Winning with AI Without an AI Strategy

“Don’t build an AI strategy. Build a business and experience strategy—and let AI support the outcomes.”

This week on The Modern Customer Podcast, Peter Czimback—former VP of Experience Innovation at Aramark—shares a business-first approach to transformation that starts with experience, growth, and human capability, using AI to amplify what teams already do best.

Rather than positioning AI as the strategy, Peter explains how leading organizations define the experiences they want to deliver—to customers, employees, and partners—and then apply AI to scale consistency, insight, and execution. This keeps transformation grounded in how the business creates value.

A central theme of the conversation is the role of people. When organizations use AI to upskill employees and remove friction from daily work, teams gain more capacity to engage customers in meaningful ways. Those moments of human connection build stronger affinity, which ultimately drives loyalty, revenue, and long-term growth.

Key highlights from the conversation:

• Why AI shouldn’t be the strategy
• How experience-led thinking changes transformation outcomes
• The role of storytelling in aligning leadership and teams
• How AI can upskill people and strengthen customer affinity
• A simple maturity path for applying AI with intent

The discussion explores how centering transformation on experience and people enables organizations to apply AI in ways that drive meaningful business outcomes.

🎧 Listen to the full episode of The Modern Customer Podcast.

Stream now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favorite podcast platform.