Guest Speakers Reveal Where AI Belongs In CX — And How Leaders Protect Trust

2026-04-27 · Source: Featured Blogs - Forrester · Field: Business & Management — Operations & Process Management, Project & Product Management, Marketing, Branding & Advertising · Depth: Intermediate, short

Summary

The CX Forum East, scheduled for June 16–17, 2026, in New York City, will feature guest speakers addressing the integration of AI into customer experience (CX) strategies. Leaders from New York Life, Voya Financial, Amazon Ads, U.S. Bank, Consensys, and former Disney innovation head Duncan Wardle will discuss moving from general AI adoption to intentional deployment. Key topics include planning for agentic AI, designing coherent experiences with AI-enabled workflows, optimizing customer self-service with automation, and fostering human creativity in harmony with AI. The forum emphasizes deliberate planning, clarifying AI's value, maintaining accountability, and preserving human oversight in CX operations.

Key takeaway

For CX leaders developing AI strategies, prioritize intentional deployment over broad adoption. Focus on clarifying where AI adds value, ensuring human oversight, and maintaining accountability. Your approach should integrate AI to enhance design workflows and self-service, while also creating space for human creativity and empathy, rather than simply automating tasks.

Key insights

Intentional AI deployment in CX requires clear strategy, human oversight, and deliberate design to maintain trust and coherence.

Principles

• Prioritize AI intent over mere adoption.
• Design foundations must be resilient for AI integration.
• AI should augment human creativity, not replace it.

Method

Plan for agentic AI by clarifying use cases, assessing impact on roles/processes, and establishing accountability. Design experiences with strong governance to prevent fragmentation as AI scales.

In practice

• Identify specific agentic AI use cases.
• Establish governance for AI-enabled design workflows.
• Evaluate self-service automation for problem-solving.

Topics

• AI in Customer Experience
• Agentic AI Deployment
• CX Design Workflows
• Customer Self-Service
• Human-AI Collaboration

Best for: Executive, Product Manager, Director of AI/ML, Consultant, AI Product Manager

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Editorial summary, takeaway, and curation by AIssential. Original article published by Featured Blogs - Forrester.