Experiences Elevated

I always look forward to the last week of December — a week to reflect the memories from the year gone by, rejuvenate and reimagine the plans for the upcoming new year. 2020 being a special year, the last week of December turned out to be even more exciting. Reflections from the year led to lots of memories. Memories of the conversations with some of our retail clients who were seeing their physical stores shut wanting to open the experience-driven digital doors at speed. Memories of conversation that enabled the Governments to get relief for their citizens at speed and helped them communicate with them at the time of uncertainty. Memories of my team who worked undeterred and continued creating outstanding experiences for the clients in their new offices– WFH and then WFA. Memories of figuring out new mechanisms to engage our clients in innovation-led conversation at a time when we could not meet in person. Added to that some exciting personal memories — the launch of Pune innovation floor, shifting base from Pune to Bangalore, uncertainties around quarantine and what if.

One common thread that bound all these exciting memories was the reshaping of experiences all around us.

As I gazed into 2021, I started thinking of why not to share some of these experience stories in the form of “Experiences Elevated” — a series of tales that affect all walks of life — our customers across industries, our customers’ consumers, their ecosystem partners, their employees, government, citizens, etc. The very thought of starting the series rejuvenated me.

Experience — A very powerful word that leads to many interpretations.

Some see this as how our sensory organs perceive the changes around us giving us a range of emotions ranging from an aha moment to anger, comparison with memories from the past to imagining the future. Some see experience to be living that life in it like you and me, that is based on needs, intents, preferences and flexes itself to adapt to the one who is experiencing it.

With digital getting into all walks of life, organizations trying to be better at gaining market share for their products and services, the key question that arises is how they can use the experience as a differential to drive business.

Pandemic re-aligned experience-driven economy. For some clients, it became a matter of survival, for some differentiation and taking pole position in their peer group but came to the forefront.

It got me thinking that while experience-oriented business appears intuitive and exciting, what are those components that define the Experience Carousal. When polled, here are some of the responses I got depicted below.

As I see this through my practitioner’s lens, I thought it is a great opportunity to capture some of the living stories around this through my Experiences Elevated blog and see which of these elements emerge prominently in each. I am sure, as you look for answers, a combination of experience and insights from the stories and components from the experience carousel will give the answer that you are looking for.

Onto my Experiences Elevated blog and the first story — a story of Flying High — https://shridhar-rajgopalan.medium.com/experiences-elevated-flying-high-156f8aa4a96

I would love to hear your comments.