About.We are Customer Start, a CX training, consultancy and advisory business with one profound goal; help organisations of all sizes to improve their customer experiences.
We focus on providing value through a clarity of purpose, strategy, execution and results. |
We are passionate about customers and their experiences. Our reason to exist is to help companies realise the value that a customer centric approach can bring.
More than that we want to help enable companies to provide ever better experiences to their customers through a more humanised level of holistic understanding and empathy to generate trust and advocacy in thousands of customers across the globe. Customer Start is here to help you on your journey greater customer centricity to ensure happier customers, empowered employees, amazing culture and improved processes. No matter where you are in your journey, Customer Start can help through our range of services. |
Our Vision
"To help make the world a better place one experience at a time."
Our Mission
To make the UK a 'Centre of Excellence' in Customer Service and Experience promoting investment, job creation and innovation through disrupting the way we think about service and experience and creating innovative leaders of the future.
Our Why
Simply stated, we believe in creating amazing experiences for every single one of our clients' customers. More than that we believe in creating great places to work for employees through exceptional culture and servant leadership.
Our Executive Team
Miles C. Thomas
Co-Founder & CX Thought Leader
Miles has over 20 years of experience in customer service and customer experience in a diverse set of organisations from Deloitte to tech start-up SubHub to International Baccalaureate and Bloom & Wild.
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Miles' Experience
Richard Godfrey
Co-Founder
A commercial entrepreneur, Richard started his first business in 2003 which rapidly became Wales' largest serviced apartment operator, offering service-led, luxurious short-stay accommodation. He went on to diversity the business into new markets with group turnover in excess of £4.5m.
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Our Senior Consultants
Christopher Brooks
Senior Consultant (CX)
Senior Consultant (CX)
Christopher is a customer strategist with over 20 years of agency, client-side and consultancy experience working with corporates across Europe, Asia and the Americas.
He is the Founder of a not-for-profit enterprise, Customer Experience World Games (CXWG) which was set up to help CX professionals make a difference to customers, employees, communities and society in general. He is the Host of the CX Superheroes Podcast series. He has been recognised as CX Today’s 2024 CX Leader's CX Influencer of the Year and 2024 CX Culture Champion of the Year and winner of International CX Awards GOLD for B2B Marketing. He is also a Thinkers 360 Leading Voice, Top 10 CX influencer, and LinkedIn CX Voice. Additionally, he is a Speaker at several CX events, judge at CX awards, contributor to the CXMagazine and research journals. |
Dr. Liz Mallen
Senior Consultant (EX & CX)
Senior Consultant (EX & CX)
Liz qualified as a CCXP in 2016 and co-chaired the Customer Experience Professionals Association London network for 3 years. Liz is a respected expert in all areas of B2B Customer Experience, having developed CX strategy and measurement programs, lead customer journey mapping projects to redesign customer experiences, influenced customer centric thinking at all levels and driven customer improvement projects.
More recently Liz has engaged with Behavioural Psychology and Emotional Intelligence to provide a more relevant and meaningful profile of personas and their needs . Liz has naturally gravitated towards Employee Experience since great customer experiences rely on happy employees. Psychological Safety can be applied to improve employee wellbeing and in so doing ensure decisions are correctly informed |
James Dodkins
Senior Consultant (CX)
Senior Consultant (CX)
Globally recognised as the CX Rockstar, James is a leading voice in customer experience. He is an accomplished author, international keynote speaker, and host of Amazon’s acclaimed CX show ‘The Week in CX’.
James has worked with some of the world’s most iconic brands including Emirates, Disney, Ritz-Carlton, and Amazon, bringing energy, insight and real-world impact to every engagement. He created the Accredited Customer Experience Specialist (ACXS™) programme to provide practical, proven CX tools for professionals looking to drive meaningful change. Following Customer Start’s acquisition of ACXS, James continues to support us as a trusted consultant, helping to evolve and enrich the course and sharing his thought leadership as we deliver CX excellence across the UK and beyond. |
Jane Hawkes
Senior Consultant (Customer Service)
Senior Consultant (Customer Service)
Queen of Customer Service Jane Hawkes aka Lady Janey is a leading Consumer Champion specialising in travel and author of #1 consumer blog. Able to advise on a range of consumer issues whilst championing the best of companies and challenging the worst.
With over 20 years experience on both sides of the counter, Jane works proudly with companies to encourage the highest standards of Customer Service in the UK. Highly passionate about her area of expertise, Jane consistently provides valued advice and recommendations as an outstanding customer service consultant. In addition Jane is a welcome new face on our TV screens, the go to expert for radio stations nationwide and is regularly featured in national press and leading publications. |
James Edmonds
Senior Consultant (CX & Customer Centricity)
Senior Consultant (CX & Customer Centricity)
A seasoned professional with a deep focus on customer experience (CX) transformation and culture, James brings extensive experience in driving strategic initiatives and embedding customer-centric practices across major organisations.
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Jerry Angave
Senior Consultant (Travel/Passenger Experience)
Senior Consultant (Travel/Passenger Experience)
Jerry is a Customer and Passenger experience expert working across many sectors including aviation and travel, financial services, professional services and manufacturing. Based in the United Kingdom, he works with companies throughout Europe and the Middle East.
Jerry's work is about helping build stronger CX programmes through the development of effective CX strategies and the delivery of operational competencies. At its core is the understanding of customers; who they are, why they do business and their hopes, expectations and fears. The value in customer journey mapping is therefore in unlocking the most important issues and prioritising what should be done about them. Jerry has facilitated hundreds of journey mapping workshops and trained countless CX practitioners to run their own sessions. He is a member of the Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA) and hugely passionate about helping those who are looking to build a CX-based career to gain increased knowledge and confidence so they can contribute more to their organisation. |
Sam Heighway
Senior Consultant (Leadership & HR)
Senior Consultant (Leadership & HR)
Sam has a 30-year career in HR with experience at director level within multi-national companies. Sam is a qualified leadership coach and member of the CIPD who specialises in helping companies maximise performance and build strong cultures.
Sam is highly experienced in team & 1:1 coaching at an executive level, effectively and confidently facilitating sessions to help break down silos and work through blockers while remaining impartial and independent. |
Our Clients
Testimonials
"Working with Customer Start was a game-changer for First Class Comms Ltd. From start to finish, the consultancy work was professional and effective, delivering a fantastic return on investment within weeks.
The alignment of our company values with a newly devised customer strategy was exactly what was needed. Once the direction was set they created us a Customer Success process which we enjoyed an instant impact from in terms of customer satisfaction and recurring revenue. Their defined framework for customer milestones is a valuable tool that helps us recognise and value our customers in the most appropriate way. But what stood out to us the most was the ease of working with Richard and Miles; they were a pleasure to work with and made the experience simple yet highly beneficial. In just 3 months, they helped us transform our customer experience, and we couldn't be happier with the results. If you're looking to improve your customer experience, I highly recommend Customer Start. You won't be disappointed!" |
"We engaged with Customer Start to commence planning and improve our customer journey. Together, we enhanced our customer success framework, focusing on customer relationships and elevating engagement. Their approach, rooted in understanding and respecting customer perspectives, exceeded our expectations.
In addition to this, we also utilised their expertise for our customer survey, which proved to be immensely valuable. Their insights and methodologies allowed us to gather comprehensive feedback from our customers, enabling us to gain a deeper understanding of their needs and preferences. This has informed our strategic decisions and further strengthened our commitment to delivering exceptional experiences. Thanks to Customer Start, we're not just responding to customer needs—we're anticipating them." |