Happy Friday! ‘This week in CX’ brings you the latest roundup of industry news.
This week, we explore the shifting CX landscape—from the rising demand for niche skills and the burden of mundane tasks to the growing threats of deepfake fraud and ineffective email strategies impacting engagement.
We’re also discussing new updates from Spotify, Gartner, Bloomberg and more.
Key news
- Swedish electric vehicle battery startup Northvolt has filed for bankruptcy after being unable to secure enough financial backing to continue. The future of its 5,000 employees is unknown and the company said it would work with trade unions and authorities to provide support. The Swedish bankruptcy comes after the company filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US last November. The outgoing CEO Peter Carlsson said then that Northvolt needed to raise between €916m (£771m) and €1.1bn to continue operations. The company had been seen as a strong contender to take on Chinese EV battery makers from within Europe.
- Spotify paid $10bn (€9.1bn, £7.7bn) in royalties last year, around 60% of its €17.1bn revenue for last year. It claims to have paid out the most royalties ever recorded. Around 1,500 artists earned more than $1m. The streaming giant reported a market valuation of around $110bn, more than the combined $70bn value of labels Universal or Warner Music, Bloomberg reports. Spotify’s success lies in its content bundling, subscription increase and rise in prices, Bloomberg writes. Some 675 million people use Spotify globally, with around one third of them paying for a subscription.
- Industry leaders in Europe have reacted to US president Donald Trump’s global 25% tariffs on steel and aluminium, as well as the EU’s €26bn of “countermeasures“. Customs broker Fausto Cappello said tariffs will disrupt supply chains, but could also create opportunities for evaluation and redesign. The European Steel Association said Trump’s tariffs would worsen an already “dire situation”, after the sector lost 9m tonnes of capacity and 18,000 jobs last year. UK prime minister Keir Starmer said on Wednesday that “all options are on the table”, while UK Steel warned the British industry would be impacted due to “highly challenging market conditions”.
CXM news stories
Here’s the full news stories that CXM have reported on in the past week. Learn all about the latest news about the effects of mundane tasks, the continued influence of emails and the risk of deepfakes.
Stop waiting for perfection: employees hired on promise perform 1.9x better
Organisations are missing out on significant performance gains by requiring employees to demonstrate proficiency in all skills before transitioning into critical roles. A new Gartner survey found that employees hired based on potential rather than complete proficiency are 1.9 times more likely to perform effectively. However, many companies still prioritise rigid skill requirements, slowing internal mobility and stalling workforce growth.
“Many organizations are transforming their capabilities so rapidly that they can’t acquire all the skills they need — the talent either doesn’t exist or is too expensive,” said Meaghan Kelly, director of the Gartner HR Practice. “This puts more pressure on organizations to build skills internally, but unfortunately, most organizations are not building skills fast enough to fill critical roles.”
Companies must shift their focus from building full proficiency to recognising promise—which Gartner defines as the willingness and ability to learn from a foundational skillset. Despite its potential, only 28% of employees report that their organisations emphasise hiring or developing talent based on promise.
Identifying and mobilising talent with promise
One of the key barriers to hiring for promise is the difficulty in identifying employees who can grow into a role. Many managers remain hesitant to embrace this approach. In the same survey, 51% of managers admitted they direct recruiters to prioritise candidates with all required skills, limiting opportunities for promising internal talent.
To shift this mindset, HR leaders and recruiters must clearly define a promise for high-demand skills. Using quantitative and qualitative data, organisations can demonstrate how hiring for potential leads to stronger long-term performance. Showcasing success stories and metrics can help convince managers that promise-based hiring is not a risk but a strategy for future-proofing the workforce.
Employees hired based on promise require ongoing support to develop their skills fully. However, many organizations rely too heavily on managers for this responsibility—despite the high levels of burnout they already face. To alleviate this pressure, companies can implement skills-based learning networks, which bring together the employee, their manager, learning and development teams, talent management, and subject matter experts.
According to Gartner, this networked approach nearly doubles skills preparedness compared to traditional one-on-one support.