IT’S TIME FOR CIO’S TO ADOPT A ‘CUSTOMER SUCCESS’ MINDSET

As CIO’s, we are quite familiar with the concept of Customer Success. Most SaaS software companies we do business with, will assign a Customer Success Manager (CSM) soon after contract signing. A CSM ensures a successful implementation of the solution and achievement of stated customer goals. Companies like SalesForce have perfected this model and is probably best in class in implementing a highly successful Customer Success Model. 

A decade (or two) ago, most of us were working with a perpetual software license model, driven by ERP vendors – buy big and then you are on your own for implementation and adoption, or worse, at the mercy of a systems integrator to see you over the finish line. Not so anymore.  An investment in a subscription allows us to start small, possibly a proof of concept (POC), and then ramp up usage if the POC is successful. Writing off a smaller investment, in case of an unsuccessful POC or if feature/functions are not a good fit, is less painful to the IT budget. Herein comes the CSM. The SaaS provider wants to ensure that your POC or feature/function test is executed successfully. A CSM will shepherd the project through, ensuring the customer is successful in achieving their goals. Initial success leads to higher adoption and increased usage of the solution. 

Here are a few key pillars of the Customer Success Framework and how it differs from Customer Service - Customer Success is proactive while Customer Service is reactive, Customer Success is focused on achieving goals while Customer Service is focused on resolving issues, Customer Success is focused on long term success while Customer Service is focused on immediate issue resolution. Customer Success enables customers to take full advantage of the solution and gain real value from it, increasing the likelihood of renewal and upsell. 

CIOs will intuitively see value in the Customer Success framework and how it applies to IT’s relationship with internal customers – whether it is applied to a specific project implementation or to day to day interaction with a business function (sometimes referred to as the IT Business Relationship Manager/BRM). 

Let’s further explore how inception and execution of a project may change under the CS framework. In a typical IT organization projects are defined and prioritized based on some form of IT Governance model that aligns IT projects and business priorities. Putting the CSM hat on, IT would evaluate, not just the immediate business priority, but the long-term success (or goals) of the business function and validate that the project aligns with long term success of the business. Once the project meets this criterion, IT will ensure success of the project by proactive validation of the solution (proof of concept or something similar) and get ahead of technical and process problems. This is an important pillar of the CS framework to ensure success, increase customer confidence and achieve high adoption.  If the POC is unsuccessful, it is better to pull the plug on a small investment, regroup and evaluate alternatives, rather than pushing on.  Next, implementing success measures to clearly understand customer sentiment is critical. Something as simple as Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a great way to measure success. Lastly, according to SalesForce - Customer Success has no end date and time, it’s 24/7/365.

All of this may be quite obvious to experienced CIO’s.  However, having a framework to guide and measure success is a great way to communicate a consistent approach to all levels of IT and business. 

Some purists may consider calling internal business a ‘customer’ to be a cliché.  However, using a Customer Success framework for internal ‘customer’ will certainly go a long way in enabling IT to provide true business value to the enterprise.