February 4, 2026 • 4 min read
Qualtrics Appoints New CEO, Signals Its Ambition to Turn CX Data Into Growth
Director of Content & Market Research
February 4, 2026
Qualtrics has appointed Jason Maynard as its new CEO.
Maynard takes the reins following Zig Seferin’s departure in November 2025, after nine years leading the company.
Seferin’s exit proved surprising as the company had snapped up PG Forsta in a $6.75BN deal just one month prior.
Before that, in May 2025, PG Forsta acquired InMoment, leaving Sefarin with the challenge of blending three companies, which are all Voice of the Customer (VoC) market leaders, per the latest Gartner Magic Quadrant.
Maynard, who last served as EVP of Revenue Operations at Oracle, now assumes this task.
Unfazed, the new CEO shared his enthusiasm for extending Qualtrics' portfolio and customer experience management (CXM) vision.
“Qualtrics invented Experience Management, and with AI at the core of modern business, the ability to understand human experience and act on what matters in context is more important than ever,” said Maynard.
“This is a rare opportunity to lead the company that created its category and build on that foundation with innovation, execution, and a relentless focus on delivering real impact for our customers.”
As Maynard seeks to seize this opportunity, he will have to overcome the persistent perception of Qualtrics as a survey company, rather than the broader enterprise player it aspires to be.
However, given his background in revenue operations, Maynard may shape Qualtrics as a more of a growth engine and help it transcend the VoC space once and for all.
Reframing Qualtrics as a Growth Engine
One of the longstanding challenges Qualtrics and its competitors have faced is that they can collect data and highlight loyalty, but they struggle to explain the “why.”
InMoment, now part of Qualtrics, is more effective than others in the VoC market at capturing additional context, not just sentiment signals.
However, there is a step beyond this: linking the context of a customer’s experience with revenue intelligence.
Traditionally, brands have considered revenue intelligence through the lens of a revenue operations (RevOps) dashboard. However, Qualtrics can help redefine this.
How? By incorporating customer context across the entire lifecycle.
As such, brands can take a broader view of growth. No longer is it just about lead-to-opportunity metrics, but it’s a combination of sales, service, marketing, digital, commerce, and beyond.
With a wider focus than most CX vendors, Qualtrics is well-positioned to seize this opportunity, which will expand as brands pivot to subscription models and customer success efforts intensify.
Meanwhile, Maynard is well-placed to lead this potential shift, given his experience in revenue operations at Oracle.
Qualtrics Needs to Quickly Consolidate
Qualtrics has a significant opportunity to pull revenue intelligence into its pre-existing CXM strategy.
However, that will require adding new capabilities at a time when it’s already onboarding PG Forsta and InMoment.
That’s a problem as Qualtrics has historically struggled to integrate quickly. For instance, it bought Clarabridge in 2021, and full integration took years.
Thankfully, as it brings onboard InMoment and PG Forsta, Qualtrics seems to realize that it must do a better job this time around, especially given the latter’s extensive and complex portfolio.
After all, nobody wants to buy 20 disconnected products.
Given this, Maynard’s first responsibility is likely deciding which components to lead with, which to shutter, and how to merge everything without disrupting its customers' environments.
Thankfully, his nine years at Oracle have shaped him for such responsibility, having entered through its NetSuite acquisition, which forced two competing CRM offerings under one banner.
His plan this time around? “Start by listening,” he wrote in a company blog post.
“I'll be spending my first weeks listening to customers, partners, and employees to understand their experience, what’s working, and what we can do to deliver even more value.”
Platform Plus Specialization Is the Future
To add more value, Qualtrics needs to both diversify and specialize.
One example of how it is already doing the latter is in its PG Forsta pick-up. PG Forsta’s expertise will help Qualtrics double down on its position in healthcare, a massive growth market that demands deep industry knowledge and strong regulatory expertise.
In terms of diversification, a move into revenue intelligence is a significant opportunity. However, its market consolidation efforts will also help Qualtrics unify more customer data on a single platform and generate a stronger, ongoing pulse of customer sentiment.
Yet, whatever its next move, expect Qualtrics to expand further beyond the confines of a traditional VoC vendor, perhaps tying experience data with growth.
If Maynard & Co. can do this, Qualtrics may become less of a necessity for reporting and more of a strategic kingpin for not only CX leaders but the C-suite.