CCO Says AI Success in CX is About Knowing When to Keep Things Human
Paul Comfort explains why AI works best in CX when it handles research and routine work while humans retain relationships, trust, and strategic judgment.
Paul Comfort
SVP and CCO at Modaxo Americas and ANZ
Strategic Shift: AI is moving CX leadership beyond operations toward trust, strategy, and complex relationship-driven decisions.
Practical Workflow: AI helps customer experience leaders research accounts, prepare meetings, and transform conversations into content within minutes.
Human Judgment: Leaders should reserve relationship-building, conflict resolution, and strategic decisions for human judgment despite AI’s efficiency.
Critical Risk: AI can confidently produce inaccurate information, making human review essential for every important communication and claim.
Readiness Test: Curious CX teams gain the most from AI, while weak customer experiences may scale disappointment faster.
Paul Comfort is SVP and CCO at Modaxo Americas and ANZ. He's also the host of the Transit Unplugged podcast and TV series, and the author of Find Your X Factor.
We interviewed Paul about how AI is changing his role and reshaping customer experience organizations. Here's what he said.
Customer Experience Leadership and Thought Leadership
I’m Paul Comfort, Senior Vice President and Chief Customer Officer for Modaxo Americas and ANZ. My role is to strengthen customer relationships, help our businesses better understand and serve transit agencies, and build executive-level engagement across North America, Australia, and New Zealand.
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I uniquely combine traditional customer experience leadership with thought leadership. Through executive interviews, industry events, consulting, and my Transit Unplugged podcast and TV series, I engage with transit leaders around the world, creating conversations that lead to stronger customer relationships and better outcomes for our clients.
Why AI Will Shift CX Leadership to Strategic Roles
I believe the future of CX leadership is becoming less operational and more strategic.
As AI handles routine analysis and repetitive tasks, I’ll spend even more time building trust, strengthening executive relationships, influencing organizational strategy, and solving complex human problems.
The organizations that succeed won’t be the ones with the most AI. They'll be the ones with leaders who combine AI with authentic human connection.
How AI Can Be Used in Communications and Research
I rely on AI to do the following:
- Research customers before meetings
- Monitor transit agency news and industry trends
- Prepare executive briefings
- Personalize communications
- Develop presentations and graphics
I never delegate relationship-building or conflict resolution to AI, nor do I delegate decisions requiring strategic judgment or an understanding of what is truly in the customer’s best interest.
AI gives me better information and helps me communicate more effectively, but I make the decisions.
How AI Enhances Customer Meeting Preparation
Leaders should not walk into a meeting without understanding the customer. AI helps with that…That level of preparation leads to better conversations, stronger relationships, and a better customer experience.
Leaders should not walk into a meeting without understanding the customer. AI helps with that. Here's the workflow that I use every week.
I use ChatGPT to research the organization, recent news, competitive environment, leadership changes, strategic priorities, likely challenges, and the background of the person I'm speaking with to fully prepare for the conversation.
That level of preparation leads to better conversations, stronger relationships, and a better customer experience.
After the meeting, I use AI to turn the topic into useful audience-facing content. That includes SEO-optimized titles, descriptions, newsletters, LinkedIn posts, presentation graphics, and executive briefings.
What once took several hours now takes less than one.
How AI Increases Both Speed and Quality
The biggest benefit I’ve experienced is increased speed without sacrificing quality.
AI helps me produce executive briefings, presentations, articles, graphics, and customer communications in a fraction of the time. It also helps me identify trends, explore ideas, and challenge my thinking, leaving me more time for informed conversations and relationship-building with customers.
And the increased speed gives me more time to build relationships with customers.
The biggest downside is that AI can occasionally present inaccurate information very confidently. In fact, I'd say that AI overconfidence is the biggest risk that CX leaders underestimate. I’ve learned that every important communication and every factual claim still requires my review and judgment.
Why Humans Must Handle Human Relationships
AI falls short in understanding human relationships.
It doesn’t fully understand the history between organizations, the political realities inside public agencies, or the trust built over years of working together. I still bring those elements to every customer conversation.
It can imitate empathy, but it can’t genuinely build trust. Customers can tell the difference between authentic concern and automated concern.
The moments that matter most still require human leadership.
Why Effective Prompting has Become a Leadership Skill
AI is only as good as the context you provide to it. I wish I had realized that sooner.
The more background, examples, and direction I give it, the more useful it becomes. Learning how to prompt AI effectively has become an important leadership skill.
And when it comes to effective AI use, here's an important point. If your customer experience is already strong, AI will help you scale it. But if it’s weak, AI will simply help you disappoint customers faster.
How Curiosity Signals AI Readiness in CX Teams
Curiosity is the strongest predictor of successful AI adoption.
The organizations moving fastest aren’t necessarily the ones with the biggest AI budgets. They’re the ones whose leaders are willing to experiment, learn, and adapt.
If a CX organization spends more time defending existing processes than questioning their necessity, it isn't ready for AI.
How to Know If You're Using AI the Wrong Way in CX
My advice is simple: Don’t implement AI because it’s exciting. Implement it because it solves a real problem.
My advice is simple: Don’t implement AI because it’s exciting. Implement it because it solves a real problem.
Start small, experiment often, and always ask whether AI is giving you more time to build relationships and create value. If it’s creating distance between you and your customers, you’re using it the wrong way.
Follow along
You can follow Paul Comfort's work on LinkedIn. Or check out his Transit Unplugged podcast and his book, Find Your X Factor.
More expert interviews to come on The CX Lead!
