I owe much of my passion for experience and hospitality to my parents. My mom worked as a bank teller for over 30 years in a small rural Virginia town where I grew up. Occasionally, I’d ride the school bus to her job and quietly watch her engage with customers. Some arrived flustered or indifferent, but by the end of their transaction, they were smiling, chatting about their children or grandchildren, and walking out with a lighter spirit.

To this day, if you’re lucky enough to be a guest in my parents’ home, you’ll be treated like you’re staying at a bed and breakfast: a hot breakfast each morning, food available throughout the day, a beautifully manicured yard, and a warm, comfortable bed to end the day. My parents always believed that no matter how someone felt when they arrived, they should leave feeling better and wanting to return.

Though I’ve spent most of my career in non-traditional marketing roles, one of my earliest jobs was as a telemarketing rep for the JCPenney catalog. I found being yelled at over delayed shoes or curtains excruciating — until a supervisor I respected gave me a key piece of advice: “The nicer you are, the faster people calm down.” I started responding with empathy instead of defensiveness, and it transformed not just the interactions but how I carried myself under pressure. Ironically, that job helped open the door to my first post-college position — at The Washington Post, no less. But I digress.

I share all of this to say, long before I held the chief experience officer title at the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), I understood that real leadership begins with how we make people feel.

What a CXO Actually Does and Why It Matters

When I first read the job description for my current role, I was immediately drawn to two things: the word “experience” in the title and the quote by Maya Angelou on the cover page:

 

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will always remember how you made them feel.”  

 

“So, what does a chief experience officer do?” is a question I hear often. In short, a CXO is the voice of the member. In my case, I oversee the strategic direction and delivery of our events and meetings, ranging from our annual conference to over 60 college fairs hosted globally, as well as membership experience and global engagement. This portfolio represents nearly 90 percent of our association’s annual revenue. But my role is about more than numbers; it’s about meaning. It’s about connecting the dots across departments to ensure every member interaction — from the first new member communication to a tenured leader’s attendance at our annual conference — feels thoughtful, inclusive, and valuable.

As B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore describe in “The Roles of the Chief Experience Officer,” CXOs need to adopt four key roles:

• Catalyst — sparking energy and action throughout the company
• Designer — shaping offerings into truly engaging experiences
• Orchestrator — aligning operations to a cohesive, customer-pleasing theme
• Champion — fighting for the needs of individual customers and the value of the organization’s offerings

CXOs align teams, connect experiences, and help associations deliver not just services, but significance. It’s about more than satisfaction. It’s about emotional and cultural connection, as well as strategic value.

The Experience Economy Has Reached Associations

Members today expect seamless, emotionally engaging experiences — because they get them everywhere else. Whether shopping online, streaming content, or traveling, people are no longer just consuming products or services; they’re investing in experiences.

Your members are not just comparing your offerings to other associations — they’re comparing their experience with you to brands like Disney, Apple, or Netflix. That’s the benchmark now.

At NACAC, we’ve embraced this mindset across our programs and culture. As CXO, I’ve worked alongside our CEO, leadership team, and high-performing staff to embed hospitality and belonging into everything we do, from pre-conference staff training inspired by Disney and the Ritz-Carlton to an “All Are Welcome Here” window sticker that greets visitors at our office entrance. These are signals of intentional care.

When our public school counselor members shared that they didn’t feel heard, we responded. Guided by recommendations from our 2022 Ad Hoc Committee report on engaging public school counselors, we expanded professional development, strengthened advocacy, and reimagined our events. Since then, public school counselor membership has grown meaningfully with strategic outreach and marketing playing a key role. And for the first time, a panel of public school counselors was featured on the main stage at our annual conference.

We’ve also enhanced the conference experience with technology upgrades, streamlined registration, expanded educational content, three months of on-demand access, and more space and time for our affiliates and special interest groups. These improvements reflect a broader shift from hosting events to designing experiences.

These enhancements didn’t happen in a silo. These efforts were fueled by membership insight and cross-functional collaboration. Experience is everyone’s job. My role is to help us lead it well.

Tools That Support but Don’t Replace Experience

Technology plays a critical role in how we deliver meaningful experiences at scale. Our college fairs, both virtual and in-person, have evolved significantly through the strategic use of AI. Our website now offers AI-enabled resource navigation, freeing up staff to provide more personalized support.

AI, CRMs, and personalization tools are valuable. But they don’t replace human connection. The CXO ensures these tools are used with purpose, not only for the sake of efficiency. That data doesn’t just inform dashboards, it informs empathy.

How to Begin Centering Experience

Even if your organization doesn’t have a formal CXO role yet, you can take steps now to center experience:

• Start by examining who currently has experience in your association. Often, it’s fragmented and spread between marketing, membership, programs, and leadership without a single, unified lens.
• If hiring a CXO isn’t immediately feasible, consider forming a cross-functional experience council, as recommended by Deloitte. Led by a senior leader with visibility across teams, this group can audit the member journey, examine key data touchpoints, and recommend improvements. It’s a practical way to embed experience-thinking into your culture before formalizing the title.
• When you're ready to create the role, seek someone who balances strategy with data fluency, design thinking, emotional intelligence, and a genuine focus on people.
• Invite the member’s voice into every room where decisions are made.
• It’s not about adding more to the to-do list. It’s about realigning your priorities around the one thing your members and staff will always remember: how you made them feel.

Leadership for the New Era

Today’s association leaders must be fluent in relationship building, emotional intelligence, and digital agility — because the next generation of association members is asking different questions. They want to know if your organization reflects their values, if their presence truly matters, and if the culture they join will help them achieve their goals.

When I became NACAC’s inaugural CXO in 2021, I knew this was an opportunity to reshape how we lead and serve. I reflected on the full spectrum of leadership I’d experienced: the empowering mentors who led with vision and trust, and the counterexamples who unintentionally taught me what not to replicate. I committed to leading with empathy, accountability, and intentionality.

J. Willard Marriott’s wisdom still guides me: “Take good care of your employees, and they'll take good care of your customers, and the customers will come back.”

It’s time to see the Chief Experience Officer not as a luxury, but as a necessity. Because in today’s world, experience is the strategy.