The Customer Success Channel

Tulasi Ryali, Senior CSM at Siemens - How to become the best CSM of the year

August 23, 2023 Planhat & Anika Zubair Season 6 Episode 8
The Customer Success Channel
Tulasi Ryali, Senior CSM at Siemens - How to become the best CSM of the year
Show Notes Transcript

In this episode, our host Anika Zubair chats with Tulasi Ryali, CSM of the Year by Customer Success Excellence about how to help your customer reach their business goals through value creation.

Being a Customer Success Manager (CSM) requires great multitasking skills and adaptability. You need excellent communication skills, outstanding problem-solving abilities and a remarkable understanding of customers. So, who holds the title of the "Best CSM of the Year" and how can you join their league?

Podcast enquiries: sofia@planhat.com

Speaker 1:

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Speaker 2:

Hello everyone. I'm your host, Anika Bert , and welcome back to the next episode of the Customer Success Channel podcast, brought to you by Plan Hat , the Modern Customer platform. This podcast is created for anyone working in or interested in the customer success field. On this podcast, we will speak to leaders in the industry about their experiences and their definitions of customer success and get their advice and best practices on how to run a c s organization. Today we are speaking to Tulsi Ally , a senior customer success manager at Siemens Digital Industry Software. With over 18 years of experience in customer facing roles, including technical architect and program management, Tulsi really has built an incredible career within customer success. For the past four years, she has focused on SaaS products and has been passionately helping customers achieve their business goals. DCI's love for solving complex problems and understanding customer needs drives her meticulous approach to value creation. She has also recently been awarded with the title of C ss M of the year by the Customer Success Excellence Awards, and today we will be talking to her about her strategies and her tactical tips on how to help your customers reach their business goals through value realizations. Let's chat to Thuli all about being the best c s M of the year. Welcome Thuli to the podcast. I am so excited to have you here with us today. For those of our listeners that don't know who you are, can you please tell us a little bit more about yourself, how you started your career in customer success, and what it is you're currently doing at Siemens?

Speaker 3:

Hi, thank you for having me. I'm really excited to have this conversation today. I'm senior customer success manager at Siemens Digital Industry Software , and I focus on SaaS products. I work closely with customers in adopting to our software and realizing the value.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. Amazing. And what inspired you to start working in customer success?

Speaker 3:

So I began my journey in customer success four years ago when the role wasn't as widely as recognized as of today. So joining this field actually allowed me to collaborate across , uh, various internal teams and engage with a diverse range of companies at various stages. So prior to this, I was a technical architect and a program manager where I was focused on the program and delivery of the program and understanding the applications and meeting the customer needs. But my scope is limited. But while I was working with , um, you know , various companies before Siemens, what I understood is solving the complex problems of a customer is key for any organization and meeting their vision and making sure that the value is realized while we deliver anything. So I learned some of the key , uh, learnings in my previous roles, and that actually made me to take this title as C S M when I , when it was offered to me at Siemens four years ago. And this role actually gave me , uh, like ability to serve in a large capacity within the organizations like , uh, LA Siemens, where we are transforming to SaaS , uh, from on-prem to SaaS products. And this is very truly cap waiting for me, and it offered me a platform to continuously learn and also address multitude of customer challenges at the same time contributing to their success.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. I love hearing that and I love that you've come from a very different, or let's say more technical background into the customer success space. And we'll get into this more later in the podcast. But in this podcast we also like to speak about personal success as well. And you've had some great personal success thus far within the customer success field. And , um, you just recently won Customer Success Manager of the year from Customer Success Excellence, which is a great title to have and a great award to win. So congratulations on that. Um, but can you maybe tell our listeners who are aspiring to be great CSMs, what is it about your recent experiences or maybe share a little bit more about your story that led to your success as c s m of the year? Yeah,

Speaker 3:

I was deeply honored to receive the title c ss M of the year, and it gave me opportunity to meet a panel of industry experts during that conference. So the application process actually starts early in the year, and I applied this , uh, I think March or April that time. Uh, and I was selected by panel of 30 industry executives for several hundreds of qualified entrants for this award. And I believe the approach that I work towards customers is more focused on the value creation and not just , uh, focusing on the region BA based , but I also , um, you know, increase my scope and also establish a strategy of increasing the , uh, customer participation across the various America's Jones , including south and north . And I mainly focus on how I can meet the customer needs at the same time, make sure that the value is delivered and go beyond the value delivery, you know, identify different areas of how I can increase or scale or identify the upsell and expansion opportunities. And I believe some of these strategies help me to win this award. And I am very grateful for the panel of judges and also the organization committee who actually recommended me for this award.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's amazing. And we're gonna dive into a little bit more of your KPIs and what made you successful in your role. And like you said, you had a number of different skills and assets that resulted in being the C S M that you are today. Before we move into that in our, on our topic of today , um, do you mind sharing a little bit more about what landed you in Texas? I know that you shared with me, me that you're, you're based in Texas, but for our listeners, I think your accent comes more of an Indian accent. So I'm curious what, what brought you to Texas? Yeah,

Speaker 3:

So I relocated to United States almost 11 years back , uh, from India. So I was born and brought up and I completed my bachelor's and master's in India. So I was working in India and my due to my work actually made me to relocate to United States. I relocated along with my family , uh, in 2012. Since then, you know , I allowed working with various customers , uh, mainly I was working with OEMs before that, but when I started working in US , I also had opportunity to work with retail and other high tech OEMs and semiconductor industries as well.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. I love hearing that as a expat myself. I always love hearing everyone's , uh, relocation stories and, and how it's, it's resulted in a life that you're building now in a totally different part of the world. So that's amazing. And also another, I guess, great thing to add to your, to your abilities 'cause it's no, it's no easy job relocating halfway across the world. So that's amazing to hear. So thank you for sharing your story. Um, we're talking today mostly about becoming the best c ss m of the year. I think that that's a great title, as you already said. And I think a lot of people listening aspire to be a better c s m every single day. And you already kind of alluded to what it is you're doing, but for our listeners that are CSMs today, CSMs can be tasked with a lot of different things to do day to day . I think that sometimes it's an endless to-do list, but how do you structure your time as a C S M? Can you give us a little bit of a snapshot into the day of your life as , um, the best c ss m of the year?

Speaker 3:

So I manage , uh, typically manage high touch engagements and I start my day by reviewing the priorities and the tasks from previous day. So I always build a to-do list and I create the internal meetings based on the impact on the customer success and the outcomes. So I create these and I also have like check-in meetings with the customers. Typically, they focus on onboarding or customer success planning, workshop value discussions or executive business reviews, followed by internal alignment calls, which are very key , uh, for the , uh, for S C S M. Uh , it is very important to collaborate well internally to meet the customer needs. So these internal calls are very important, especially with the sales team where I , if I identify any upsell or cross sell . So I bring it up upfront . And if there are any renewals that are at risk, it's very important to make that heads up for entire team and get their support on time. So these internal calls are not just with , uh, sales but support services and various channels within the organization. The focus is , uh, prioritizing based on the customer needs. I schedule these calls and my day is completely filled with the meetings, talking to the people and identifying how I can quickly address the challenges or the needs of the customer to move forward.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. And you mentioned internal collaboration calls, which I think you went into detail, which is great. And when you hand off maybe upsell opportunities to the sales team or renewals to the sales team make sense. But can you tell me a little bit more about these value discussion calls? I think they sound very intriguing and like you said, you're there as a C S M to deliver value to the customer, but what, what, what does a value discussion call mean to you? What is it that you're doing in that call?

Speaker 3:

Oh, yeah. So when I do the customer success planning session, so I typically brainstorm and identify the current state and the target , uh, you know, what they would like to achieve the target state. So in these , uh, discussions, I baseline the information what quantify and also qualify to when they can meet that quantifiable metrics, business metrics. So there some, sometimes , uh, you know, for example, if they would like to reduce the time to market by 10 weeks, which is a kind of aggressive timeline, 10 weeks in a span of four months or five months. So how do we meet that? Can we meet that? So those discussions, I'll start upfront and make sure that we are achieving that metrics in that particular timeline, like five months, if not , uh, how I can alert this , uh, not achievable to the customer or how I can make it possible with the help of our teams. So this value discovery workshop will also be done , uh, uh, very beginning by, in collaboration with our pre-sales team , uh, the , you know, the estimated savings. That's what we put that in the value discussion very beginning. And as a C S M during the adoption phase and also after the go live phase, I make sure that the estimated are realized like for 40,000 , uh, dollars per, per month or per quarter is what is estimated then how do I make it realized ? So I calculate that math while we, while I focus on the adoption metrics and after the goal I , what's the consumption status, how much they have reduced, and how much they had in the beginning. So the , that's the kind of , uh, value discovery workshop that, that, that's what I focused in. Really .

Speaker 2:

That's amazing. I love it. I absolutely love it. 'cause I think every step of a customer journey requires a plan. I think if you don't have a plan, you have no idea where you're going and you are building a value success plan, let's say. And I also absolutely love hearing that you do the r o I calculation for the customer, where you make the, you make the math make sense, really, and I say this all the time to my CSS team, is if you make the math make sense, it, it makes paying for your software a no-brainer. Uh , your , your renewal is easy and upsell is easier just because you've made all the value really obvious and you've tied it back to a dollar or let's say monetary metric, which is really, really important and key I think as a C S M. And I think you do that every day , which I'm not surprised by because of, you know, you're the best c s m of the year. But can you tell us a little bit more about the types of customers you're working with? You kind of mentioned it earlier, but what are the types of customers you help? What sort of touch points do you have with these customers? We also, we mentioned two calls already, but are there any other calls, meetings, emails? What are you doing with these customers?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, sure. So as I mentioned that I work with these high engagement , um, value-based customers. So , uh, like, so for example, like strategy accounts. So these customers have significant impact on cus company's business and I work closely with them to ensure that they achieve their strategic goals and objectives. And the other type is high value customers where , uh, the customer has a high contract value. Uh , my role involves in ensuring that they maximize the value , uh, and that they derived from our product. And say , third category is like industry leaders. So these are something the customers who are the leaders in the industry and they can be served as a valuable reference and case studies for us. So my interactions would include more in showcasing their success and collaborating on their thought leadership and coming to the touch points , I do have onboarding touchpoint. So during this onboarding phase, I work extensively with the customer to make sure a smooth adoption of the software and followed biweekly touch points in the very beginning phase that allows me to address like what are the challenges and answer the questions and guide them through the initial setup and bring the right people if they need some en enablement sessions during that time. So I'll bring the people on board during this phase. And another component is , uh, customer success plan. So I typically conduct these sessions in person , I visit the sites and the plans of the customer. Um, and I discuss in detail on the current state and also map the future state challenges in the current state is what I will be capturing in my C SS P And also, as I mentioned earlier, that I'll capture the business metrics which they anticipate to achieve and quantify them how , uh, the duration of time when they would like to see that outcome. And this planning component serves as a foundation for me to track the customer progress. So some of these , uh, touch points would be like biweekly engagements on the customer success plan, tracking the adoption and also the metrics and these biweekly touch points ensures that they're on track , uh, not deviating or no , no risks or anything to identify those ahead of the time. And mainly , um, as a C S M, the proactive approach is very important. Um, that's the one of the reason, instead of waiting for the two weeks of time having it till next touch point , if we see something that's going down or going beyond the expectations, I quickly set up the call based on the priority as well. And the third touchpoint would be the executive business reviews. So the executive business reviews, typically I conduct them on a quarterly basis that allows me to give a overall customer progress, a program progress to the executives and the value that they are gaining. And I bring up the next steps and what is the plan for the next 60 days and the next quarter. Um, those are the discussions I typically conduct in the executive business reviews. So these are the typical touch points that I do with my customers.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. And I really love that you have customers that are segmented not only on value, 'cause you mentioned that they're the high touch or high revenue customers, but you also mentioned that you have a segment of customers that are industry leaders and , um, you're almost trying to derive case studies out of them or best practices as well. That's really interesting. What made you guys segment your customers that way and what made you start focusing on customers in these different, let's say, segments rather than just revenue-based segments? 'cause most businesses focus on the revenue of the customer, and you're clearly focused on a few different segments. Why , why this direction with your customers?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, because this is very important , uh, to identify some valuable references and make sure that we showcase the success to the rest of the customers as well. Uh , that's why there are some customers we identify that we identify to help them , uh, to build a more success with our software , uh, and other customers. As I said, the high contract value is something that we need to take care and make sure that they are seeing the value out of what they purchase with our product. That's where , uh, this kind of , uh, segmentation is required when we work with high touch engagements, and that's actually helping us to grow as well.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that. I always love using customer case studies as great examples to other customers because a lot of your customers don't know what they don't know. Sometimes they really don't know how to best use your product, but when you're able to show them or give them an example of someone else in a similar industry or using the similar products that they're using the ways forward, they really appreciate that. I always find that customers love hearing other ways customers are using your product. So I think that's really great that you're doing that. You mentioned a few data points that you collect when you start speaking to a customer, especially around the value discovery call and the r o i and all these important metrics that you're starting to , to gather. And I think data is critical to customer success, but how are you leveraging data day-to-day? I know you're collecting some of the data yourself, but are you tracking product usage? What are some of the important data points that you're looking at day-to-day?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. Well, so data is indeed crucial to the role of S C S M, and it provides insights that help to der more , uh, informed decisions and proactive engagement and a successful customer outcomes . So data is very, very crucial for S C S M. And I typically , uh, have use this data to monitor the customer health. So I, I use data to track the health of each customer account, and this includes several factors like product usage, engagement metrics, and customer feedback, izing this data so I can identify the signs of potential churn and measure the customer satisfaction and proactively address any issues ahead of the time. And the second one is we do have a in-house built telemetry platform where I can look at the usage based on monthly active users or the key KPIs on , on our software. So tracking how customers are using our product, it provides insights to the level of their adoption when we are delivering, when they're delivering the value. And this data helps , uh, for me to identify more power users, like , uh, areas of under utilization and the opportunities for upsell and also the additional features. Third one is , um, customer feedback is also critical for C S M and data from the customer feedback service , like number of support, tickets, interactions, that can also highlight some of the pain points, challenges, areas of improvement. And CSMs can use this kind of feedback, the data that is coming from the feedback to address the pain point concerns and enhance overall customer experience.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that. And you just mentioned the level of adoption and how much of your product is being adopted, which I think is a critical data point for A C S M. Are you using these data points in those executive business reviews or even in the value discussion calls that you're having? How, how are you leveraging this data? When, when is it important to, to showcase it to the customer? So

Speaker 3:

I use this data me , these metrics , uh, in my executive business reviews. So every time I bring up the adoption metrics, how they're adopting and how many, for example, how much they scale or how much they, how, how the potential they have to grow, it's also important for me to showcase to them. So these data based on the number of tickets, number of tickets that were addressed and the feedback, what were the pain points that were identified and also met during what timeline is also showcased in those reviews. Because it is very important for the customer to understand how quickly we are addressing their needs, how quickly we are relu providing the resolution , uh, to their support tickets or how quickly we are improving from our end too, right? So that is where it, it , it is very important to showcase these analytics in the reports. Uh, it , I include typically in my executive business reviews and also do the account reviews with internal teams on a monthly basis. We have a call with leadership team where I showcase , uh, use these telemetry usage as well as the feedback metrics , uh, in a report showcasing like, this is how, how the customer is progressing and these are areas of concerns. So where I can get my help from my colleagues as well internally,

Speaker 2:

I love that you use everything you use in executive business review, both externally in front of a customer, but internally as well. So you're almost making, you know, more use out of the data that you've been presented, which is really, really important. And I think that helps you greatly 'cause you do need to get internal buy-in just as much as you need the customer to believe in the metrics. And executive business reviews I think are very, very controversial in customer success. Some people love them, some people think they're useless. What are your thoughts, and, and I think I already know the answer because you have high touch engagement, but how are your executive business reviews structured? How do your customers receive it? Who's on those calls with you when you have those executive business reviews?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, typically I include a level, level the , uh, contact or those , uh, point of contact that I regularly meet on a biweekly basis to make sure that the manager plan manager or the director also understands what the program is delivering. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , uh, and these executive business reviews really make an impact from my , uh, experience. And it also gives a platform to understand what their vision is, what's their future is, like, what they would like to build more, or what they're looking for, any other competitors or any other extra, additional features that we can incorporate. So it gives me a platform to understand , um, their pain points challenges, and sometimes it is not a always a happy ending , uh, review. It's, it's a , it's taking the customer frustrations as well too. So it is important to be patient and listen to the customer. So I mainly make these reviews as a listening more, mainly focusing on the listening part of it , understand what customer is saying and what customer is looking forward for after I showcase. Like, this is the health , this is the where we are, and this is the progress we made and the plan for the next 60 days. Okay. And the now time for the listening. So that is , those reviews are very important, especially , uh, in, in my case, while I work with these customers, these reviews make a huge difference.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. Yeah, I agree. I think that if you can deliver value in them and your customer sees value in in E B R or a business review, I think they're super critical. But I think you also mentioned that not all calls are happy. Not all calls are successful with customers. And I think in the reality of being a C S M, there are probably lots of calls that we don't wanna maybe admit that aren't the happiest or easiest to do when it comes to customers. How do you deal with some of the tougher customers? Or maybe you had an E B R that didn't go very well. How do you kind of come out of that and, and take away learnings and apply it to, to future calls?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, yeah. It's a very good question. So not all, all customer calls are happy. It's important to understand their pain points, frustrations and their plans as well, and where we are lacking and what we are doing good and how we can improve ourselves, how we can be more innovative than others in the industry, right? So those are some of the key learnings. Every review is different and every customer is unique based on their needs and based on the industry and the complexity of their needs. So every review is a learning for me. I capture the learnings from the, from the reviews and the action plan is required . That's what I focus on. What is the action from for, for me and for my company or from my colleagues, from the review, right? I take those action items to my colleagues as well. Internal collaboration is very key for C S M because it's not a one man show, it's a whole , uh, company to meet the customer needs. So these brs gives us a , uh, in a way for what our understand, like how we can enhance our product features as well. So sometimes I take these action items to , uh, create an enhancement request on our product features , uh, that justifying the case that this is , uh, critical and how it is important for my customer. And I also take like action items, how this, how I can help , uh, the customer by quickly solving some of the support tickets if they're trending for a longer time or some, sometimes how I can create a value or , uh, create some area where I can show customer that our software, we have a huge pool of different types of software, how I can help my customer with cross-selling the products. So those are some of the action items I take from the E B R and work with our colleagues , um, and apply it to the customer, not just to the one customer, but going forward, like , uh, next E B r I'll be more prepared to address some of these ahead of the time. And one more thing I would like to add is I typically take a product management personnel from our team to make sure that the customer also gets aware of the product roadmap so that it addresses some of his concerns and also the needs when they talk directly to our product teams.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that there were so many things that you just shared that I think are such key takeaways for anyone listening, I love the piece that you are continually learning. I think as a C S M or anyone in customer success, you have to continue to learn from the hard conversations like you just said, and you apply it not only to that customer, but to future customers, which I think is really admirable because I think learning and continuingly learn, we're never, we're never complete, we're never, we can't, we can't say we've learned everything. So I do love that you continue to learn from every example or every customer experience. And then the second part you said is around having customer success as an entire team approach. And you have product members that join in on the calls, which I think are super critical. I do not think customer success is a one man team. Uh , you definitely have to have everyone bought into the idea of it and everyone speaking to the customer. And I think it's great that your product team is speaking directly with the customer and that you're able to get them on board to have those calls. But that's not always easy. I'll say some, some product managers aren't always keen or, or open to having customer calls. Um, you mentioned the internal collaboration call. Is that how you get your product managers more excited and interested in the customer calls or what do you do to get them on board with these calls?

Speaker 3:

Oh, yeah. So we do have like a weekly huddle , uh, with our product management teams and r and d teams. Uh, we'll share the customer feedback with them and we'll make sure that they're aware of what , uh, it's what's happening on these accounts so that be prepared to address the future needs of the customer. So we'll make, we'll make them , uh, what , uh, what's happening. Not just like , uh, one, one or two other features, but overall progress of the account.

Speaker 2:

Amazing. And you work not only with product, but also with the sales team quite closely by the sounds of it. I know that you guys identify opportunities for upsells, but then you don't exactly handle the renewal or the upsell, that's something that they're doing. So how, how do you hand off , how does that relationship work with upsells and renewals? Mm-hmm .

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So we do have a separate team , uh, for doing the renewals, but we collaborate with the renewal team. We, we provide the insights of the customer health to our renewal team. They'll successfully complete the renewal. But to get to that point , uh, how , what is the indicator for the successful renewal is very important, right? So , um, what we do in the com organization is to main maintain a customer sentiment for all of our customers. And I typically have this customer sentiment on a weekly basis update the sentiment , uh, which is a key indicator for the successful renewal. So where if it is a low or red, then the customer is not happy and it is at risk. And , uh, we alert the , this kind of risk of renewal ahead of the time. If I need to bring the people in or do some , uh, enablement training for the customer or address their needs, I bring the right people, talk to the customer and try different approaches to make sure that the renewal happens. But before getting there, how I also make sure that we don't face that kind of situation for the customers getting into the risk of renewal. So , uh, it's important for A C S M , uh, to make sure that these needs are captured in the very beginning and addressed. And if any , you know, fashion that , uh, these milestones, whatever we lay down in the customer success plan are met on a timely fashion.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's so important, the timely fashion, I think having a deadline is critical to any customer success plan or outline or account review. If you just say, Hey, I have this goal with your product and there's no deadline, you could be working for weeks, months, years, who knows. But having that timeline holds you accountable as a C S M, but also holds your customer accountable, which I think is really, really important. We talked about learnings, we talked about how you continue to learn, which is great, but what is your personal biggest learning of being a C S M?

Speaker 3:

Understanding every customer is unique. So every customer is unique and understand their needs is also very important. So no single approach fits for all situations. That's what I believe. And the ability to adapt to the situation and communication is key , uh, is a biggest learning for me. And if there was something like missing part, we need to identify that or fill that gap, right? And every customer environment is different and sometimes it involves a complex structure engagement on the customer side as well as internally we need to , uh, you know, bring that kind of dynamics, understand what the customer needs are or how complex is the situation, and bring that back to our internal teams, make sure that they also on , on the same page, understand how critical is that , uh, customer. So that's, that's the biggest learning for me. Adapt to the situation and communication is key.

Speaker 2:

I couldn't agree with you more. I think that that is so well said . That is I , if any , anyone can take anything from this conversation, those two learnings would be it. But I know there's a lot of people who are listening to this podcast today that aspire to be the best c s m of the year, or they're even aspiring to break into customer success. What would your advice to everyone that's listening that wants to be a better C ss m, what would be your advice to them ?

Speaker 3:

So I would say put the customer first. Always, no matter what your primary focus should be, understanding on their needs, aspirations and challenges, prioritize their success above all else, doesn't matter , uh, what it is, but , uh, what the other , uh, you know, situations or the internal assignments. But it is important to make sure that you prioritize the customer success. And the other one is listen, actively empathize and work collaboratively to achieve their goals.

Speaker 2:

I love that. I think the biggest learning for me in customer success is the active listening piece. I think you really do have to actively listen to everything a customer wants. And like you said, they'll tell you exactly what they want and they'll tell you what they're looking for and their goals and they'll help you get to their successes. But you just need to actively listen and be able good participant in that conversation. So thank you for sharing all of that. We can keep talking and I'm sure everyone will continue to take notes on all your tips and tricks on how to be a best C s m. But we're gonna wrap up with our quick fire discussion where I ask you a few questions and the challenges that you have to try to answer them in one sentence or less. Are you ready? Yep . Okay. Let's do this. The first question is, what do you think is next for the customer success industry?

Speaker 3:

So the customer success industry is likely to continue moving towards even more personalized and hyper target customer experiences with AI and advanced analytics. They can play a significant role in understanding individual customer needs and tailor the interactions and it leads to more successful outcomes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah , I agree. I loved hearing that because I do, I'm so curious what AI is gonna do when it comes to shaping the personalization of how we interact with customers. So completely agree. My next question is, which SaaS product can you not live without as a CS profession?

Speaker 3:

Um, we use , uh, mostly on Salesforce and we also have a inbuilt telemetry platform where we use for analytics purposes, but mainly the Salesforce, we are completely dependent on that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I would say having a very good c r M is critical to being a good C S M because you need to know who your customers are and what products they're using. So. Agreed. Um , my next question is where or what is your favorite customer success learning resource?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I typically follow the posts on the LinkedIn and I also read the books by Nick , Nick Mata , uh, and also the podcast channel, customer Success channel. Um, uh, some of the podcasts also makes me a good, gives me a good learning source.

Speaker 2:

Okay. Amazing. And then who is inspiring you currently in customer success, or whom do you think we should have as our next guest on this podcast? Uh ,

Speaker 3:

Recently I read the book by Rod Cheka , the Chief Customer Success Officer. And that's a great , uh, uh, you know , book for me to get inspired by many leaders. And I would love to hear from Rod on his , uh, journey.

Speaker 2:

Oh , amazing. I haven't had him on the podcast. I will consider Rod then <laugh>. Well, thank you so much tulsi for your time and energy and all your tips and tricks. I know everyone listening probably wrote down a whole bunch of notes. I know I did. If anyone has any other questions or wants to get in touch with you, what's the best way to connect with you?

Speaker 3:

Uh , they can connect me on the LinkedIn so I can respond back , uh, if they message me so I can also give some tips and advices or mentor them if they need. So I'm help .

Speaker 2:

Amazing. Thank you so much for your time, and we'll make sure to link all your LinkedIn details in the show notes. But thank you again for your time.

Speaker 3:

Thank you for having me. Thank you for the opportunity, Annika, and have a great day.

Speaker 2:

Thank you for listening to the Customer Success Channel podcast today. We hope you learn something new to take back to your team and your company. If you found value in our podcast, please make sure to give us a positive review and make sure you subscribe to our channel as we release new podcasts every month. Also, if you have any topics that you would like me to discuss in the future or you would like to be a guest on the podcast, please feel free to reach out. All my contact details are in the show notes. Thanks again for listening and tune in next time for more on customer success.