Lauren Wood

Yeah. I mean, all of those rings so true to me as a customer success leader myself and someone who has just been obsessed in studying how customer success is changing. Because even three years ago when I was in a customer success leadership role before I started my consulting business,

All of those things were ringing true, but it's only been exacerbated as AI has really transformed how we're approaching business and also just the state of the economy and things. And I want to dive into all of these things. And the first thing I would love to talk about is really the identity crisis that you mentioned, because

All of those things were ringing true, but it's only been exacerbated as AI has really transformed how we're approaching business and also just the state of the economy and things. And I want to dive into all of these things. And the first thing I would love to talk about is really the identity crisis that you mentioned, because

All of those things were ringing true, but it's only been exacerbated as AI has really transformed how we're approaching business and also just the state of the economy and things. And I want to dive into all of these things. And the first thing I would love to talk about is really the identity crisis that you mentioned, because

I look at so many different organizations who use the word customer success to describe a different role, a different set of responsibilities. And I'm always wondering like, Why is it so difficult for customer success to have like a standard function, a standard approach? What would you say to that?

I look at so many different organizations who use the word customer success to describe a different role, a different set of responsibilities. And I'm always wondering like, Why is it so difficult for customer success to have like a standard function, a standard approach? What would you say to that?

I look at so many different organizations who use the word customer success to describe a different role, a different set of responsibilities. And I'm always wondering like, Why is it so difficult for customer success to have like a standard function, a standard approach? What would you say to that?

So what I'm hearing you say is there needs to be a direct revenue focused activity that customer success owns. Makes total sense. But I feel like it's a little easier said than done because I see a lot of organizations say that. And then they say, and you're going to do support and you're going to help the sales team and you're going to do this and you're going to do that.

So what I'm hearing you say is there needs to be a direct revenue focused activity that customer success owns. Makes total sense. But I feel like it's a little easier said than done because I see a lot of organizations say that. And then they say, and you're going to do support and you're going to help the sales team and you're going to do this and you're going to do that.

So what I'm hearing you say is there needs to be a direct revenue focused activity that customer success owns. Makes total sense. But I feel like it's a little easier said than done because I see a lot of organizations say that. And then they say, and you're going to do support and you're going to help the sales team and you're going to do this and you're going to do that.

And the customer success team is not really set up for success in achieving the revenue potential that they can drive. And I think it really, in my opinion, comes down to the customer success leader to say no. If you want me to achieve a positive NRR, if you want me to go after this number, if you want me to drive revenue, I'm not customer support anymore.

And the customer success team is not really set up for success in achieving the revenue potential that they can drive. And I think it really, in my opinion, comes down to the customer success leader to say no. If you want me to achieve a positive NRR, if you want me to go after this number, if you want me to drive revenue, I'm not customer support anymore.

And the customer success team is not really set up for success in achieving the revenue potential that they can drive. And I think it really, in my opinion, comes down to the customer success leader to say no. If you want me to achieve a positive NRR, if you want me to go after this number, if you want me to drive revenue, I'm not customer support anymore.

I'm not onboarding or I'm not whatever it is that doesn't make sense that isn't actually helping to drive that number. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that because I think so many CS leaders struggle with this so greatly.

I'm not onboarding or I'm not whatever it is that doesn't make sense that isn't actually helping to drive that number. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that because I think so many CS leaders struggle with this so greatly.

I'm not onboarding or I'm not whatever it is that doesn't make sense that isn't actually helping to drive that number. I'd love to hear your thoughts on that because I think so many CS leaders struggle with this so greatly.

And that brings me perfectly to my next question around the ROI of customer success. Because as you also mentioned, budgets have been cut. Customer success has been on the chopping block. I think it's also part of the reason why customer success becomes kind of this hodgepodge of all these different roles because leaders are saying, well, customer success doesn't drive that much value.

And that brings me perfectly to my next question around the ROI of customer success. Because as you also mentioned, budgets have been cut. Customer success has been on the chopping block. I think it's also part of the reason why customer success becomes kind of this hodgepodge of all these different roles because leaders are saying, well, customer success doesn't drive that much value.

And that brings me perfectly to my next question around the ROI of customer success. Because as you also mentioned, budgets have been cut. Customer success has been on the chopping block. I think it's also part of the reason why customer success becomes kind of this hodgepodge of all these different roles because leaders are saying, well, customer success doesn't drive that much value.

So we're going to just like reduce headcount over here and give it to customer success. And it gets messy. Right. But for organizations that are struggling to prove the ROI of customer success, what are the most valuable pieces of data, the most important insights that they should be bringing to the table to really show that?