The Top 20 Customer Success Mentors To Learn From And Work For - 2025
Overview
The knowledge we need to excel at our jobs is often locked in the minds of peers. At Sharebird, our mission is to make this knowledge accessible to everyone. Imagine succeeding with top mentors by your side.
The Customer Success Mentor List showcases the top 20 customer success mentors to learn from and work for to develop your career. Every one of these practitioners has contributed content that Sharebird users trust and value for their professional development.
Methodology
Sharebird's algorithm ranks customer success contributors based on how helpful our users perceive their content to be. We do not handpick people. To be considered for this list, mentors need to be current customer success practitioners and in a leadership role. We look at the following factors with Sharebird content: views, saves, and followers. We then apply a proprietary algorithm to calculate content credibility and helpfulness. Views show us content relevancy, saves show us content quality, and followers show us content credibility.
Sharebird does not accept payment to be included on this list, which allows us to maintain objectivity and independence. We update this list every year. For any questions about this list, please contact [email protected].
About Sharebird
Sharebird is where the top customer success leaders share their expertise. Discover actionable insights and advice to tackle your toughest work challenges and unlock your full career potential.
In Alphabetical Order by Company:
Trevor Flegenheimer
AlertMedia VP, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Customer Success, at the end of the day, is about making customers successful. The more time you invest on your customers' ultimate success, the more personal success you will see.
Jessica Haas
Appcues Chief of Staff & VP of CX
Career Path Tip: No matter what you know, how far you’ve come, or how good you are — earn your spot, every day through learning and service. You will always have areas where you can improve, learn, grow, and challenge yourself so stay curious and open, whether that feedback is coming from your customers, teams, peers, colleagues, or a fortune cookie, stay open and invested in self-growth! Bonus for the women out there: Find ways to honor the women who came before you and leave a better, more empowering place for the ones coming after you; it matters more than you know.
Georgia Glanville Harrison
Braze VP Customer Success, EMEA
Career Path Tip: Embrace your role today with the confidence that you are capable of tackling even greater challenges. Whenever I feel overwhelmed by the next step in my career, I remind myself that I experienced the same feelings when I first entered the industry. If I had known then what I know now, I wouldn't have worried so much. I strive to project that sense of calmness into my daily routine.
Ben Terrill
Brex Senior Director, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Now more than ever, CSMs are under increasing pressure to drive revenue for the business. But this is our time to shine! Take the opportunity to deeply understand your customers, continuously sharpen your business acumen, and focus on delivering and showcasing tangible value at every touchpoint. If you focus on these principles you will set yourself apart and make a lasting impact.
Conor Holmes
Confluent Director, Customer Success EMEA
Career Path Tip: Details matter. Whether it’s preparing for a customer call, crafting a presentation, or even having a casual coffee with a new hire, the difference between doing something thoughtfully and doing it half-heartedly is profound. Prioritizing self-awareness and preparation will not only elevate your work but also accelerate your personal and professional growth.
Kiran Panigrahi
Gainsight Senior Director - Client Outcomes
Career Path Tip: Focus on Outcomes, Not Just Effort!
True Customer Success lies in understanding and driving measurable outcomes for your customers. Build a culture where your team aligns their efforts with customer goals and business impact. Leverage data, listen to feedback, and collaborate across functions to deliver tangible value. Remember, success is not just about retaining customers but empowering them to grow with you.
Meenal Shukla
Gainsight Senior Director of Customer Success
Career Path Tip: The future belongs to those who blend human wisdom with AI understanding. Focus not just on learning AI tools, but on developing the strategic mindset to know when to leverage automation for scale and when to apply irreplaceable human skills like empathy and creativity. The most successful professionals will be those who transform 'AI anxiety' into 'AI advantage' by staying intellectually curious and saying yes to challenging opportunities that push their technological comfort zone.
Michael Maday
Gainsight Senior Director, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Be curious! Ask questions about the future of your organization, what your leaders are focused on, what needs your customers have, and how you can help move all of these folks forward!
Natasha Evans
Hook Head of Customer
Career Path Tip: A prior boss and mentor once gave me some incredible career advice that has served me very well: "Run towards the problem". When big problems arise, lots of people are seen running in the other direction. But if you run towards it and solve it, you've immediately made yourself invaluable and built an incredible brand within the business. Don't be afraid of hard things!
Matt Kiernan
HubSpot Senior Director, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: I find the best CSMs have strong business acumen, can step into a customer relationship and understand where there is opportunity to either (1) inject their product into existing process to create efficiency or (2) suggest a new process built around their product that drives better outcomes.
Stephen O'Keefe
HubSpot Senior Director, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Constantly ask yourself: “how would I explain this to a customer in the simplest language possible?” As organizations grow, complexity creeps into internal processes first, and then customer process. If you can’t explain a process to a customer in 30 seconds or less, you need to strip it down and simplify it further.
Nicole Alrubaiy
Jellyfish Senior Vice President, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Growth happens outside your comfort zone. In Customer Success, and in leadership, everyone is figuring it out as they go. Embrace the discomfort, stay curious, and trust your ability to adapt and learn along the way.
Christine Knific
mParticle by Rokt Senior Director, Customer Success - North America
Career Path Tip: In sales, we've heard the phrase "Always be closing." In Customer Success, we should Always be Discovering. This means that every conversation a CSM has with a customer is an opportunity to ask why, learn how, and dig deeper into the customer's business goals. The more we know about the client's goals and business, the more valuable we become.
Brett Milstein
Narvar Director, Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Customer Success is all about relationship building. CSMs spend a ton of their time on zoom calls with their customers and valuable/engaging conversations are what help build strong and trusting partnerships. The CSMs I typically see with the most success (especially regarding renewals and upsells) are the ones who have built the best relationships with their partners.
John Brunkard
Salamander Advisory Senior Associate, Customer Success Practice
Career Path Tip: Own your own career and cultivate a growth mindset to continuously learn, develop, and improve. Be the architect of your own success as a Customer Success Manager. Embrace change with resilience and adaptability, as these qualities are essential in today’s dynamic environment. I believe in the power of networking; seek mentors and coaches, and remember to pay it forward by helping others along their journey
Caoimhe Carlos
Udemy Vice President Global Customer Success
Career Path Tip: Keep your customer at the centre of your decision making, put yourself in their shoes and aim not just to solve problems that arise but to preempt them. The best customer success pros build trust through genuine empathy and curiosity, an authentic desire to understand their customers' challenges and an ability to spot patterns early and transform those challenges into at best opportunities and at worst moments of learning/growth. Also be professional but don't be afraid to be yourself, humans connect with humans and at its core customer success is about helping others succeed.
Jeff Beaumont
Customer Success Consultant
Career Path Tip: Work for a good manager — someone who cares, wants you to succeed, and has your back. If they’re great, they will give you feedback that stings and hurts, but is a true blessing to you. They will strengthen your strengths, help you see yourself better, and help you navigate your career goals. In short, if you want personal growth, you need a person to help you grow.
Manil Vasantha
Leader, Customer Service
Career Path Tip: They say, ‘Wear your customer’s shoes,’ or ‘Walk the talk.’ Never claim, ‘I understand,’ unless you truly do. To genuinely understand your customer, you must grasp not just their immediate requirements and use cases but also their broader circumstances—how these factors impact their business outcomes and decisions. It goes beyond mastering the CSM process or your product; it’s about connecting the dots between your customer’s needs, other customers’ use cases, and how competitors position their products. Don’t just mimic competitors—learn and innovate.
To thrive in customer success, immerse yourself in the industry, become a subject matter expert in the application of your product across verticals, and cultivate a deep, trusted relationship with your customer. ‘Customer for Life’ is not a slogan—it’s a commitment to fostering trust, delivering value, and consistently evolving to meet your customers' ever-changing landscape. True customer success lies in aligning your expertise with their growth and positioning yourself as a thought leader who empowers them to succeed.
Wynne Brown
Board Member and Advisor
Career Path Tip: There are no neutral interactions with customers; each interaction is either positive or negative. If you aren't giving value in some way, you are eroding trust, brand and goodwill. Be sure to always provide some value - big or small. This will force you to become more and more customer-centric, and customer-centricity is the difference between thriving and dying.