Customer Success Playbook Season 2 Episode 39 - Sadee Akhtar - Collaboration

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In this episode of the Customer Success Playbook Podcast, host Kevin Metzger interviews Sadee Akhtar, a tech leader specializing in optimizing collaboration between customer success (CS) and professional services (PS) teams. Sadee shares six key insights on improving team dynamics during the onboarding process, emphasizing the importance of data-driven decision making, aligning on customer journey design, and ensuring smooth handoffs between teams.

Detailed Analysis

1. Data-Driven Approach to Onboarding

Sadee emphasizes the importance of balancing quantitative data with qualitative insights when designing the onboarding process. She notes that gathering a comprehensive view of the customer journey often requires multiple layers of investigation, as different teams (sales, CS, PS) may use various systems to track customer data. This holistic approach ensures that teams can identify pain points and areas for improvement more accurately.

2. Aligning on Customer Journey Design

The discussion highlights the critical need for establishing design principles that reflect both customer and business needs. Sadee recommends:

• Creating ease for both the organization (efficiency) and the customer (optimized experience)
• Adopting simple, straightforward principles focused on designing with the user in mind
• Aligning these principles across all post-sales teams to ensure consistency

3. Effective Tooling Strategies

The conversation delves into the challenges of selecting and implementing tools that enhance collaboration between CS and PS teams. Key points include:

• Choosing tools that align with customers' work styles (e.g., Jira for software engineering clients)
• Considering both large-scale systems and smaller communication tools (e.g., Slack channels, conferencing systems)
• Leveraging tools to facilitate feedback collection and improve the overall customer experience

4. Streamlining Handoff Processes

Sadee stresses the importance of a well-designed handoff process between sales, PS, and CS teams. She suggests:

• Clearly defining responsibilities for each stage of the customer journey
• Automating information collection where possible to reduce manual handover tasks
• Focusing on key information rather than overwhelming teams with unnecessary details

5. Addressing Common Challenges

To tackle challenges in CS and PS collaboration, Sadee recommends:

• Investing in a well-defined customer journey that all teams understand
• Setting realistic and achievable goals (e.g., OKRs) for implementation timelines and value delivery
• Maintaining open communication channels between teams
• Building strong relationships and empathy with customers

6. Post-Go-Live Support Considerations

The discussion touches on the importance of planning for post-go-live support during the onboarding process. This includes:

• Understanding what needs to be done during onboarding to ensure smooth post-go-live support
• Recognizing the constraints of professional services budgets and ti

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