Punk’s not dead—it’s in the boardroom

A few years ago Adrian Swinscoe, a customer experience consultant, was lamenting that the field had become overly focused on benchmarks, metrics, and other abstract notions removed from actually connecting with customers. “People were getting so much into the details, they were losing sight of the customer,” he says. If only, Swinscoe mused to a friend over a beer, someone could just do something a bit more “punk.” As Swinscoe, who counts Bad Religion among his favorite bands, thought about what exactly that could mean, he realized the analogy felt fairly apt. After all, he says, punk evolved roughly 50 years ago partly as a reaction to rock ’n’ roll genres that had become overly focused on production and instrumentation, rather than making entertaining music. Punk musicians have long made up for a lack of rigorous training with energy, enthusiasm, and an authentic, do-it-yourself spirit. “Here’s three chords,” goes one variation of a punk-rock cliché. “Now start a band.” Swinscoe believed the same stripped-down approach could work for customer experience, and he began putting together what became his 2019 book Punk CX, a cheeky guide with an aesthetic inspired by classic punk art…