Building a Customer-Centric Culture: Leadership, Governance and Service Excellence – Dubai, 26–30 Apr 2027

Programme overview

Technical depth: Conceptual · Practical mode: Case study

Introduction

Most organisations say the customer comes first, yet budgets, incentives and decision rights still reward internal targets, and customer experience initiatives fade once the launch campaign ends. Frontline staff notice the gap between stated values and what leaders measure. This Core Concept course equips executives to diagnose their organisation's real culture, judge where it works against customers and decide the leadership, governance and incentive changes that make customer focus stick. Participants examine cases from several sectors and leave with a Customer-Centric Culture Roadmap for their own organisation.

Course Objectives

• Diagnose the gap between an organisation's stated customer values and its actual culture using recognised culture models
• Evaluate the organisation against the ISO 23592 service excellence model and the EFQM Model 2025
• Define a customer promise and the leadership behaviours that visibly support it
• Decide the CX governance, decision rights and incentive changes needed for cross-functional accountability
• Judge the risks, resistance and return on investment of a culture change programme
• Present a Customer-Centric Culture Roadmap for board or executive committee endorsement

Target Audience

• Chief executives, general managers and managing directors setting organisational direction
• Executive committee members responsible for customer-facing divisions
• Chief customer, experience and marketing officers leading customer strategy
• Human resources and people directors shaping culture, reward and capability
• Heads of strategy and transformation accountable for enterprise change portfolios

Course Outline

Day 1: Why Customer-Centricity Stalls

• Product-Led Versus Customer-Led Organisation Models
• Service-Profit Chain Linking Employee and Customer Outcomes
• Schein's Three Levels of Culture: Artefacts, Values and Assumptions
• CX Maturity Review Against the CXPA Competency Framework
• Executive Current-State Review of Silos, Incentives and Decision Rights

Day 2: Frameworks for Customer-Centric Organisations

• ISO 23592 Service Excellence Principles and Model
• EFQM Model 2025: Direction, Execution and Results
• Denison Organisational Culture Model and Survey Dimensions
• Johnson and Scholes Cultural Web for Customer-Centric Diagnosis
• ISO 10001 Customer Codes of Conduct as Public Commitments

Day 3: Leading the Culture from the Top

• Customer Promise and Brand Values Articulation
• Leadership Behaviour Charter and Role-Modelling Routines
• CX Governance Model: Steering Committee, CX Office and Decision Rights
• Employee Experience Alignment of Hiring, Onboarding and Recognition Criteria
• Executive Customer Immersion and Frontline Listening Routines

Day 4: Accountability, Risk and Return

• Incentive and Performance Contract Alignment Using the Balanced Scorecard
• Customer OKRs for Cross-Functional Accountability
• Culture Change Risk Register Aligned to ISO 31000
• Kotter's 8-Step Process Applied to Culture Change
• CX Return on Investment Case Evaluation

Day 5: Case Work and the Culture Roadmap

• Airline Case Study: Rebuilding Frontline Empowerment After Service Failures
• Public Utility Case Study: Moving from Compliance Targets to Customer Outcomes
• Culture Gap Scorecard for an Own Organisation
• Customer-Centric Culture Roadmap Drafting
• Executive Peer Panel and Roadmap Defence

Skills You Will Gain

• Culture Diagnosis
• Customer Strategy Leadership
• CX Governance Design
• Incentive Alignment
• Service Excellence Evaluation
• Culture Change Risk Oversight
• CX Investment Appraisal

Why Attend This Course

• Leave with a Customer-Centric Culture Roadmap for your own organisation, tested by fellow executives
• See where your own incentives and decision rights quietly work against the customer promise
• Judge proposals from CX teams and consultants against recognised service excellence models
• Exchange experience with executives from other sectors and countries leading the same shift

Conclusion

Customer focus lasts only when leaders build it into how the organisation decides, rewards and governs, not just into its value statements. This course moves from diagnosing why customer-centricity stalls, through the service excellence and culture models that define it, to the leadership routines, governance, incentives and risks that decide whether it holds. The final day turns that material into a Customer-Centric Culture Roadmap that participants take back to their executive colleagues as the agenda for the change they will lead.