More than convenience: Improving the customer journey around the globe

Lisa Woodley: I'd love a button where I could drop the vocals out, so it's just me singing along to the song so I will out there.

(CATALYST INTRO MUSIC) 

Clinton Bonner: Welcome to Catalyst, the Launch by NTT Data podcast. Catalyst is an ongoing discussion for digital leaders dissatisfied with the status quo and yet optimistic about what's possible through smart technology and great people. Today, we're excited to welcome Megan Wang to the podcast. Based in Shanghai, Megan is a key figure at NTT Data China, where she has been at the forefront of integrating cutting-edge technologies into customer experience strategies. With her deep understanding of the design world and her expertise in the latest technological advancements, we're going to discuss the evolution of customer experiences in all facets of technology. Joining Megan is our colleague and friend of the pod, Lisa Woodley, who has had a career spanning 20 years focused on digital experience, research, design and data. Lisa has built and led successful multidisciplinary teams that bridge design, psychology and data analytics to create innovative experiences at the intersection of user need and business value. Megan, first, over to you. How are you doing this evening in Shanghai? 

Megan Wang: Hi. Very glad to have this chance to talk to, you know, about all the customer experience. Very good. Shanghai is very good. And I'm... (Laughs) Yeah. So I've been working in NTT Data for more than 11 years, and during the past 11 years always focused on the customer experience.  

Clinton: Excellent. Lisa, how are you doing today? You're not quite as far away from me as Megan is, but we're all here digitally in this wonderful era in the studio. How are you today? 

Lisa: Yeah, I'm doing pretty good. It's a beautiful day here in New Jersey. Maybe not quite as exciting for our listeners as Shanghai. 

Clinton: Yeah, yeah. 

Lisa: But I'm really excited today to have this conversation with Megan, because Megan's team, our team, we've got this whole global design network where we get to interact, and it's always a lot of fun when we get to... In that customer experience world, you get really focused on the audience that you're familiar with. Like the, culturally, like.... Where you sit. And so it's always awesome to talk to our international colleagues and get that global perspective on what customers want. So I think this is going to be a good conversation today. 

Clinton: For sure, Lisa. And one of the cool things when Megan hopped on, is that she just got back, speaking of global, on a, sounds like a pretty killer vacation, where you went to Turkey and Egypt. So, Megan, we'll start with you. Over the past few years, how have you seen customer experience evolve in the world? And I do wonder, as you're answering, Lisa, if there's going to be some deltas between what's happening on one side of the globe versus what we're seeing over in North America. But, Megan, to you first. 

Megan: You know, as I just introduced myself, I've been working on the customer experience for more than ten years. NTT Data. However, you know, at the first, I don't know, it's like 7 or 8 years, I don't... I didn't call it customer experience. In the past, and at the beginning when we talk about experience, we talk about the user experience. I have a team, I have a dedicated team called the UX/UI team. So when we talk about that, people always think about something, you know, it's like a single application or some single touchpoint. If we talk about a system, we talk about how the interaction design, what it looks like, what it looks and feel. And since a few years ago, I don't know, like three, four or five years ago, so people has, like, a more common sense about the customer experience. Because when we talk about the customer, we are not talking about some single touchpoints. We are talking about, you know, the customer journey starting from the day one, when the customer have any branding awareness with us. And you know, when the customer tries some product or purchase a product, use the product. And during the whole process, whole time period, enjoy this product. We have to understand, you know, our customer needs. And... Then when we talk about customer experience, we talk about whole life cycle. We talk about omnichannel. It's not about some single application, again, anymore. So, I think this is the biggest change in my field during the past years. 

Clinton: Yeah. And then, Lisa, you know, I... That part for me, nothing seemed, nothing standing out as diametrically opposed or even really different than how we see things, I think, in North America. But I think the evolution over to things that are more product mindset, and the holistic nature of the experience, versus, you know, a one-off thing that might happen that, hey, a great experience on mobile, but the rest really falls apart. Lisa, what might you add to that? 

Lisa: So, there is almost no difference in terms of that importance of the omnichannel experience. I would say the only thing that might vary a little bit is the timeline. Because I think that expectation and that idea, honestly, it was when Starbucks... Starbucks is sort of the one that invented that sort of holistic customer experience when they created an experience in the store that made you pay $5 for a cup of coffee that you never would have paid that much for coffee previously. So, there is that sort of service economy that started in the US, especially in the 2000s, when Starbucks became ubiquitous. And I know it seems like it's not related to what we do because it's not digital, but it was the idea of... It wasn't just about getting a cup of coffee, it was about creating a holistic experience around that cup of coffee. And so, they thought about the overall journey and the overall experience, and not just that one thing. But it's probably only been in the last, probably, 5 to 7 years that we've really started to apply that to digital. And some of that, I think, is because of the technology that's come out has made it easier for us to provide that than it was previously. 

Clinton: And I love that you mentioned Starbucks, because there's a lot of interesting things happening. The history of Starbucks, when Howard Schultz, you know, bought it out from a couple of dudes in Seattle, he wanted to go charge a buck a cup. And they were like, you're insane. And this is a while ago now, right? But they're like, you're out of your mind. You're not going to get a dollar a cup. Lo and behold, as you mentioned. Yeah, he did. Right? (Laughs) So... But the, I think some of the more interesting things of real recent history with Starbucks is, they created such a seamless mobile app ordering experience that they actually caused a lot of pressure on the baristas and the physical system itself. That they maybe made it so easy and good that they took away the specialty of it being like, your second or third place. I think Starbucks would say, hey, this is your second place. 

Lisa: Right. 

Clinton: And it became a transactional queue. Which is the exact opposite of what they intended to be when they started, when Howard Schultz took it over so he could charge that premium. So it's very interesting that of late, it's not like an over-rotation, because, like, oh, you made the mobile app too good. I don't think that's it. I think the system wasn't ready for the volume the mobile app could produce, and it actually ended up degrading the experience recently. And this is not an opinion of mine. This is, they just replaced the CEO to go figure this out because they're seeing this degradation. So Meghan, I wonder, in your... How you see it. Are there any examples out there where, you know, there's really great intentions through digital, but maybe sometimes they're just not aligned with the omnichannel, what has become, omnichannel in full experience in 2024 and beyond? 

Megan: Okay, I think I may give you, like, one experience. So, you know, the food delivery. 

Clinton: Yeah. 

Megan: As the end customer, I love food delivery. So in China, that's because everything is so fast. You know people is like, always has to be calmed down. And so, when I order some food on some platform, usually they promise, the platform promise me, that your food will be delivered in exactly some certain time based on the distance. So, for example, like they say, most of my food could be delivered in 30 minutes. So, on behalf of that, at the beginning, I really love it. Until I tried to understand more details about how they are running all those operations at the behind. Actually, in order to make sure I can get my food in 30 minutes, which is my experience, will be very good, all the delivery guy had a huge pressure. They have to be run very fast on the road, which is actually, I think, the safety issue actually is more and more. And now people is like, talk much about that. Why, you know, the platform, why the company, the digital platform has to be such strict KPI for the delivery guys, so that they rush to deliver the food and they don't care about the safety, they don't care their own safety. But you know, for the other people working on the road, we also want the safety. So this is something that we think, maybe it's a little, maybe too digitalized. Which is to, in order to improve the end customer experience, however, it does bring some other issues. This is maybe something I think is too much. 

Clinton: Yeah, that's a really cool example. Yeah, that's a really cool example. Lisa, what do you want to add? 

Lisa: Yeah. This is where service design comes in. So it's, speaking of another trend, of, you know, we went from experience designers and user experience designers and all of that, and service design, now, is really what is intended to take these things into consideration. So with service design, you start looking at the customer journey. But then you look at all of the people and processes and technologies and the business behind it, and that's how, you know, with the right service blueprint, you could identify, oh, well, if you make this so easy and transactional, you're going to break the system because people can't make coffee that fast. Or, you're going to cause accidents on the road because you put so much pressure on the driver to get it there in 30 minutes. And when you do a really robust service blueprint, you're taking all of that into consideration. So you can help identify, you know, you're going to need to solve for, this problem is going to pop up because it is... Megan, I love that example. Because, you have this amazing customer experience, and like, just no idea what's behind it. And it turns out what's behind it is a bad experience if you're the one that the delivery driver hits because he's speeding. (Laughs) 

Clinton: Yeah, it's a bit more of a digital butterfly effect than it maybe ever was. And it's just, I don't think that's going to stop. It's just, things are so interwoven. And as they become more and more omnichannel and ubiquitous, you're just going to have these downstream consequences that if you're not thinking critically about them when you're about to go do them, there's going to be some price to pay later down the road. And then, Megan, I know that you have a lot of experience also in the EV world. You know, electronic vehicles and that boom as well. I'd love to get your perspective of, you know, I'm on CNBC or Fox Business all the time. I see the China market and the EV competitors booming over there. 

Megan: Mhm. Yes. 

Clinton: And really, really competing toe to toe now with the best of the Teslas and what we see in North America and other places of the globe. What do you see in customer experience from EVs that's exciting you, or that you think should be questioned also? 

Megan: Okay. That is my favorite question. (Laughs) You know, so first, maybe I want to ask you another question first. 

Clinton: Sure. 

Megan: So, what do you think about, if you can have karaoke in the car? 

Clinton: I will... Lisa, I'll toss it to you in a second. 

(Laughter) 

Clinton: I think, what I think is, my initial reaction is, while fun, I already have no issue singing to my... You know, the radio, whether that's Sirius XM or, I don't have a CD player anymore, I wish I still did, but I had my CD Logic with lots of great memories. But I have no problem singing along as is. I don't think I need another thing to manipulate while, you know, potentially I'm driving. Now, if it's autonomous and it's a party mobile, maybe different. But Lisa, for now I'm a no on karaoke in the car. I just think it's overkill. 

Lisa: Both Clinton and I were singers in bands, or are, occasionally, still. I wouldn't want full-on karaoke, but I'd love a button where I could drop the vocals out, so it's just me singing along to the song. (Laughs) So I will put that out there. 

Megan: (Laughs) Okay. Do you know why I ask this question? So, because you were talking about us here in China, we have a lot of EVs, right? There are a lot of competitions. We do have a lot of, we call it the NEV, which is like, a, new startup companies. They do have some... So one of the, the brand is NIO, N-I-O, which is very famous. One of the most welcome function in the car is karaoke. And... (Laughs) And the young people just love it. You know, it's like, you know, some people, you know, you have the party, you have the friends, you just drive a couple of hours. You just go to, from the Shanghai to Hangzhou, the other city, it takes like 2 or 3 hours. So one's driving and the other people just sitting at the behind. And, you know, just enjoy that. People think electronic vehicle car is EV, it's not a car. It has to be very fun. And when we talk about fun, so, people spending a lot of effort on the, you know, the movie, the sound effects, and some gamification. And there is a brand that just has the best game engine. And NIO has the karaoke, has everything fun. I think, you know, this is maybe because of the customer experience changing. The young people, when they're buying the car, they're actually not expecting just some traditional ones, just to... They actually expecting, this is a car, this is very important. This should be, match, my lifestyle. 

Clinton: Yeah. 

Megan: This is, should be, a part of my life. 

Clinton: This is such a cool, cool pivot. It's really cool. It's great to hear this, too. I don't think that's quite here yet in North America. And Lisa, I'll toss to you in a second. But it's not surprising, because... And why is it not surprising? It's because, if you look at the EV world and who really penetrated the infotainment of that world, it was the game makers. It was like, you know, Epic Games. And they got in early with the EV market, and they're like, wait, we could transform this experience and give it what was really, actually, a game engine, right? So, the graphics, the experience. And so, it's not shocking that that gaming mentality and gaming experience has just kind of continued to pervade it. And, you know, the other piece is, as cars become more and more autonomous and that just becomes the norm, it won't take that long. Well, it seems like the experiences are even ahead of the autonomy that is coming from cars, to meet those needs nice and early. So hey, you get them when they're 16 years old or 17 years old, and they love the, that experience. Maybe in ten more years, 15 more years, when it truly is self-driving and the governance is in place for it as well, well, they're going to be locked into an ecosystem the same way people are locked into, let's say, Apple. So, Lisa, I don't know, have you seen this in North America yet, or is this kind of net new for you? 

Lisa: No. And I was actually going to say something very similar along the lines of what you just said, which is, we're definitely not... We're not... Well, this is something I'd be curious to talk to Megan about, also, differences between China and here. 

Megan: Yes. 

Lisa: We're definitely not at that point here. I think there's a couple of things. One is, here, I think the safety concerns. We're definitely experimenting with things like that, but I think there's a lot of concern about distracted driving. But, Clinton, to your point, this is the seed of the future. Because once... If you think about it, once automobiles become autonomous, and they will, there's no question. And I took a Waymo in San Francisco, and I can tell you, it was probably better than taking a regular cab. (Laughs) But, um, the idea is that the in-vehicle experience is going to 100% change. You're not going to need a steering wheel anymore. You're going to have all of this extra space. You're not going to have to be, you know, facing out front. And I see this as the seed of that future of, it's going to become an extension of your living room, or your house. If you're commuting for two hours, you're not going to need to be sitting like this anymore. So you can do karaoke and play games and do things like that. And so, I find it to be a fascinating peek into where we're going with in-vehicle design. 

Clinton: Mm. And Megan, I do wonder if that, in your opinion, is starting to impact air travel. China's a huge country. It's large physically, right? So, some some of those trips, you just can't cheat it. You gotta get on a plane. But I do wonder about those, like in North America, we would maybe say something like, you know, like a Boston to, say, DC. You know, some like, Northeast Corridor type flight that might take, just might take a few hours. Is that starting to permeate people's mentality? That's like, oh, let's hop in the car. Like, we don't need air travel for that type of trip. 

Megan: I think it depends. On the, in the east of China, so it's like a... Well, maybe something, some background I need to be explained. So, China government actually spent many years to build all the infrastructure. So, there's one number is, last year we are talking about the take rates. The take rate means, like, every 100 car being sold, how many EV included. Last year was a 36.8. And this year people is expecting to be, like, 40%. So, every 100 cars sold will be 40% of them is EV. Why, you know when people, before they buy EV, safety is definitely something, think about it. You know, like, the batteries, or are the... Have an accident or something. Another big concern is about charging. So, infrastructure. So, China government already spent so much huge investment to fix that issue a lot. So, in the east of China from Shanghai to Hangzhou for example, drive like three hours. So, you can just find a charging points anywhere. It's very convenient. So, this is something that people have less concern about it. 

Clinton: Very cool. 

Megan: I think this is one of the... Yeah, one of the reasons people would like to choose EV. 

Lisa: Yeah. We definitely... And here we definitely, in the US, do not have the infrastructure in place yet. So it is a concern that's driving automakers. Instead of building the infrastructure, it's, how do we increase the the battery capacity, right? So it's like, you can go four hours, you can go 400 miles, instead of thinking about, like, what do we actually do with the infrastructure? So that is an interesting difference that also indicates why China is a little bit further ahead in experimenting with different types of EV. Because EV here in the US is starting to get more and more adopted. 

Megan: Mhm. 

Lisa: But, yeah, the infrastructure is still presenting a challenge. 

Clinton: Yeah. So, I love the future-forward conversation we're having, which also screams, you can't have a conversation in 2024 about the future or about the present, and not talk about the role of gen AI, right? Generative AI. And how that might be transforming customer journeys. So, Lisa, I'll toss it to you first. Where are you seeing gen AI in terms of transforming customer journey? Is it just beginning? Is it becoming mature? Where are you seeing it and where would you put it on, like, a maturity scale? 

Lisa: I mean, again, it depends on... So I'm... First of all, we're seeing it everywhere. There's three places where we're seeing it specific to, sort of, the experience. So, one is the tool that designers use, which is sort of, it's important, but it's not like the, it's not the thing, it's not where everybody is focused. So there's sort of AI as a tool, but then there's AI as an interaction channel. So, AI agents to help you actually, you know, solve problems. And then there's the AI to use the customer data to create these bespoke experiences for anybody coming along. So, we are seeing, I would say, AI as an interaction channel. It's still pretty young, at least here, I'd say it's not super mature. AI for like, in terms of processing massive amounts of customer data to give those bespoke experiences. I'd hate to call it mature, but it's one of those things that grew up too fast, and it's maybe a little bit, um... I'm not exactly sure. Like, it's like, it's... If maturity is not necessarily number of years, like, maturity is, how well have we figured out how to use it ethically, and like, towards a good end? So, I do think that that's the one that's been around the longest, is the, you know, from, even before AI of, like, mining customer data to try to figure out what they want. AI just enables you to do it faster, more seamlessly. But yeah, that's the one where it's like, mature in quotes. (Laughs) Because it's been around for a while. But it's got a ways to go before we can really use it in a way that I think will benefit everybody. 

Clinton: Yeah. And I think, you know, before AI was the word, and of course it's been around a while, but certainly gotten red hot within the last, let's say, five years or so, and gen AI. I think it was simply called, at that point, with data, just data science. 

Lisa: Yeah. 

Clinton: Getting it... 

Lisa: Or big data. You get big, how do you turn big data into action? 

Clinton: Big data. Big data lakes. And then data science and algorithmists who really understood how to use it, to apply algorithms. And then you could apply AI to do a human-plus-machine combination to just enhance those algorithms and try lots of different ways to solve really tough problems. Like, combinatorial optimization problems, which are hard. But you needed those really great mathematicians to kick those things off. And now AI is really learning and catching up and probably superseding the mathematicians. And then, Megan, for you, with the EV conversation, your experiences in China were different. And they... Ahead, and potentially... Whether we call it ahead or just, hey, it's different for the time being, but really different experiences. Like, the karaoke example is perfect, and how... It's great. I love it because it's so, like, real. We all understand what that can mean. It's a piece of gravity that's bringing people to buy a specific car. Kind of insane to me, but now I get it. What about gen AI that you're seeing in your part of the world for customer journey? 

Megan: Love it. I think as Lisa said, you know, I don't say AI is mature. I always tell the other people, say, actually people are talking about AI for so many years. However, I define 2024, this year, is the beginning of the AI, gen AI. Because I think AI has just started. And that's why, actually, well, I'm working on the customer journey, customer experience. I cannot say I'm not, just give up that. So why I'm working on the customer experience, and I also love AI? I figured out, okay, I can love both. So why I use AI to enhance customer experience. This is actually, I try to make my job perfect. Especially in the EV world. The car has to be smart. For example, like, if I want to have a trip to Tibet. So, I can just tell my car, hey, I want to go, I want to have a trip to Tibet. The whole trip would be, like, ten days. And, you know, the car can help me to generate a plan. Can tell me, you know, what is the routine, the navigation you should drive, and how many charging stations on the road, and where you should stop. And next to the charging station, there is a restaurant, actually it's very good. You can just go to have lunch, enjoy the lunch, have a rest, and have your car charging. So, this is something that I think, this is already happening. And I believe that, after, you know, in the future, not very far, maybe like three years, five years, the car could be much more smart. 

Clinton: Yeah. And I love... This gets into certain things like, voice of the customer, or like, mind of the customer. Inside, again, we took it back to the EV world and the car world, which is great for me. And, Lisa, we had Clemens on, Clemens Conrad, a team member of ours at Launch by NTT Data, and he went over to both Tokyo Auto World and CES, kind of back to back weeks. But one of the things he came back with, I think it was from CES, he's like, yeah, there's applications of AI that they're showing off that are really just froth and hype. He's like, for example, I hopped in a, you know, a demo-able car and it was like, oh, it's Mother's Day, and you haven't thought to send your mother a card yet. AI can generate a card for you right now. And he was like, what use is that? He's like, that's just peak, a peak of the froth. I don't think that's actually a use case people care about. But then, Lisa, Megan just said, hey, I want to go to Tibet. And it probably knows a thing or three or four or five about Megan's preferences. And then can maybe help plan, if not the perfect trip, maybe 90% of a perfect trip in milliseconds. And what do you think the power... How powerful do you think that is for customers going forward? 

Lisa: Well, that's really the AI agent that I was talking about, which is... I know people think of AI agent as customer service agent, but that's not really what we're talking about. It's not just the agent when I have a problem and I call in, but the agent becomes... An AI agent can become your concierge. So, instead of doing all the research about Tibet and figuring out what you want to go see and all of that, you just ask. Hey, I want the perfect Tibetan vacation. This AI agent already knows you. It knows all of your preferences, and it sort of spits it out. And think about that in every aspect of your life. Like, the algorithm can know the kind of clothes that fit me, what kind of clothes I like, because it knows everything that I've bought to date. It knows the things I've returned and the things I've kept, right? So it has a really good idea. So then, I should just be able to go to the AI agent and say, I have a wedding coming up next weekend. It's on a Friday evening and it's semi-formal. Find me a dress. And it should just pop up, you know, those examples of the dresses. So that, I think, is the next big thing we're going to see in customer experience, is that AI agent that is, as much or as little as you want. You know, maybe I do want a reminder about Mother's Day. So I might, and it may know that. So it may then prompt that. So for Clemens, that might be something where it's like, why would I want that? And for somebody else they might be really happy that their car, I don't know if you care if their car reminded them, but... You know what I'm saying. And the idea of this AI agent, eventually, if you think far enough out into the future, it is going to be your agent. And it is going to follow you through all of your devices. It's going to be Jarvis, basically, it's your Jarvis to your Tony Stark. Where it is going to follow you, it's going to be on your phone, when you get in your car it's going to be in your car, it's going to know you. It's going to become a little bit more like a personal assistant than an interaction channel. 

Clinton: And I wonder, Megan... Well, I'll speak for America, how presumptive for me. 

(Laughter) 

Clinton: But I will. I'll speak for, you know, Americans, in the sense that, there is a trust gap between big technology and the American mindset. And I'm sure there are some people that are like, give me that yesterday. What, you know, you just described and what Lisa is describing also. And I bet there's a healthy percentage that are like, no, never, thanks. Thank you, but no. Like, you don't need to know me that level. Because you are handing over quite a bit of decisionmaking authority, especially if it becomes ubiquitous and you just kind of like, okay, you gave me three dress choices and away we go. Or, that's the place I should go see in Tibet. There's going to be that healthy skeptic that goes, well, who's controlling that decision? Like, where is that coming from? And I think that many North Americans, specifically Americans, will have that skepticism. And I think with some good reason, with things that have happened in the past. But how does that play out in China? Is there... Is that skepticism there? Or are consumers more willing to take that direction easily? 

Megan: Okay. I'm not saying all the people is, are very open. Actually, I've been facing a lot of people, actually... Well, some of the people told me it's like, when I talk about it, I'm, okay, I'm working for the customer on the EV, people say, like, I hate EV. 

Clinton: Hm. 

Megan: And I hate, you know, all those... You know, people, some people even talking, they think it's very scary that, you know, something like a digital application knows him so much. But me, I'm with a lot of people. I really love this. Because, you know, it's just, it can help me to make my life so easier. To make it, like, so convenient, right? So, I just... Talk about EV again, I just give you another sample. So this is another China internet giant, they actually used to, in the past, they only focus on the smart home. For example, like, all the locks, the digital locks, all the smart kitchen, the smart bedroom, something. And suddenly they say, okay, I want to produce cars. And we, my team, we just for fun, we even had, like, imagination. We just created this whole lifestyle. You know, think about it. So, how life could be very easier, if you have the whole setup of those, the smart home and smart car. And so, when you're, in the morning, when you just, you leave home, when you lock the door... When you lock the door, when you walk to the car, to the basement, you know, to find your car. Your car is already understand, hey, you're leaving. So the car will start overheating. Turn on the air condition to just create a very comfortable car environment for you. When you walk down to there, you already, especially in the winter, you already had a very comfortable car. You're going to there. And when you drive your car, when you leave, you know, your, maybe your lights, you don't have to turn off all the lights. Your smart home already knows that you are driving. You're already leaving home. All the lights just turn off. And all the air conditioning just, you know, turn off. And after work, you just start the navigation, when you're driving home, and your home realize you're going back. Your smart kitchen start cooking, and your air conditioning start turning on, and it creates a very comfortable, warm environment, homey environment when you walk to home. Think about that. For me it's like, okay, maybe there's a little scary, you know, maybe some application knows me too much. Maybe one day they want to replace me, because my home maybe is too comfortable. My AI said, hey, this is my home, too, just, you know. (Laughs) But however, at least today, I'm enjoy all the benefits, all the advantages that AI bring to me. This is, I think, just compare that. Yeah. 

Clinton: Yeah. And I think... So, Lisa, I love that Megan brought it back to, you know, this is, at its best, of course there's advancements that AI can help us with that are in the health realm and things of that nature that are like, let's go solve cancer. Like, things like, that AI, computer vision could absolutely help us go do, which is tremendous. Then there's also just the raising of the human level of experience. You have to remember, there's a large portion of the globe that still does not have access to cheap power, cheap energy, and even, like, access to clean water and electricity. And internet. Large percentages of the globe, still. And again, just like the karaoke maybe being ahead in Shanghai inside EVs, the vision that Megan's pointing, it's like, well, if someone doesn't quite have clean water yet, how could they envision the future that Megan's talking about? But it will catch up. And it will, you know, the other places will generate the energy and get it distributed so that they could really uplevel the life of everybody in those societies that don't have it yet. And you can look at India. India's jump in the last 30 to 40 years, it's unbelievable. And they have, you know, 1.2 billion people or so to go serve. And they're leapfrogging other societies because... They're growing up in a, they're growing up, they're maturing as an economy, and have matured as an economy, in a time where the technology allowed them to really accelerate. And go into a digital-first environment. So, yeah, I'm not sure there's a question there, Lisa, but my fascination with AI for good. AI for... 

Lisa: Right. 

Clinton: ...For making things simpler on humans, that are comfort things, and just, and that have societal impact. But also, if those things become easier for humans, where can they go focus their time? And how do you think that time will get focused if they're not toiling in things that were tasks even five, ten years ago? 

Lisa: Yeah, I mean, there's sort of two sides to this. So the one side is that, yes, that's the promise of all of this, is that you have this Star Trek future, that I call, which is a very bright future, where you're working side by side with AI and robots and whatever, and it all makes your life so easy that you actually can become an explorer or, you know, explore art or learn a musical instrument, right? You can fulfill yourself further. But there's also that side of, like, it can help with human fulfillment. There is always going to be the dark side of, I've read enough dystopian sci-fi to see what happens if nobody has to work. And then, do people atrophy? Or do they, you know, become better than themselves? So there's a lot of, sort of, moral implications of this. But the fact is, it's changing. Like, yes, there's moral implications, but we're going to figure it out. For better or worse. We may not... You know, I think social media and the algorithms behind social media taught us that, not 100% sure we're better off now than we were before from a social discourse perspective. But I also... So, I'm old enough to remember everybody being afraid that computers were going to take over. Computers were going to take people's jobs. And that, man, we wouldn't have to work. We're having the same conversation. So what do you do when computers come in and take stuff over, and then you don't have to do those manual tasks and whatever? And I'll tell you what it did. It created a whole new industry. That the four of us are employed in. (Laughs) So, it creates those openings. So, where I'm going to be curious is, I'm not sure I'm buying the, AI is going to make things so easy that we can then just pursue whatever we want, and nobody ever has to work. I'm more curious, like, what new industries are going to come out of this, that are going to create different kinds of jobs than what we have currently. So, I'm fascinated to see, like, the, already different things coming out. Like, you know, from a designer perspective, designers becoming designers of relationships. Because now I'm not designing an interface, I'm designing somebody's AI agent that they're going to be interacting with. So I find, I just find that, like, directionally, it's very fascinating where it could go, and very terrifying, where it could go. 

Clinton: Well, I think that's a fun place to end this conversation. Fascinating, terrifying. We don't know what the future holds. We sure are going to try to shape it. And I want to give Lisa some kudos there. Lisa just said, the four of us, you might be like, wait, I've only heard three voices so far. So Lisa, ever so gracious, we have a producer on with us as well. Another Megan, who's hanging in the back room. So, Lisa, I appreciate that, and I think the listeners should know that you were very courteous to include her in that description of, all four of us do work within technology and use digital platforms, which is really cool. Megan, it was awesome to have you on, and I love where this conversation pivoted to and went. Getting that glimpse of your side of the world and what is happening over in China and Shanghai, and as you travel globally. And then us marrying that with what we're seeing in North America, gives folks a really good landscape of the differences, the similarities, and maybe a little futurecasting along the way, which I think we did really successfully today. So, Megan and Lisa, thank you so much for sharing your invaluable insights. And we touched a lot on how AI is playing a role in customer experiences. We talked EVs, we talked karaoke. We had a lot of fun. I feel like we had a lot of fun today. So, thanks so much. And for our listeners out there, we hope you found today's discussion as enlightening and inspiring as we did. Thank you again, and join us next time as we continue our exploration into the cutting edge of digital transformation on Catalyst, the Launch by NTT Data podcast. 

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