In this episode, our host Anika Zubair chats with Maranda Dziekonski, Senior VP of Customer Success at Datasembly about the importance of viewing customer success as a revenue generator rather than a cost center.
The field of customer success (CS) has been through a whirlwind of changes this year due to the global economy. As we near the end of 2023 and start planning for 2024, sustainability and revenue have become top priorities for every CS department. But why is revenue such a vital piece of the CS puzzle? And how can CSMs and CS leaders enhance their skills to adapt to the evolving market?
Podcast enquiries: sofia@planhat.com
In this episode, our host Anika Zubair chats with Maranda Dziekonski, Senior VP of Customer Success at Datasembly about the importance of viewing customer success as a revenue generator rather than a cost center.
The field of customer success (CS) has been through a whirlwind of changes this year due to the global economy. As we near the end of 2023 and start planning for 2024, sustainability and revenue have become top priorities for every CS department. But why is revenue such a vital piece of the CS puzzle? And how can CSMs and CS leaders enhance their skills to adapt to the evolving market?
Podcast enquiries: sofia@planhat.com
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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 ACS organization. Today's guest is no other than Miranda Koski who needs no introduction. She's a CSS executive leader and a fractional COO. She has won numerous awards including winning Top 25 css Influencer, three years running. Miranda has spent her career in customer success in various roles from head of Customer success, VP of Customer Success to chief customer Officer at companies like Lending Club . Hello Sign swiftly. And she is currently SVP of Customer Success at Data Assembly. She's a startup junkie and is super passionate about taking both the team and the company to the next level. She has over 20 years of experience working both in building world-class operations and extensive experience in building and scaling teams in early and mid-stage startups. And today we are going to chat to her about the importance of revenue in customer success and how focusing on css being a revenue center rather than a cost center will ultimately help your business thrive in tough times. Welcome Miranda to the podcast. There are probably very few people out there that are listening that don't know who you are. But before we jump into today's topic, can you please tell our listeners a little bit more about yourself, how you started in customer success, where you are now, just give us a little bit of an intro to you. Yeah,
Speaker 3:Hi. Thank you so much for having me. Um, I'm Miranda Koski . I am the Senior Vice President of Customer Success at a company named Data Assembly. I am just wrapping up I think my eighth week there. Uh, so still new. Super
Speaker 2:Exciting though. New, new role. Very
Speaker 3:Exciting. I love the team and love what we're doing. And there's still, even though they're series B, there's still like a lot of building, so I'm having a great time. But what brought me here, so I've been doing this type of work now for 24, 25 years and started out early in my career managing a very large book of business for nine years for a company in Michigan and then relocated to Silicon Valley, California. For those that don't know, and I've been here for 13, 14 years on my ninth startup . I've done pretty much every role in an organization that you can think of .
Speaker 2:<laugh> that is startup life.
Speaker 3:Yeah. With the exception of product and engineering. I haven't touched product and engineering, but I call myself a retired human resource leader. I've also owned sales, marketing, BizOps, finance, all the things. I even own it for a little bit. A little bit meaning like a year. Oh ,
Speaker 2:Nice. Didn't know that one, but you seemed to cover it all. <laugh>.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like people would come to me and say their power cord wasn't working and I would tell them, yes, go buy a power cord or computer's not working . And I would say, did you reboot <laugh> ?
Speaker 2:Yes . Yes. This is like it 1 0 1
Speaker 3:<laugh> it 1 0 1 , exactly. But yeah, so really happy to be here today to discuss where my heart lies, which is within customer success.
Speaker 2:I love that. You mentioned the retired HR part in customer success. I think that's gonna play a big part in in today's conversation, but you have held a number of roles, number of different organization. What continues to inspire you to continue to work in customer success or the startup world? As you've said, you've been at a number of them. Well,
Speaker 3:First I love building. You will find me often late at night writing processes, thinking about frameworks. It's fun for me. I love taking things that may have a lot of gray matter area and defining them. And in startups there's no shortage of that. Not at
Speaker 2:All. <laugh> , not
Speaker 3:At all <laugh> . But what really inspires me and keeps me rolling and keeps me coming back again and again to startups is the career growth of folks around me. Startups is they're stressful, they're hard, but they're also a place where if you're hungry and not afraid to get your hands dirty and have like a strong learning mindset, you can really like grow a significant amount in startups in the startup world. That's really what keeps me motivated. Watching folks go from I see to directors and VPs or move from sales to customer success or customer success to marketing or product or engineering. At swiftly where I was at for four years, I had multiple team members move out of the customer success org to, I mean we had an engineer, we have a product, we have somebody who moved to marketing, like watching them just grow and develop their skillsets and move in the organization. That's like really rewarding to see.
Speaker 2:Definitely. And I think you and I have that in common by the way. I am on my sixth startup and I feel the same passion as you were just saying, everything you were saying. I know the listeners can't see, but I was nodding my head and smiling 'cause I totally agree that the passion and the drive that you need to bring into a startup is a lot and it can be a lot of overwhelming moments , but there's a huge amount of career trajectory success for yourself, for your team members like you mentioned. And I think that really motivates and inspires a lot of people. And I think you and I have that in common where it's like it has influenced your growth into the roles that you've mentioned already and into the career directory that you've seen, which is really exciting. I think being at startups is great, but I also know that this year, especially in SaaS and in tech, it's a little bit tough. I think sustainability and revenue are on every leader's mind as we finish off 2023 and as we kind of start planning for 2024, I have always been revenue minded. I think that that's what is a part of customer success. But some teams don't do that. They don't have revenue targets. What is your take on revenue and customer success? Where do you feel like it fits in? Good
Speaker 3:Question. So if you would've asked me this question five years ago, I would've said, no, keep customer success pure. They shouldn't touch revenue, they shouldn't own a number. My mind has been evolving and changing. Mm . So I think because of where we are with the current economy, CSS has to get used to owning a number. If not owning a number, being able to prove how they directly impact revenue.
Speaker 2:Definitely I couldn't agree more
Speaker 3:Customer success if they're doing customer success correctly, the renewal or upsell event. Now cross-sell is different in my mind, but the renewal or upsell event should just be another day in the life of, right? Sure.
Speaker 2:It shouldn't be something that's like sticking out that you have to work towards. It should be naturally occurring if you are obviously following certain path towards the success of your client.
Speaker 3:Exactly, exactly. And that's why I really preach the value cycle a lot. Mm-Hmm . People in my teams or people in former teams have heard me talk a lot about the value cycle, right? So you surface the problem statement, you partner with your customer to figure out how are we gonna solve these problems? You create a plan, work the plan, deliver on that plan. So hopefully you're delivering on value and then you report, which again another controversial subject, but I prefer to do that through an executive business review report out. And then you're collecting new goals, surfacing new problem statements, problem statements that maybe the customer knows exist. And then also uncovering and surfacing problem statements that the customer may not know exist. If you create a flywheel like this, what naturally happens is one, the customer starts viewing you as a partner and not a vendor. Two, you're gonna surface problem statements that the current investment that they've already made can be solved for with you know, your current product, but also expansion opportunities with that type of flywheel. It's not like a transaction. You're not coming in to say, give me more money. You're partnering with them to figure out how do we solve more problems? How do we create more efficiencies? How do we create more revenue? Whatever, whatever the ROI or outcome is, how do we do more of that? How do we do more of that in more areas of your organization using you know, data in a different way, whatever it may be. How do you do more of that? And then again, it's less of a transaction and more of just part of the lifecycle, part of the relationship.
Speaker 2:Definitely. I love that you just said flywheel or circular because I think we get very stuck into revenue being linear and being almost like you gotta reach this one endpoint of revenue growth. But like you said, it is something that happens through value over time and it happens again and again, which is the flywheel or the circle that you spoke to earlier. But coming back to your earlier point around five years ago you mentioned that maybe customer success stays so pure doesn't have a revenue number or a target. I think that that's interesting 'cause I've always had a revenue target, so I'm on the other side of things. But a lot of other people are in the same shoes that you've been in where they've had non-revenue targets and it's kind of tough for them to rethink this because customer success or anything in the customer experience, customer support has been seen as a cost center and not as a revenue generator. Why do you think now revenue is so critical to be a part of the CSS function? Well,
Speaker 3:So five years might not be the right number. It might be more like 10 years because I started coming around to this probably a little quicker than others. Look as somebody who's worked closely with CFOs whose own finance, when stuff hits the fan and we're looking at budgets where to cut budgets, the teams that get cut first are the ones that are cost centers and not driving revenue. So just from that perspective, from an HR perspective, from a finance perspective, this is the economy we're in now. This is the world we're in. So it's important that um, leaders are, if they don't directly own a number, they're figuring out how to tie what their team does every day to revenue outcomes. Definitely. That is so mission critical for the role, the function and actually the future of css. So what caused me to come around just looking holistically at the customer relationship and thinking about the customer experience. I might get hate mail about this, I might not, but put on your customer hat for a moment folks, you're a customer likely of many tools. You may or may not have ACSM in some of those tools. You work with those individuals to hopefully help you, you know, have success with the investment you've made. Do you really want another random person swooping in at the renewal time and asking you for money <laugh>, it's like <laugh> . I mean think about that. Think about the experience. Definitely . I think that definitely that's really when we think about it, yes, the whole premise of keep customer success pure, they should be focused on ROI and outcomes. Yes, I agree with that. However, I also think there has to be a comfort level with them thinking through the commercial side of things as well. Now I will give a little caveat. I have and a couple times put a renewals manager in place. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> because as the renewals are tough Yeah. They may require RFPs or tough negotiations.
Speaker 2:Definitely. Yeah. I just had a conversation around this where it totally depends on your renewal cycle. Do you have a procurement process that you have to undergo? Is there multiple stakeholders that have to be re-added into the renewal process? If it's that kind of way, then yes, you definitely need someone with a different skillset to come in and almost act as your partner in crime to help execute on that. But like you were saying, a hundred percent , you're still affecting that revenue outcome, which I love that wording by the way. And I think that if a CSS leader is not using revenue targets right now or is not held accountable, revenue outcomes is a great place to start. Can you expand on it? Can you say like if you had revenue outcomes before, what are some KPIs that they should be tracking or how should they make sure that their CFO knows that they are revenue based even if they don't have direct revenue targets?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'll go way, way, way back. So in the way, way back machine, one of the things I did to prove out customer success at an early company is I ran an AB test. MM-Hmm <affirmative> . So I had a very similar portfolio that I was monitoring, stickiness, renewal and growth and had one managed by the , a similar portfolio managed by a customer success manager versus not being managed. And the portfolio that was managed by a customer success manager achieved something like 50% greater upsell. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> . Wow. And like the churn on it went, you know, on the non-managed was like 20% annualized versus I think it was like five under 5%. Uh, with the CSM, if you have the luxury to do that, that is one way to prove if you run an AB test over a certain amount of time, I had that luxury. Thankfully. Yeah . Not everybody does. Quite frankly. Tying things to KPIs, as you said, is really important. The KPIs that I tie my teams to are gross dollar renewal and net retention. And here's the thing, just saying that your team owns gross dollar renewal and net retention isn't enough. Mm-Hmm . So make sure compensation model follows, but also make sure you're not setting up emotion that causes cannibalization or any kind of politics internally. I'll expand on this and this is where revenue outcomes comes to play. Gross dollar renewal. Yes. CSMs, you are responsible in my orgs for your individual gross dollar renewal. So if you have a hundred dollars up for renewal, how many of those dollars renewed? Yep . Think about your levers that you have available to you to drive the right revenue outcomes. Right. And this isn't about selling, this is about you partnering with your customers to make sure they are successful within the product. It is worth noting that I do work heavily in the B two B enterprise motion. So we're usually talking hundreds of thousands of dollars that the contracts that my teams work with. So that is thing one. Thing two, net retention. So I have usually a team goal on net retention. Interesting. And the reason why I do a team goal is sometimes we will have an upsell motion that maybe is particularly sticky, like not sticky in a good way. Like it's kind of like, ooh , this could be really messy or needs extra, you know, negotiation skills. What I don't want to have happen is CSMs be so focused on the dollars that they're not focusing on what's happening or what the right thing is for their customers. So when you do a team-based net retention goal, everybody wins as long as the customer is winning and the team is winning as a whole.
Speaker 2:That makes sense. Yeah, of course. I , I don't
Speaker 3:Know if I answered your question, but that is revenue outcomes to me.
Speaker 2:No , definitely you already did. 'cause it's not just owning the number, it's the activities Correct. That contribute to that number, which I think a lot of people get intimidated when they're told, Hey, you have to own NRR or GRR , any of these revenue numbers if they've never owned it before. But it's not just owning the number , it's what have you contributed to doing day by day, week by week , month by month, et cetera , to help move the needle forward on those numbers. Which is I think a great place to start. You don't have to own the number, you can just own activities that contribute to the number, which is a great place to start. But I'd love to hear your input on if someone is currently in a company or running a customer success team that's seen as a cost center, what are some of the first steps or tips or something that someone can do to shift the mindset towards becoming a revenue center?
Speaker 3:Well first meet with your CFO or your finance leader to figure out how they're doing the finances, understand what makes you a cost center versus you know, somebody that is driving revenue. So I, I wouldn't wanna give advice just a blanket advice and say do a, B, C, X, Y, Z until the individuals understand that. Then ask the question, what would it take here internally for my team to be viewed as or classified as someone who maybe isn't under cogs, which is cost of goods sold and somebody who's more on the revenue side. Right. So what would that take generally it , it goes back to sh having your team own like the renewal and the upsell. It's usually that simple in finance world, understanding what that really means for your customers and your team is crucial. I wouldn't urge people just to go out and start doing things willy-nilly, understand why it is the way it is now, what would happen if we changed it? Understand what would that do to the customer experience, what does that do to the CSS motion? What skill sets are missing within your team to be able to handle renewals? Is this even necessary? Maybe it's okay that you're a cog but the team still views you as somebody that supports revenue and you can make that a very solid case. Like really dig in, like put on your curious hat, curious George hat and go out and like pick up all the rocks, peel back all the layers of the onion and understand.
Speaker 2:Definitely. And I love that you've already mentioned some of these critical things like speaking to your CFO, but yes, customer success is mostly seen under cost of goods sold. Like it is a typical thing in most SaaS businesses. Hence why we end up in the cost center pile of things, but also understand a business's profit and loss margins too. Because that will also really help you understand where you fall, how much your customer success managers are costing versus how much revenue they're bringing in. And all this as a leader I would personally say is just good knowledge to have. It can only help you, it doesn't hurt. Obviously there's a lot of things to shift that mindset, but like you said, just starting with understanding those basics can really help you propel your whole mindset and your whole framework and your whole ownership of renewals totally can change when you decide to start looking in and being curious, like you said,
Speaker 3:And honestly I know this is a topic probably for a different day, but this is one of the things that make a VP different than ACO.
Speaker 2:Yeah , I agree .
Speaker 3:VPs own a function, they own their department and in their department there could be multiple teams in there, but somebody that's operating at c-level , they own the business. Yeah. They understand what's going on in the business and what the levers are and how all the little pieces come together and play together. Um, they understand what the margins are, they understand what the book of business that their CSMs manage, what that ratio needs to be. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> in order for it to be financially viable in viable
Speaker 2:For the business.
Speaker 3:Exactly. Yeah , exactly. For
Speaker 2:We could do another whole podcast on like the difference between being like a like senior customer success leader and then a true executive owning, like you said, being a part of the business growth and not just the necessarily the department growth. Exactly. But we're gonna save that for another day. Let's come back to the revenue topic <laugh> and talk about how the world of customer success has really changed this year because of the macroeconomics of the world. We already talked about how CSS being focused on revenue is a huge result of this change and what's happening right now. But what does that mean for the CSM? I'm just thinking before everyone was like a do it all , cover everything. Then we got super specific of, you know, you need a technical CSM or you need like, you know, an implementation manager versus ACSM . But what kind of skills do you think are important for being a successful CSM going into 2024 knowing that this revenue shift is so important right now?
Speaker 3:Well, I will tell you what I will be looking for when I hire, I'm looking for somebody who is entrepreneurial in nature. So they're taking a look at their book of business and they're not just saying, what do I need today from to do today for my customers? They're looking at it and they're looking three months out, six months out, however many months out to figure out what needs to be true for this renewal to happen, what needs to be true for growth to happen. They're dissecting their book of business and looking at green space like where are the obvious growth opportunities, where pitfalls and risks that we should be aware of as we're going down this path. They're also taking a look at contracts and understanding how contracting works at their organization because knowing that can change how you interact and who you interact with and who you know you need to interact with, right? You might be interacting with a leader of one department, but if the budget you know, lies within another department, you need to interact with them as well. And those are things that, you know, I would expect my my CSMs to know and learn as they're managing their book of business. Like it's their own company.
Speaker 2:Definitely. I always say that to my CSMs, I'm like, you are the CEO of your book of business. So what you do will directly affect the growth and you know, acceleration of your business but will also affect possible losses in your business. And you have to treat it like that in order to truly be successful in your role.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. Absolutely. So while I'm not coming right out and saying learn how to negotiate contracts because I don't know if that's necessary at their organization, what I am saying is switch your thinking and if you are ACSM right now listening to this and you're sitting there waiting for your customer to reach out to you, stop, stop doing that. I hope you're not
Speaker 2:Doing that, but hopefully you're doing something else. But if you are, please stop <laugh>.
Speaker 3:Yeah , it happens. It happens more than you know, it really does. And that's , um, I'm not poo-pooing, it's just the way of what it has been. But stop doing that. Open up your book of business right now and think how can I be viewed as a better partner to my customers? What can I do? What are actions I can take right now to help them realize more value on their investment again and again and again. Right? Open up your eyes and think about it a different way instead of looking at what are the fires I need to put out right now? Think about where can we provide more value. One of the things that we're seeing in this economy is things that are not mission critical are being cut. You do not want to fall into that. If you have a customer that cuts you, you wanna be able to tell the story of all of the things you did to prove out value, to proactively engage them, to think through different use cases to reduce single points of failure, whatever it may be in your organization. You wanna be able to show all the playbooks you used, all the levers you pulled. So if your customer is somebody that has to cut your company, you have the story and the narrative of everything you did to make sure that didn't happen.
Speaker 2:Definitely. I couldn't agree more. And you just said you don't wanna be that person that gets cut. And that is happening obviously across the entire SaaS and tech world. Everyone's evaluating budget, really looking at what they wanna spend on and unfortunately that's also happened in the customer success hiring landscape as well. There are a lot of people that fell into that cost center side of things in a business. And like you said, the easiest thing to start cutting is things that don't make revenue, which means there are a lot of people looking for work right now. And with the CSS landscape changing and ACSM possibly looking for a job today towards a more revenue centered CSS function, what do you think they should be focusing on? I'm , I'm gonna ask you with the HR hat on right now, what do you think they should be looking for? What do you think they should be presenting when people are looking for roles in as ACSM right now?
Speaker 3:Look , I, I know it's hard out there, right? It is very hard out there right now. So a few things, if I'm gonna put my HR hat on, pretend I'm looking through resumes. If you are somebody who's never owned revenue and you're struggling to get a role, one, be open to taking different roles within an organization that would give you revenue exposure. Whether that's, you know, taking on an account management role because that's not a big leap. You can go from being ACSM to an account manager or an AE role. Be open to that to get that experience and then you can come back and be that enterprise CSM that has had, you know, has seen both sides of the coin. So that's thing one. Thing two, if you're like, yeah, no way in hell Miranda, that's never gonna happen, I'm not gonna do that. Fine. Figure out ways that you can prove you have the chops to hang. So whether that's creating a portfolio, creating content, whatever it may be, figure out your transferable skills and how you're gonna tell that story on a resume. You have, I think the statistics that I've quoted before, again and again as you have seven to 10 seconds. Yeah ,
Speaker 2:Seven I think, I think I've heard seven.
Speaker 3:Seven, yeah. Seven seconds. Let's call it seven to wow the recruiter that is screening your resume. So figure out your outcome language on your resume outcomes that you drove. Don't just put, I held EBRs . Great. Tell me about the outcomes. I conducted EBRs for top 20 customers and drove 20% growth in revenue. Love that. Bam. That's a resume. I would be like, oh, I wanna talk to that individual. So think about how you're positioning yourself and also, I hate to say this, but LinkedIn, LinkedIn, LinkedIn. It's so powerful not only for networking, but when I am looking at candidate resumes, I also open up their LinkedIns. I wanna see do things match, you know, is there any content that has been put out? Like I look at all of it, I look at the holistic picture because I'm a big believer we bring our whole selves to work. So I like to see the whole self <laugh>. So put yourself out
Speaker 2:There. Definitely. And coming back to that resume piece, I think it's so critical to highlight key metrics, but almost like, like you said, tie it back to revenue. Even if you didn't have a revenue target or own a revenue target, you contributed to revenue in some way, shape or form in your previous roles. So having that either highlighted in that way that you just stated, Miranda, or I've seen a great resume that on the top, instead of doing like a summary or a profile, they just listed all their EV targets they've ever hit. And I was like blown away. 'cause seven seconds I saw the top of that resume, I was like, right, I need to speak to this person. Yeah. 'cause they summarized it for me so well in the top and then they went into detail later on. But I think it's so amazing.
Speaker 3:I love that idea. Your resume is yours. You don't have to stick to the old format, right? Like
Speaker 2:Not at all. I would say please don't <laugh> , like please excite me. Exactly . Like please don't
Speaker 3:<laugh> . I know especially somebody that had to sift, you know, I had posted a job about a month and a half ago and it blew up. Like I had like a thousand applicants within a few hours and I had to shut it down. Oh
Speaker 2:Gosh. And the market today. It was just crazy
Speaker 3:Oof . And then I had to sit and sift through all those resumes and I felt personally obligated because you know, it was, I posted it from my LinkedIn so I went resume by resume and there were a handful that really stood out and they did things just like you said.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's , you have to really stick out. You have to be different in this market and especially in a shifting market that is gonna be revenue focused . You need to change your narrative, your story in whether you own that number or not. You need to tell a really strong story between how customer success affects revenue and coming into that, I think CSMs and CS leaders really have to upscale themselves to prepare for this change in market and what 2024 is gonna bring us. Because if you asked me at the end of 2022 or in the middle of 2022, I wouldn't have said what we're going through in 23 was gonna happen. But hey here we are constantly changing. I feel like since the pandemic, it's year after year, a different level of cs. But how do you think CSMs or CSS leaders can really upskill themselves to prepare for the changing of market into 2024 and and into the future of css? Oh,
Speaker 3:I feel like I still have so much whiplash from everything that has gone on this past year. I haven't even started thinking about 2024, which is a terrible, terrible answer. <laugh> but
Speaker 2:Honest. But <laugh> ,
Speaker 3:I a hundred percent honest. I need to, I need to sit down and really think about 2024 just, you know, for my team but also the industry. If I think of what's going on right now, I think 2024 will be consolidation. So I said this probably March the first time on a podcast that this fall in winter, we're gonna see a lot of startups that are, they're gonna run outta money. Just to be quite frank, the funding is still pretty dry. There's money out there to be invested, but investors are being extra careful. The unit economics that they're looking for and the investments that they're willing to make, it's changed. It's no longer growth at all costs . CSS is going to have to figure out how to tie themselves to revenue outcomes, right? I imagine some com most companies are gonna start seeing their growth pick up, but there's gonna be huge hesitance around bringing in more resources because of the funding, the nature of funding. So with all of those facts, you know, being true for 2024 mm-hmm . Where I would urge CSS leaders to really focus on is what tools and technologies are out there that are going to help make your CSS team more efficient, improve your customer experience, make it a no-brainer. So when the renewal does come up, your customers are like, yes, I have to continue to work with them, but really hone in and leverage. Like there's some amazing tools and technologies out there. Finance is more likely to give you money to buy a tool than they will be to hire a person. Just remember that. So if I were to give anyone advice, it's right now act like you can't hire in 2024 when you're planning, what would you do differently?
Speaker 2:I think you hit the nail on the head with the, what we knew as growth at all costs has now what I think will bring sustainability at all costs into 2024. And I think we have to think of revenue and sustainability in customer success and how do we do that? Being mindful of cashflow, like you just said. And I think that that's gonna be the biggest challenge and I'm glad you brought it up. 'cause I think that tools and processes and efficiency is really gonna unlock the successful customer success teams over the ones that maybe fail or flop or businesses close . That'll really set you apart. But we can keep talking all day, Miranda, about this topic and every other topic in customer success. But I wanna wrap up with our quick fire questions. So are you ready to try to answer the next few questions in one sentence or less?
Speaker 3:God, it's so hard for me. I'm so loquacious, but yeah, let's do it. <laugh>.
Speaker 2:It's okay. You're not the only person that I've challenged and has not made it through this, but let's try. The first question I have for you is, what do you think is next for the customer success industry?
Speaker 3:I think we're gonna see AI become more front and center in customer success, and I'll just keep it to that short sentence. Awesome.
Speaker 2:Next question is, which SaaS product can you not live without as a CSS professional?
Speaker 3:Well, because I'm a leader of a team, I'm gonna say lattice, it helps keep everything organized with my team. So
Speaker 2:Nice. I love Lattice. Next question is, what is your favorite CSS learning resource? My
Speaker 3:Favorite CSS learning resource. Um , well, honestly it's podcast and webinars like this. I don't have one in general, but I , I love catching what's going on in podcast and hearing the thoughts from all of the, the folks in the community.
Speaker 2:Amazing. And my final question is, who is inspiring you and whom do you think we should next have as our podcast guest?
Speaker 3:Kristen Hare is doing some amazing work. If you haven't spoken with her, she should be on your list. Jay Nathan, I follow his newsletter. Um, those are two immediately. Like Jay Nathan is a good, he does a good job of talking about business, not just customer success. And I think that's important.
Speaker 2:I love that about everything he shares. It's always tied back to the business, unique economics of everything. Totally.
Speaker 3:And I do have one rapid question for you.
Speaker 2:Okay. Oh , I've never gotten this, but Miranda , being a podcast host yourself . I feel like this is natural. So go on Miranda, ask me a question. What's
Speaker 3:The name of your Yorkie that I keep seeing? Oh, that nobody will see. It's adorable. But it's a Yorkie, right?
Speaker 2:Yes, yes. She's a teacup Yorkie and she's not here anymore, but her name is zz .
Speaker 3:Oh , so adorable. Anyway, that was my rapid fire question. I hit 'em hard, don't I? Yeah,
Speaker 2:I love it. I love it When she comes back, I'll show you her. Anyways, Miranda, thank you so much for being on the show, sharing your insights, taking your time. If anyone has any other questions or follow up to our conversation, what's the best way of getting ahold of you? Uh ,
Speaker 3:Just on LinkedIn. Very simple.
Speaker 2:Amazing. Thank you again and , uh, thanks for your time. Thank
Speaker 3:You.
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.