Earlier in your career, how did you work with the C-Suite?

I started my career in sales. As an Account Executive, my job was to gain an in-depth understanding of my customer’s business objectives and advise them as to solutions that could address their challenges. As deals progressed, the C-Suite would participate in the evaluation and often be the final decision maker.

At one point I was in an inside sales role calling on prospects in a highly regulated industry in Texas. I nurtured relationships with my champions, listened to their pain points, and subsequently kicked off an evaluation with a company that had been using a competitive solution that specifically catered to their industry for over a decade.

What initially started with a phone call with a technical analyst developed into several meetings with stakeholders and finally a green light from various C-level members of the organization. I helped them choose an implementation partner and stayed close to them after the sale to ensure a successful go-live.   A few months later, the CHRO visited SF to take her daughter to a college orientation weekend and asked me to give them both a tour of my company’s campus. As we took a selfie together, I realized that moment that the relationship mattered more to me than just the win.

I was not very good at this and learned through my mistakes :-).

Please look at my answer for the question, 'What advice would you give to your younger self as a customer success manager on influencing the C-Suite?'

Early in my career, I didn't. I was at a larger company with many functional and department heads. Not everyone will/should work directly with the C suite, but if the work you're doing has a high impact on the entire company, you will.

My first real work with the C suite was when I was building a new Customer Success function at a mid-stage company. We had built our first churn/retention forecast and our CFO needed to understand our projections and have confidence in them before taking it to the board. We walked through my model, which varied from our tops-down Finance projections. Every month, we would review recent churns, top risks and our quarterly and annual churn forecast with the CRO and CFO. This became a rhythm they depended on.

As time went on, I was tasked with more strategic initiatives because of the confidence I built with them.