At risk / sensible accounts - who you gonna call?

Sebastien Venancio

If there is something strange 
In your health dashboard
Who you gonna call?

Hi everyone, 

Occasionally in the past and more frequently following my promotion as Lead Success, my manager has been using me as a "risk buster" of sort (hence the silly pun). Basically I'm being sent on accounts (in addition to my own book of business), either in the backend or as an additional client facing resource, where there are instability, risks due to any number of reasons, complex projects starting to go off the rails, this kind of things. I would then try and provide structure in the ways we work and engage with the client, guidance and coaching to the less experienced CSM assigned on the account, and a bit more consultative approach to the client.

So far the results and feedbacks were good, but it is a very artisanal approach, and it's only me. Of course we have processes in place and a fairly large amount of documentation, but unfortunately, it would not replace experience in difficult situations. So I've been wondering, do you have something in place in your org to address these situations requiring a more hands on approach or a different relationship than a hierarchical one between an IC and their manager?
I definitely know other colleagues that would be great resources as well, and I believe it could be extended to other functions, but not sure if it actually make sense or how to approach this.
What are your thoughts on the matter? Does it make sense to try and scale this initiative? How would you go about it?

Victoria Shapira

Hi Sebastien,

What do you mean by risk? There are so many different types of risks and we should not handle them in the same way.

For example, a customer could be suddenly not responsive, or the company could be acquired by another one, or the customer is facing many technical issues, etc...

So first of all, you should map the main types of risks and then work on the action plan for a process so the less senior CSM would know what to do.
Then, if the issue is related to the lack of knowledge on how best to approach angry/upset/at-risk customers you should think about what you bring to the table that they don't in terms of soft skills for example or even in terms of expertise. Once you know what they are missing you can teach/mentor them so they can grow and handle it themselves in the future.

In certain organizations, there is an escalation manager who can handle the escalation internally while the CSM still faces the customer.

Harsh Shah

Hi Sebastien,  greetings!

At my current organization, when any account is at risk then the CS member who is currently handling the account is responsible to escalate the situation to their senior team member, sales team, product owner, or manager. For this we have an escalation matrix which helps CS member to decide when to raise an alert and to whom. So, you can try to create such an escalation matrix for your organization which gives a clear idea about the responsibilities and steps to take when things go sideways. Lastly, we also have an internal discussion about lessons and learnings after each cases and update the process if required.  

If there is something strange 
In your health dashboard
Who you gonna call?

Hi everyone, 

Occasionally in the past and more frequently following my promotion as Lead Success, my manager has been using me as a "risk buster" of sort (hence the silly pun). Basically I'm being sent on accounts (in addition to my own book of business), either in the backend or as an additional client facing resource, where there are instability, risks due to any number of reasons, complex projects starting to go off the rails, this kind of things. I would then try and provide structure in the ways we work and engage with the client, guidance and coaching to the less experienced CSM assigned on the account, and a bit more consultative approach to the client.

So far the results and feedbacks were good, but it is a very artisanal approach, and it's only me. Of course we have processes in place and a fairly large amount of documentation, but unfortunately, it would not replace experience in difficult situations. So I've been wondering, do you have something in place in your org to address these situations requiring a more hands on approach or a different relationship than a hierarchical one between an IC and their manager?
I definitely know other colleagues that would be great resources as well, and I believe it could be extended to other functions, but not sure if it actually make sense or how to approach this.
What are your thoughts on the matter? Does it make sense to try and scale this initiative? How would you go about it?