280: The Skills AI Can't Replace: Why Human Service Still Wins with Jeff Toister

Send us Fan Mail

AI won't replace your people. It will replace the ones acting like robots.

Returning guest Jeff Toister, best-selling author of Human Service: The Skills AI Can't Replace, joins Yanique Grant to unpack where humans still win in a world racing to automate. Drawing on new research spanning more than 370,000 phone calls and 400-plus face-to-face interactions, Jeff makes the data-backed case for connection, understanding, and advocacy, the three human skills AI simply can't provide.

In this episode:

- Why connection is efficient: warm rapport makes calls 16% shorter
 - Understanding and advocacy, the skills that beat automation on complex issues
 - The greeting research: 12% better first-contact resolution and warmer customers
 - Why AI replaces the transactional employee, not the true expert
 - How to simplify your service strategy heading into 2027

Featured resources:

Book: Human Service: The Skills AI Can't Replace by Jeff Toister
Book: The Service Culture Handbook by Jeff Toister
Zoom (video conferencing Jeff uses daily, while noting no single tool is truly indispensable)

LinkedIn Learning (home to Jeff's training courses, taken by 5 million-plus learners)
Customer Service Tip of the Week (Jeff's free weekly email with content to share with your team)

Connect with the guest:

 Human Service book (download the first chapter free): humanservicebook.com
 Customer Service Tip of the Week (free weekly research and tips): toistersolutions.com/tips
 Reply directly to any weekly email and it goes straight to Jeff

Follow the show: X @NavigatingCX and join our private Facebook group, Navigating the Customer Experience Community. Hosted by Yanique Grant.