Category: General
It’s a big title for a big article – strap in, this post is a long one, a question-by-question teardown of a Customer Success survey from a major media company, along with actionable take-aways. How’s that for clickbait?
Continue reading “Customer Success in the Wild: Panoply Podcast Network Survey Teardown”
I live in a neat little neighborhood just outside of the city center of my town – it’s not a development, but a little residential pocket with a half-dozen streets, maybe 80 homes?
It’s one of those neighborhoods whose first or second round of homeowners are starting to get a little older, move into apartments or somewhere where it doesn’t get so darn cold in the winter time. As they sell their homes, first time homebuyers and small families are moving in – it’s a neighborhood in transition, and it means that my kiddos, when they’re a little older, will have lots of kids around their age in the neighborhood. It’s a good thing. It’s a nice place to live.
One joke I have with my wife, about our neighborhood, is this: there’s a street hockey goal that’s always in the street where we turn toward home. We’ve never seen anyone actually using it, but it’s always there, rain or shine, spring, summer, fall. We had both noticed it, independently, and once, driving together, I said;
“I figured it out, by the way. It’s not for street hockey – it’s a reminder.”
She looked at me, and nodded.
“It’s a reminder, so when we drive in, when we get home, we say to ourselves, ‘Don’t forget to have a goal.’ ”
We had a chuckle – I’m still working on my Dad Jokes, obviously. But, still, it was the sort of little thing that has stuck with me, and every time I pull into our neighborhood, I see the street hockey goal, and I say to myself, ‘You’ve got to have a goal.’
Especially when you’re working in a job you enjoy, with people you respect, it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day ebb and flow of The Work. It’s a small thing to do your work and go to meetings and let the tide carry you in and out of your daily labor. I have been in that type of aimless, do-good-work-and-go-home mindset for some time.
There’s no shame in it: to be ambitious without a clear destination, though, is a recipe for frustration and for burnout. So – I joined a Mastermind group. I got more involved in the broader support / success community. I’ve given it some thought – my need for a goal, I mean – and I’ve decided on this:
I’m going to be in the top five Customer Success professionals working in the SaaS space within the next five years.
Or, ‘Five in five.’ Even shorter: 5in5.
Here’s why Customer Success is the right fit for me:
I’m an analyst; I know how to find patterns in behavior, I know how to use the tools of Big Data to identify the best course of action that will reveal real insights. I understand the import of Small Data; I’ve surveyed and interviewed customers across multiple product lines, using a diversity of approaches. I know how to turn all of that research into action and communicate that action clearly – even to busy folks who aren’t interested in statistical significance.
I’m customer focused; I’ve built my career on finding ways to make the millions of publishers, bloggers, artists and business owners find success at WordPress.com. I understand how customers can provide us information even when we aren’t asking for it. I am keenly aware that while reducing the time it takes for customers to get a reply is important, it’s not as important as reducing and preventing the pain that causes your customers to reach out in the first place.
I am dedicated to leading; I know that I am better for the folks I work with. I know that a diverse collection of perspectives and approaches will always be greater than the sum of its parts. I’ve found great satisfaction and endless opportunities for humility in leading teams, especially remote teams. I’ve written about that an awful lot.
Customer Success is in its infancy; the combination of skills that I have, this weird intersection of analysis, customer experience, and team leadership – it’s not clear how I can leverage this into impact, into creating the most value in the universe. In this way, the fact that the work of Customer Success is still so flexible, without the more rigid history and expectations of something like Customer Support (‘Reduce response times’), it allows me to not only pursue impact – but to create the role, shape what it means to be successful.
The next piece of the puzzle; how do I get there?
Stay tuned!
If you’ve been following me on Twitter, you may have noticed a little shout out from me mid-August:
Pretty cool, right? You’re forgiven for not 100% understanding what this means – if I’m being honest I don’t 100% understand it myself.
I’ve been invited and now am a participant in a private Slack instance, for the folks in the Predictioneer program and folks at IBM. I have access to the full featured professional level of their Watson Analytics toolbox (more Posts about this soon – it’s a really interesting piece of work, and is something I’m still learning about in big ways).
Most interestingly, I’m also headed to IBM’s World of Watson event later this month in Las Vegas – check this thing out, y’all. A 20,000 person conference. What?!
There is going to be an awful lot happening at this event – there are almost 1,500 different sessions, speakers, and workshops to attend. For the record, take a look at this speaker page. Kindly do note that there is a Philosophy Professor in the mix!
We can find some more context around what will actually be happening in Vegas in this letter that IBM provides to convince your boss to send you to this conference (really!):
IBM World of Watson in Las Vegas, October 24-27, 2016, formerly IBM Insight, is a great opportunity for me to engage with thought leaders and experts.
I’ve reviewed the details for this event and believe that the knowledge and connections I would gain would be highly beneficial to our organization.
This event delivers unmatched value for all things data, analytics, cloud and more. During the conference, I will be able to:
• Learn how cognitive businesses are using data science, advanced analytics and Watson to extract new insights, enhance their expertise, and exceed all expectations.
• Gain best practices and knowledge directly from IBM experts, in addition to exploring key topics like data science, advanced analytics and cognitive computing, through elective courses and innovation talks
• Preview product roadmaps and key trends and learn how they apply to our industry
• Get hands-on experience at more than 200 labs, certifications and training valued at $8,000
• Meet with experts and more than 500 IBM client speakers who are working with data and analytics in ways that could benefit us
• Choose from more than 1,500 targeted business and technical educational sessions
• Participate in hours of networking with peers from other companies facing similar challenges, all while learning tips and best practices that I can bring back to implement within our organization
I will also get the chance to explore the newest products, services, and solutions offered by IBM and 120 IBM Business Partners. This is an exceptional opportunity to experience game-changing innovations that are fueling digital transformation across our industry.
The conference will help me enhance my skills while strengthening contacts in the industry. Not to mention the fact that I’ll get critical hands-on experience with the latest cognitive solutions capable of propelling our company into the future. I will share what I learn with other members of our team so we will all benefit from this event.
I’ve started to put together my personal agenda for my time there – there is no shortage of sessions on customer behavior, collecting customer data, and finding ways to leverage that into doing business better – but after a conversation with my Mastermind group, I wanted to reach out to you all, folks who are aware of my approach and my thinking, and see what you would want to see me bring home from this event.
After all, I think it’s fairly plain what IBM hopes to see from me – social engagement at the event, blogging, and bringing the Whippersnapper Startup Mindset to the table.
I know what I’m hoping to find at the event – lessons from Big Businesses that I can bring home to Automattic. Working in tech today does mean some amount of hubris, some amount of echo-chamber, small-tribe thinking – but the fact is, these big businesses are big for good reasons. I’m hoping to find the Venn diagram piece that fits my work today, and get ahead of the curve for tomorrow.
What I don’t know is what you all might like to see – I’d like to write quite a lot during and following this event, and having a better idea what you, the folks reading my blog, are interested in, means I can bring the best stuff here.
What interests you when it comes to the intersection of Data and Support / Success? What do you think we could be doing better? What part of AI do you think will be impactful for our work? Should I focus on bots? On the Internet of Things? Maybe something else altogether!
Please let me know in the comments! I’ll also be seeking the same feedback on Twitter, so if that’s your preference, definitely reach out!
I referenced this in an earlier post (here!), and it’s too good not too give it its own space. This is from the Preface of Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State and Utopia. He’s describing how professional philosophers assemble theories and arguments for publication.
(you can get your own copy for one dollar and nine cents right now)
“One form of philosophical activity feels like pushing and shoving things to fit into some fixed perimeter of specified shape. All those things are lying out there, and they must be fit in. You push and shove the material into the rigid area getting it into the boundary on one side, and it bulges out on another.
You run around and press in on the protruding bulge, producing yet another in another place. So you push and shove and clip off corners from the things so they’ll fit and you press in until finally almost everything sits unstably more or less in there; what doesn’t gets heaved far away so that it won’t be noticed.
(Of course, it’s not all that crude. There’s also the coaxing and cajoling. And the body English.)
Quickly you find an angle from which it looks like an exact fit and take a snapshot; at a fast shutter speed before something else bulges out too noticeably. Then, back to the darkroom to touch up the rents, rips and tears in the fabric of the perimeter. All that remains is to publish the photograph as a representation of exactly how things are, and to note how nothing fits properly into any other shape.”
This strikes me as resonant; not just for philosophers or even just academics, but for many of us (myself included!) – at work, at home.
If you’ve been reading my stuff for very long, you’re aware that I think about hospitality a lot.
I use it in broad terms – I think that the work that we call Customer Support, Customer Success, Customer Service, and so on, all fall under this same umbrella.
Before I worked for Automattic I had a successful career in high end coffee – before that I was in grad school and working in restaurants and cafes.
One piece that’s worth keeping in mind, one cornerstone to excellence in hospitality regardless of industry, is that we’re playing a team sport.
Today is my fifth wedding anniversary (Happy Anniversary, Doc!) – last night we went out to a nice dinner. She had a lobster salad and I had the tuna steak. During our meal, I noticed a waiter serving a large table next to us.
Each of the entrées had toothpicks with different colored foil on the end – some red, some blue, you know the kind. As he turned his back to the table to pick up another diner’s plate, he’d quietly remove the toothpick, leave it on the larger serving tray, and present the entrée to the customer, announcing confidently the entrée, the sides, the special bibs and bobs requested by that particular diner.
If you’ve worked in a restaurant, you know what those toothpicks were – they indicated the done-ness of a steak, or which cheeseburger had the Swiss rather than the cheddar. They were little reminders built into the process to allow the server to present an entirely seamless and apparently perfect experience to the customers without holding all of that information in his head.
(This was a table of maybe twelve diners? Not an easy task to remember every person’s nuanced order)
It was an interesting reminder for me, that a seamless and lovely delivery to a customer, a shiny and outstanding experience, is the result of a whole team of folks working behind the scenes – working to support one another just as much as they’re working to support the customer directly.
(I’ve written some about this here and here.)
This kind of internal hospitality may seem small – a cook leaving reminders of what makes each dish special – but it adds up to a lower effort, higher-level experience for the customer.
It’s easy for us to extend this idea to the work we do in developing software. Think of your internal tooling – are there obvious, visible flags for features or situations where things are different from the usual? How much do you make your colleagues lives easier?
This doesn’t just apply to development teams working with success/support teams, either. If you work in a customer-facing role, whether support or success or whatever, how easy do you make it for others in your company to understand your work? What are the toothpicks that you offer to make their jobs easier? Do you have a standard, easily replicated template for bug reports that includes steps for reproduction, customers effected, and a consistent urgency scale?
(If not; think about making one 🙂 )
The customer experience, especially an excellent customer experience, is the end result of tons of tiny decisions, all stacked on top of one another. It’s only possible to really do the very best for our customers when we first do the very best we can for one another.
Simon Ouderkirk 