Tell us something fun about yourself.
I am a massive Weezer fan and have seen them in concert 4 times.
If you could go back in time, what would you tell yourself as a new CSM? I would tell younger me that it's ok not to know everything and to ask as many questions as possible. Curiosity will be your best friend as a CSM, both in terms of best practices internally at your company as well as in doing discovery with customers.
What resource or influencer do you recommend checking out?
For influencers, you absolutely cannot go wrong with Diana De Jesus. She writes some of the most practical and helpful content out there on what it takes to break into being a CSM.
For a book, I'm going to go with Atomic Habits. The book powerfully describes how to create the new habits we all want to create.
What is the one tech tool you can't live without?
Might be a slightly biased-sounding answer but I could not imagine living without monday.com. I use it to organize everything I do and it helps me immensely with planning everything I want to do and staying on top of my goals.
How can those looking to break into CS get started?
Begin now by identifying the real examples of what you already have done (not just could do) that align strongly with what's expected within CS. Hiring managers care much more about specific examples of demonstrated ability than hypothetical knowledge.
What's next for Customer Success?
True scalability. There is a growing conversation around how to provide truly scaled solutions for Customer Success and I believe this will increasingly become top of mind for many organizations. They will want to figure out how to leverage digital customer journeys, customer communities, and more to make better use of 1:1 interactions as not their sole lever.
What’s something you recently learned the hard way?
It's always better to overcommunicate and make sure you're bringing people along the journey for any change management. I had a situation recently that involved leading some change management where I didn't communicate enough and assumed an understanding of things I should not have assumed. That was my bad, and it was a great reminder of the need to be proactive in my communication.
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