GGR Blog - 'Not Strategic Enough'

Heather Wendt

This week we bring back a blog post from 2021 where Russell Bourne shares some insights into the complaint that CSMs are often "not strategic enough".

Looking at two areas of growth, the mindset and the engagement, Russell shares some practical ways that CS Leaders can help their team members develop the necessary ability to understand where CSMs fit into the customer process and set them up for success.

Read the blog here

What are some ways you have either empowered your team or been empowered to step into a more strategic role?

Bob London

Based on my experience, you should coach the team on asking more interesting questions about the customer's broader context - starting with their company's top-level business priorities, then the customer's broader responsibilities. They become very engaged when you ask about them, since that's what they're experts in - not our product!

Heather Wendt

Absolutely @Bob London! You cannot even begin to become strategic in your engagement with your customers if you do not have a solid understanding of their needs, and traditional yes/no questions and their like are just not going to get you there!

Chad Horenfeldt

Totally agree with Bob who is the master on having strategic conversations. One area that I focused my CS team on last year was acting more strategically internally. This means being the ambassador of the customer across various functions in your org and doing discovery to understand how you can help them. This also includes communicating your highs and lows in multiple ways to educate the rest of the org on what CS is and the impact it has.

Heather Wendt

Love this, @Chad Horenfeldt! Some of these behaviors do not come naturally to our team, so helping them learn how to do this well is such a great tool to give them! And yes...those cross-functional relationships are critical in 1) serving the customer more effectively and 2) internal education...I never want to be part of a team that the rest of the company asks "what do they even do?"...dangerous waters!