key takeaways
• Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
• Final thoughts
• AI summary
• Read the transcript

Defining customer-centric culture

Nate defines customer-centric culture simply yet powerfully: “the way we do things around here.” This involves consistently aligning internal beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors with the goal of creating meaningful customer experiences.

Employee experience fuels customer experience

Drawing from Denise Lee Yohn, Nate highlights the vital link between employee experience and customer experience, explaining that organizations offer employees a daily “gift”—a fulfilling work environment and culture—which they in turn deliver to customers. He emphasizes that without genuine internal positivity, customer-facing efforts will inevitably falter.

Empowering teams through leadership and autonomy

From his rich experience building and transforming contact centers across industries, Nate stresses the necessity of employee empowerment. By giving teams autonomy and encouraging a “servant-challenger” mindset, employees transition from transactional interactions to innovation-driven, meaningful engagements.

Further reading: Empower your customer journey team for seamless collaboration

Strategic advantage of a customer-centric approach

In an age where baseline transactional service is easily automated, Nate argues that differentiation hinges on providing uniquely compelling experiences that resonate deeply with customers. He recommends creating identity-driven, co-created experiences to build enduring loyalty and distinct competitive advantages.

Deeper insights: Balancing Automation and Empathy in Customer Experience (Harvard Business Review)

Key takeaways from Nate

• Employee experience is foundational: Positive employee experiences are prerequisites for authentic, engaging customer interactions.
• Promote employee autonomy and innovation: A “servant-challenger” mindset encourages proactive problem-solving, innovation, and meaningful customer interactions.
• Go beyond transactional service: Deliver experiences that deeply connect with customers’ identities and values to cultivate lasting loyalty.

“A strong customer-centric culture starts internally—with engaged, empowered employees who genuinely believe in the purpose behind their work.” – Nate Brown

👉 Want to dive deeper? Watch the full CX Minutes episode with Nate Brown here.

Frequently asked questions (FAQ)

Final thoughts

Nate Brown clearly demonstrates that igniting a thriving customer-centric culture begins internally. Organizations that deeply invest in employee empowerment and enthusiasm will see a ripple effect, creating powerful customer connections and sustainable success.

AI summary

This episode highlights how employee empowerment fuels customer-centric culture. Nate Brown, Co-Founder of CX Accelerator and Head of CX Advisory at Metric Sherpa, shares how authentic leadership, internal engagement, and purpose-driven service transform customer experience from the inside out. Topics include employee activation, radical candor, challenger mentality, and building community-first CX teams.

Transcript

Intro

0:08 Sabina Persson, Custellence:
Hi everyone, I’m Sabina Persson from Custellence and you’re so very welcome to the videocast CX Minutes. It’s six questions, six minutes, and it’s all about customer experience.

This is a series of episodes where we bring you actionable insights, practical knowhow, and personal stories from top professionals — all in just six minutes. Well, around six minutes, that’s the ambition.

Welcome Nate

0:37 Sabina:
And joining me today is Nate Brown over at Metric Sherpa. Hi Nate, how are you?

0:45 Nate Brown, Metric Sherpa / CX Accellerator:
Hey Sabina, I love the show! Can’t wait to dive into the six-minute fire round.

0:52 Sabina:
It’s so good to have you here. I’m super excited. So, we’re going to jump into the questions, but first — who are you and what do you do?

Who are you and what do you do?

0:58 Nate:
My name is Nate. I’m a student of this amazing work of customer experience. I love how left-brain and right-brain this work is. It’s so scientific, and yet it’s so organic. It’s so relationship-based. It’s the best work in the world. So I just love learning about it every day.

And I’m a Nashville native. I love pickleball. I love disc golf. I’ve got two amazing daughters. That’s me in a nutshell right there.

How do you define customer-centric culture?

1:26 Sabina:
Great! And we’re going to talk about customer-centric culture. So I want to start by asking you — how do you actually define customer-centric culture?

1:33 Nate:
Well, my favorite definition of culture is just: the way we do things. The way we do things around here. So if we think about customer-centric culture, it’s the way we think about — and ultimately behave towards — our customers.

We’re trying to together create a compelling experience for them. But the only way that’s going to happen, we have to is anchor that in a culture where we together think and feel a certain way about our customers. And then our behaviours flow out of that.

How does your work impact the CX culture?

2:07 Sabina:
Yeah. Can you share how your work impacts the CX culture a little bit?

2:12 Nate:
Yeah, I’d love to! I’m all about the activation of employees first. I love how Denise Lee Yohn talks about it — as an organization, you’re giving your employees a gift every day. And that gift is the only thing that they can give forward to the customer.

If you’re trying to give a gift you don’t have, the burnout, the inauthenticity. It just doesn’t work. It doesn’t last. It’s not consistent.

So the first thing is activating the employees. Giving them the gift of a really good, compelling experience. Making it an amazing place to work. Where, they love being there, they’re proud of the mission, proud of one another — they’re lifting one another up.

All these great things happen because you’re excited about who you get to serve. And that translates into your everyday.

3:05 Sabina:
Brilliant! That’s awesome. Employee experience is like the other side of customer experience, right?

3:10 Nate:
It’s all the same! We talk about sides and different things, but I like — again, it’s another Denise Lee Yohn metaphor. It’s like the house.

We protect this. We protect each other. We’re making each other better. We’re together in this circle of psychological safety.

But then that circle pulses outward, and we start to invite our customers in, in specific ways. But it doesn’t change the sacred community in the house. That has to be established. That’s the foundation. That’s the cornerstone of that outward pulsing — where you getting to invite your customers into a specific experience.

How do your teams work together to create better CX?

3:50 Sabina:
Thank you. So how do teams in your organization work together to create better customer experiences?

3:56 Nate:
I’ve been able to built up a lot of contact centers throughout my career — at a major safety science company, a performing rights organization, inside of a major gaming company. A lot of different spaces.

And what I’ve found is, it’s fascinating how much it comes down to leadership mentality. How much freedom, how much positive autonomy you’re giving to customer service workers — to allow them to be incredible.

I’ve started talking about this servant-challenger mentality. Most of the time, we get caught up in this ticket taker box. Let’s just fix the thing and move on. But we’re so far past that in this space.

So what are we evolving to? Well, I love talking about the challenger. Let’s break that box! We’re so much more than ticket takers. Let’s break the inertia. Let’s innovate. But let’s not innovate just for the sake of innovation — not for our own careers or edification.

Let’s continue to serve. Let’s continue to focus on lifting up one another — and the amazing customers that we have, and the brand promise we get to defend.

So we’re activated as challengers. We’re breaking inertia. We have the courage to have radical candor, to use Kim Scott’s idea, and hold each other accountable — but we’re doing it because we care. And because we’re able to serve one another with a common purpose.

What can organizations gain from working customer-centric?

5:37 Sabina:
Great. So what can organizations gain, in your opinion, from working customer-centric? This could be a long one!

5:44 Nate:
I just think about how tempting it is today to plug in a piece of technology and have that be your customer experience — because it’s gotten really good. And that gives you a baseline of pretty high standard when it comes to transactional customer service.

So if that’s the baseline, and that becomes the expectation, then what are you left with? How do you break through the noise? How do you earn market share? How do you penetrate deeper?

I like to think about it like this way: how do you find the customers that belong to you?

The only way that happens is if you’re creating a really unique and compelling experience. You’re going above the baseline of competent service. You’re doing the quick things quick. You’re making the seamless parts frictionless.

But then you you thinking about: how can we connect? How can we provide a sense of identity? How can we co-create with our customers on something that actually matters to them?

And that’s how you earn loyalty. That’s how you transcend the status quo. But a lot of organizations are gonna go here, and stop. Resist that temptation.

What’s one piece of advice you’d give on customer-centric culture?

7:23 Sabina:
That’s so great! I mean, you’re so inspiring, Nate.

7:28 Nate:
Are you getting CX goose pimples?

7:30 Sabina:
I do! — exactly. So, last but not least — do you have one piece of advice you’d share, on this topic that we talked about, customer-centric culture?

7:35 Nate:
Get excited! If you as a CX leader are not excited about what you’re doing for your customers — and for each other — you’re not going anywhere.

There has to be an intrinsically motivating excitement that’s going on. To connect people and make them feel like they’re doing something that matters.

You can have all the science correct. You can be performance-managing the heck out of people. But you’re not going to break the box. You’re not going to elevate. You’re not going to innovate. And you’re not going to earn loyalty with your top talent — or your customers — until you get excited about your unique brand promise.

And you together, as a community, your ability to deliver on that promise. So think about how you can make people come alive in the work. How can you use intrinsic motivators?

And then you layer on the guide rails. This has to happen, like this is how we do things, you know that culture like, this is how we treat each other, like there’s some of those fundamental things that have to be there.

But light the match, too.

Wrap-up

8:47 Sabina:
Oh wow. As you said — the goose pimples! So Nate, thank you so much for sharing, and for spreading the light here on CX culture. It was so valuable. I’m sure I’m not the only one who will think this is great. It’s been great having you here on CX Minutes.

9:09 Nate:
Thank you! You rock, Sabina. Love the show. To all the folks out there and all the future guests — keep rocking it. Love this work. Let’s make it awesome together!

9:20 Sabina:
Yeah, let’s! Thank you so much. And with that, it’s a wrap. Thank you for watching and I’ll see you next time. Bye!

Check out other episodes of CX Minutes here.

By Tove Lundell