14 Principles for a CX Focused Company
Apply W. Edwards Deming's 14 Points to build a customer experience–driven company culture that improves retention, satisfaction, and long-term growth.
Customer experience isn’t a department. It’s a way of thinking—and behaving—across your entire organization. If you’re serious about designing experiences that reduce churn, increase loyalty, and drive growth, then CX has to become part of your company’s DNA.
One of the most durable roadmaps for this kind of cultural transformation? W. Edwards Deming’s 14 Points for Management.
While originally crafted for manufacturing, Deming’s system-wide thinking and focus on quality improvement are surprisingly modern—and incredibly relevant for building a CX-first organization.
Let’s break it down.
1. Create constancy of purpose
Commit to customer experience not as a campaign, but as a long-term investment. CX isn’t about quick wins; it’s about reducing friction, increasing clarity, and creating value at every touchpoint.
CX takeaway: Make customer experience a strategic priority, not a side project.
2. Adopt the new philosophy
The new standard is not meeting expectations—it’s surprising people with how thoughtful and human your experience feels. Every company claims they care. Very few make people feel it.
CX takeaway: Shift from tech-centered thinking to experience-centered design.
3. Cease dependence on inspection
Don’t rely on customer support to “catch” bad experiences. Design systems that prevent them.
CX takeaway: Bake usability, accessibility, and empathy into the design process—don’t duct-tape them on later.
4. End the practice of awarding business on price tag alone
Choosing vendors, tools, or consultants based solely on cost undermines CX. You can’t build trust on unstable infrastructure.
CX takeaway: Invest in partners who share your values and long-term CX mindset.
5. Improve constantly and forever the system
CX isn’t a one-off project. It’s an operating system. Map the journey, measure friction, and continuously refine every step.
CX takeaway: Set up a CX improvement loop with regular feedback, iteration, and accountability.
6. Institute training on the job
You can’t improve customer experience if your team doesn’t understand what good looks like. Or why it matters.
CX takeaway: Train everyone—from engineering to sales—on your CX principles and their role in upholding them.
7. Institute leadership
Leaders set the tone. If CX doesn’t matter to the executive team, it won’t matter to the rest of the org.
CX takeaway: Make customer stories, not just metrics, part of leadership conversations.
8. Drive out fear
You can’t improve anything if people are afraid to speak up. That includes internal systems and customer insights.
CX takeaway: Create safe spaces for teams to flag CX issues, even when they’re messy or inconvenient.
9. Break down barriers between departments
Your customer doesn’t care about your org chart. Their experience is horizontal. Your teams should be too.
CX takeaway: Form cross-functional CX working groups—designers, devs, ops, support, marketing—all solving for the same journey.
10. Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets
“Delight customers” isn’t a strategy. It’s a poster. What matters is what you do, not what you say.
CX takeaway: Replace platitudes with real, measurable actions that improve experience.
11. Eliminate numerical quotas
Focus on outcomes, not output. A higher ticket resolution rate means nothing if the underlying experience still sucks.
CX takeaway: Align KPIs with value delivered, not just tasks completed.
12. Remove barriers to pride in workmanship
Great CX happens when people are proud of what they build. Don’t crush that with rigid process or short-sighted incentives.
CX takeaway: Give your team ownership over improving experience—not just executing tickets.
13. Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement
Customer experience is a moving target. Learning is how you stay relevant.
CX takeaway: Encourage everyone to study behavioral science, service design, and systems thinking—not just job-specific skills.
14. Put everyone to work to accomplish the transformation
Everyone owns the customer experience. Everyone shapes the culture.
CX takeaway: Make CX part of onboarding, team retros, product reviews, and performance cycles.
Final Thought
You don’t build a great customer experience by accident. You build it by aligning your whole organization around quality, care, and continuous improvement.
Deming’s 14 points give us a timeless blueprint—not just for better processes, but for a more human company.