Customer Success Playbook S3 E 64 - Jake McKee - AI Voice and AI Adoption

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The future of AI isn't just about technology—it's about relationships. Jake McKee, renowned as "the community guy," delivers a paradigm-shifting perspective on AI adoption that goes far beyond features and functionality. Rather than getting caught up in the technical capabilities, McKee advocates for designing the emotional connection between humans and AI systems. This customer success playbook episode reveals why the most successful AI implementations focus on relationship design, helping users feel comfortable whether they're interacting with a clearly identified robot or a humanistic assistant. McKee draws from his extensive experience at Lego and Fortune 500 companies to demonstrate how thoughtful AI experience design can transform user adoption and trust.

Detailed Analysis

McKee's revolutionary concept of "AI Experience Design" (AIX) represents a fundamental shift in how organizations should approach AI implementation. His core principle—"design the relationship, not the functionality"—challenges the prevailing rush to launch AI features without considering the human emotional experience. The discussion reveals critical insights about user psychology, particularly how people naturally anthropomorphize AI systems, using phrases like "please" and "thank you" even when they know they're communicating with machines.

The conversation explores the delicate balance between AI enthusiasm and appropriateness, referencing recent challenges with overly enthusiastic AI responses. McKee emphasizes that successful AI relationships require the same nuanced understanding we apply to human interactions—matching energy levels, providing appropriate friction for creative processes, and recognizing when users need quick answers versus thoughtful collaboration.

Perhaps most importantly, this customer success playbook demonstrates how AI transformation requires understanding context and purpose. A customer service agent dealing with frustrated callers needs rapid, efficient AI assistance, while a creative professional benefits from AI that provides "good friction"—intentional slowdowns that prompt deeper thinking rather than overwhelming users with instant responses. This strategic approach to AI experience design ensures technology serves human needs rather than creating additional complexity.

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Episode Transcript

Kevin Metzger (00:05):
Customer success.

Roman Trebon (00:10):
Hi everyone, and welcome to the Customer Success
Playbook podcast, where we bringyou actionable insights for
creating meaningful customerexperiences.
I'm your host, Roman Trevon.
Joined by me, as always, is myco-host Kevin Metzker.
Today we're excited to welcomesomeone who's deep into driving
humanistic AI design.
Kev, I know you're excited aboutthis.
You wanna tell our audience, uh,a little bit more about our

(00:32):
guest today?

Kevin Metzger (00:33):
Our guest today is Jake McKee, better known as
the community guy.
From steering fan relationshipsat Lego to architecting AI
experience design programs forFortune 500 brands.
Jake's mission is simple.
Make tech feel human.
Jake, great to have you here.
Thanks.
Appreciate the invite.
I'm excited to talk.

Roman Trebon (00:53):
Jake, let's get right into it.
Our Monday show is our numberone tip, so our, our big tip.
So what is your single best tipfor ensuring companies, uh, can
make sure that their customerstrust?
Adopt new AI poweredexperiences.

Jake McKee (01:10):
It's a good place to start.
I think the answer I alwaysstart with right now as we start
talking about this idea of AIexperience design or, or IX, as
I call it.
Is to design the relationship,not the functionality.
It's a weird concept, uh, this,this AI X idea of designing the
relationship between the humanand the intelligent AI system.

(01:32):
But we are starting to feel, uh,and think about the, the
connection we have with thesetools as.
Relationship.
Right.
And those systems are startingto behave.
Uh, we're anthropomorphizingthem to some extent with valid
reason to do so.
Uh, you know, we're using thingthings like the words please,
and thank you.
When we're a asking, uh, for,for answers to our prompts,

(01:56):
whether the machine hassentience or, or we just believe
it kinda doesn't matter at thispoint, right?
We're really making some, somemental and emotional connection
and I think we.
We're, we are really seeing ahuge rush to launch technology.
Um, and I think there's a realneed to, to kind of slow that
down and think about not justhow the, how the systems work

(02:17):
from a ui ux standpoint, butalso how do they feel, how are
we making the users feel?
How does the system design, um,help people warm up into that
experience?
How do they transition out ofthat experience and back into it
later?
Um, you know, what other kindsof content activities.
Experience elements are weadding to make sure that we are
not feeling uncomfortablebecause either we think we're

(02:38):
talking to a robot or because wethink we're talking to a real
person.
Sometimes I'd rather talk to therobot, right?
And know that it's a robot and,and have some comfort there.
Other times I want it to beextremely humanistic, uh, and
feel like it's humanistic,right?
So, you know, really thinkingabout designing the
relationship, not just thetechnology or the features

Kevin Metzger (02:54):
when it comes to designing the relationship and.
Chat.
GPT recently did a rollback of,uh, GPT-4 because it was overly
enthusiastic.
And a matter of fact, uh, Ithink, uh, there was some kind
of crazy thing where they werelike, I left my family because
they were making me feel bad,and I felt like it was the right

(03:16):
thing to do.
The response from chat amputeewas, that's awesome.
You should feel very proud ofyourself on one hand.
On the other hand, obviouslythrough the process of anthropo.
Hard work to say, you know, wecan actually go too far or, or
do things the wrong way.
So when you're thinking aboutthis from a business
perspective, what's a key kindof thought around how you use

(03:40):
the AI in the transaction?
Some of the key things you'rethinking about?

Jake McKee (03:45):
Yeah, the number one thing, and I think you're,
you're bringing up a reallyinteresting point here because
enthusiasm is not necessarilybad.
I don't necessarily want thetools to be that enthusiastic.
I know other people that do.
If I talk to three people in thecourse of a day, I may have
three very differentconversation styles based on who
those three people are.
Right?
And that's fine.

(04:06):
I'm able to morph.
Appropriately for thoseconversations, right?
I'm not fundamentally changingmyself, but if one person's high
energy, I might meet that withhigh energy.
If one person's low energy, Imight meet that with low energy
as well, right?
There's nothing wrong with that.
It's not good or bad, it just iswhat it is, and, and part of
designing these systems is to,it's to start recognizing things
like that, right?
It's not to do away withenthusiasm, it's.

(04:27):
To really think about how do webalance it out?
And when we talk aboutrelationship design, one of the
cool things about relationshipdesign is we have a lot to draw
on from our own personalexperiences.
Right.
And at asking the folks I workwith, Hey, let's back up.
If this was a real human, whatwould you want from it?
What would you do?
How would you expect it to act?
You know, we have a lot moreknowledge than we may think just

(04:48):
because we've lived.
In the world for however manyyears we've lived in the world,
and we've had however manyrelationships with, with other
humans that we've had, and we'retrying to make these systems
more humanistic in order to helpus.
But the other piece of this is,I think, really being clear on,
on what the goal of your systemis.
If I'm a, uh, agent on thephones and I'm using an AI, uh,

(05:08):
tool to help me, you know, findthe right answers for somebody
who's calling in, has been onhold for 20 minutes.
30 minutes longer sometimes, andthey finally gotten to me.
I want to be able to get in, getthose answers and get out.
That's a very differentexperience than when I'm working
personally on writing things formy LinkedIn newsletter or trying
to come up with a.

(05:29):
Narrative for a document I'mworking on or a presentation or
something, I want a little bitof good friction is what I call
it, right?
It's one of my operatingprinciples for the A IX work.
Is, is, is make good friction.
How do I slow down at the righttimes?
How do I start to, IM inputimperfection in ways that might
prompt my brain to thinkdifferently than just give the
answer I asked for the questionI asked, right?

(05:50):
Because I am in, in a mode ofcreation where I'm using, in
this example.
As my creative and criticalpartner, I need a little bit of
slowing down old fighter pilotthing.
That slow is smooth and smoothis fast, right?
Instead of just blasting answersout at me that it's, it feels
overwhelming and I'm not reallysure how to pick out my own
ideas from the blast of content.
I'm just getting, you know, howdo we slow that down?

(06:11):
Don't gimme 50 differentexamples, gimme one, and then
say, you know, here's threequestions about that to help
prompt me into thinking throughthis process.
But those are two very differentexperiences and I think, you
know, really.
Understanding the, therelationship and the connection
you're trying to build to thatsystem and what kind of reliance
you'll have on it, how oftenyou'll use it, you know, just

(06:33):
this is relationship design,right?
That we all know and love fromour own lives.
Sometimes I know, uh, somebodyfrom a work environment and I
only reach out to'em every oncein a while and they only reach
out to me every once in a whilewhen we're needing something in
particular.
And that's perfectly fine.
Yeah.
Right.
Unless one person is reallythinking, I'm going to create a
really great friendship withJake, and then all he does is,

(06:54):
you know, ping me when he needssomething.
Right?
There's that imbalance, right?
And I think that's, that'sreally what we're talking about
is how do you really create thatrelationship in the way that
makes sense for the peopleinvolved, the entities involved,
they'll say.

Roman Trebon (07:05):
This is great stuff Jake.
Thanks for kicking off our weekwith your, with your tip on, on
adopting ai, design therelationship.
Right.
Is that the one we're walking?
That's right.
Design the relationship.
I love it.
Yeah.
So, um, Jake, you're gonna comeback on Wednesday.
Hopefully we didn't scare youoff.
Absolute, absolutely.
We're come back on Wednesday,right?
Uh, and we're gonna get into ourone big question.
Good.
Uh, we're gonna talk about howcustomer success and marketing

(07:28):
teams could work together todrive long-term value.
Make sure you subscribe to ouraudience so you don't miss it.
Until next time, Kevin, keep on.