Automate. Augment. Amplify. Protect.

Thank you so much as Natasha said I think this is the last session so I can totally understand if you are tired If you want to do some stuff on your laptop, but let's get through this I Don't see that thing here But anyway so show of hands, I think you know this is this is the last session You have heard AI probably like 150 times over last two days How many of you genuinely feel? Overwhelmed with everything AI in your work life One two almost half of you guys half of the room feels genuinely overwhelmed With everything AI well, I have a good news and a bad news bad news is I cannot take the AI away from your life the good news is You know I'm going to talk about some of the playbook which will make you feel more important more relevant especially in the AI era that we are going through today, so Well I talked about it some of you I saw some of you guys have copy of this book I'm chief success officer at Rocket Lane. We have a booth Right here, and if you are interested in reading books You know please stop by at our booth We have limited copies if not our team will figure out how do we get a copy for you? This is a collection of my 15 years of experience Working in customer success leading customer success in different companies That I work for and I've advised The forward for the book is written by none other than Nick Metta who I'm sure all of you guys know Nick Metta very well So super excited for my third book that just launched last weekend Let's let's talk about the topic You know I'm going to talk about what we do Here at Rocket Lane some of those things are implemented some of those things are being implemented But we'll talk through The idea of where we are headed and why I personally believe that CSM is more relevant now Than it ever was right I'm not gonna read through the numbers because I think you guys have seen these numbers you guys have been seeing these numbers all last one and a half days So to speak, but I'll let you read the numbers, but I another show of hands how many of you actually feel?

That there is more churn there are more surprises There's more stuff in your email than ever before which needs your attention 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 okay, and that's you know for what it's worth It's not just you right. I think the entire CS industry is going through that you know we've All felt like oh wow there is AI technology now our life is going to be simple We are going to wake up and there's something going to be waiting in our email and now I know how my day is going to look And it's working out to be quite the opposite. I'm sure you guys feel all that right But I think you know in in all of these numbers, and how we feel how over when we are I think there is a method to madness I'm not saying I have all the answers, but there is some method to madness We had rocket lane So by the way rocket lane is a professional services Automation product we do end-to-end PS Automation product we do end-to-end PS Automation part of our product we have this philosophy that we work with our customers on which is our three levels of transformation and Our product fully supports those three levels of transformation The third level is the most important one from that perspective, but from a CS perspective Not only that we are in That we are inheriting those three levels of transformation in terms of what we do at For customer success, but the fourth one is is from my perspective is the key here right for for the CS leaders and CSMs here Which is how do we protect this is not about protecting your job? This is not about protecting the CS role This is about protecting what we stand for which is our customers their success their renewals their expansion, right?

That's really what we are going to talk about So I'm going to talk about how very briefly Because we have only 20 minutes So I'm going to talk about how we have implemented some of these levels at rocket lane or how we are Implementing it and then you know I'm going to talk about L4 Which is the protect in terms of why CSM is absolutely a necessary well now, right? So the first one is operational transformation. I think this is like you know five years ago ten years ago Everyone started automating everything everything was a structured data Everyone had dashboards everyone had dashlets all of that stuff is gone right? I mean that's that's old school That's that's everyone forgotten about that the new way of operational transformation is really Each of us have a different need from our systems from our data Gone are the days when you have standard dashboards like oh you go to dashboard and you see what you need Now is now is the time when you are seeing a real example on the right hand side I'm not sure if it's readable from the back or not, but you are seeing a real example that we use which is You know I wanted to know for one of our customers a very specific Information which is a rolling 12 month of usage by month through April 2026 and a summary of that usage for the last year Right in a traditional automation obviously this wouldn't work, but now you know we are able to connect I'm going to use all the buzzwords again that you have been hearing for last one and a half days Which is we have connected our slack or email our mcp server our charge B Which is where our commercial data is we have connected our mix panel?

Which is where product usage is now? We are you know we I'm able to just ask our bots the arjuna that you are seeing is our the name of our bot internal bot and now I'm I'm able to ask like hey. You know what is important to me. What do I want to know?

I don't need to ask anyone. I don't need to go to anyone. I can just ask and I get the information That I need How many of you? Have dealt with hallucinations in terms of the results that you get back from such bots Okay, and that's a real real challenge, okay?

I cannot solve it for you, but I think that's a real challenge, and I always take it with a pinch of salt I have lots of wartime stories about hallucinations, but for some other time and and so the level one is like You know You need everything at your fingertips right everything is personalized everything is what is important to you what matters to you You need all that data you connect with all these mcp servers that everyone has these days and Voila right you you have everything that you need The as a so so that as a cs function that puts you somewhat That empowers you somewhat right like you feel like yeah I you know I can go open up my laptop in the morning I can ask a bunch of questions right and I know what what has to happen The next one is really the the delivery transformation right we all have jobs to do in terms of governance cadences monthly ops meetings the QB ours and and you know the expansion opportunity identifications What are the strategic recommendations that we can give to the customers all kinds of stuff the delivery? transformation that we are doing here is the next level which is a set of agents, which is telling me Everything that I need to know in my portfolio right including obviously the churn risk The expansion opportunities out there what has changed overnight? Why do I need to pay attention to this 10 accounts versus the other 10 accounts that I was dealing with last week all that kind Of stuff right so from a delivery perspective if you have to deliver all of that stuff if you have to have a qbr tomorrow You don't have to struggle. I mean everyone talks about how you can with one click you can create a powerpoint about qbr Yes, I think that's that technologies here.

You can create those qbr decks and qbr Powerpoints and all that stuff But I think the information that has to go in there has to be something that that Resonates with you rest that that has to resonate with the customer and and that's the next level of transformation that we are doing You know in terms of how we are dealing with customer success at rocket lane The third one is really the work execution transformation like and this is by far one of the most important for me The customers you know a lot of half of you raised hand in terms of you know How over when we are and how you are dealing with more surprises and churn and stuff like that I think when we are talking about work execution You know there's only one thing that really matters more than ever and I think you know in the gain side keynote they talked about that as well, which is the outcomes the right hand side of the screen is outcomes and More than ever I think if AI technology has done anything good It is to allow us to really focus on what matters most So what we do at rocket lane is we have two kinds of outcomes that we track and we are in the process of fully Automating it not there yet but the outcomes that we as rocket lane deliver to our customers and The outcomes that we deliver through our product to our customers customer Both of those are super critical right because when it's time for renewal and expansion You want to make sure that they've realized outcomes or the value or the ROI? There are so many different words that we use is something that you have been tracking month on month quarter on quarter If if a slide like this is not included Slide like that is not included in your QBR Then I think you know you are going through the motions. Maybe customer is happy. Maybe they are referenceable When the time for renewal comes I think there are going to be all kinds of questions, especially in today's time The changing the systems has become easier integrating the systems have become easier AI can replace your systems You know in a JFA all of those things did not exist five years ago So you could get away without any of these things But now outcome is probably the only vehicle for you to ride on to make sure that this journey My book says customers for life And and the way you do obviously this is one of the ways But but most important thing for customers for life is really focus a laser sharp focus on outcomes, right?

And in in your Product in your company the definition of outcomes ROI value realization may be different You just have to figure out what that is and just automate as much as possible This is where AI technology can help you and yet not replace you which is if you know What are the outcomes that your product can potentially deliver now backtrack how that? How can you prove that to the customers month on month quarter on quarter? And that is where you can use your AI technologies to say that hey These are the three most important outcomes that I want to track and we have agreed with the customers Here is the baseline and you know now I want to start tracking that because now it has an ability to collect all of your Product usage data all of your commercial data slack data, you know Meeting requests all meeting recordings all of that stuff, right? So so that's that's extremely critical from a layer 3 transformation perspective Now you've done all of this stuff You know, this is all technology so far, right?

We automated we kind of amplified All of that stuff, but now the real thing comes, you know You have everything you need through all of this technology including a beautiful Extremely impactful QBR deck But then so what? You have to deliver it's only as impactful and as Effective as your delivery as you as in as a human being right and before I go into that You know some of the things The the reason why CSM is repressible and I'll talk through the story that happened three weeks ago but before that arguably if You implement the three levels of transformation correctly in your environment It's supposed to give you Maybe half of your time maybe two-third of your time back What you do with that time is the key, right? Because AI can do all of these things that we have talked about but AI cannot do that level 3 here the number 3 here Which is build that relationship that compounds over time Right, maybe next year. There will be a instead of me.

There will be a hologram Talking I don't know maybe that technology will also come but then customer will also be a hologram and then the Dollars that they people pay will also be a hologram and then you know, everything just nullifies, right? So it doesn't work. So so we are we are a replaceable from that perspective a story three weeks ago, I Cannot talk too much about The details of this customer But you know a highly escalated account very big account for us and one of our stakeholders, you know For all the reasons they are the our customer is going through massive amounts of changes Because their customers are demanding Massive amount of changes and I'm sure this is a story that resonates with everyone and and this stakeholder of ours, you know was not happy with us Would not give us time and And there was a constant demand and we felt that we just did not have a way to get in and really work through With her to really, you know level set maybe before we could even do anything with that, right? and and so Me and my team actually a couple of people from my team.

We actually took a flight to Chicago You know my philosophy or I'm sure it resonates with a lot of you guys But my philosophy is spend as much time in person In the room as possible, especially with the keys stakeholders, even if it's a one-hour meeting I don't think anything zoom cannot replace it emails cannot replace it your hologram cannot replace it None of the technology can replace that that bond that you create when you are in the room and so for that one-hour meeting You know, I took a flight for our flight eight over total back and forth on the same day, but You know she came into the meeting and the you know, the first sentence she said as soon as she came in the meeting Remember this, you know, she she's an amazing person. She's very powerful in her organization. She's under tremendous pressure from her CEO and her customers and she's running PS CS, you know everything and She's agitated with us because of whatever reasons She comes to the meeting and the first sentence she says is you know, I have a hard stop at 3 o'clock I need to go and she came probably about 13 minutes late 12 minutes late into the meeting I'm sure you guys you guys have heard this before because the mindset When that person walks in and says that sentence the mindset is I want to get out of here as soon as possible I'm doing a favor to you by meeting you. That's the mindset.

I Have seen plenty of those in my life lifetime You know If you read this book, I have a chapter called Murphy's law everyone aware of Murphy's law Murphy's law says if Anything has to go wrong will go wrong if you want your customers to stay with you for eight ten years fifteen years Whatever lifetime, right? But what you do when something goes wrong? defines the next phase of your relationship with that customer and most people Do something that feels like counterintuitive When Murphy's law actually hit and I'm quite the opposite So if nothing else you should read that chapter or that section in the book You will I'm sure you will enjoy reading that that part of the part of the book but There's a there's a chapter called feed the ego all of us have ego. I don't think there is anyone Who will say I don't have ego right?

our egos are at a different levels and it plays out differently in different situations and stuff like that and You know, we talked for like 15 20 minutes that 15 20 minute was extremely well researched well thought out very deliberate content That was the prep part of that was AI part of that was experienced part of that was you know what the situation was and You know that 15 minutes Changed everything the tone changed she opened up her laptop She said, you know, I want to show you what I'm dealing with the challenges that I have day to day You know and then the rest of the meeting continued it went on for one hour 55 minutes And it had to end because I had to leave for my flight not that she had to go Right. And so I had to say that sorry, you know I have to catch my flight and I have to go the outcome of that is really None of your AI technologies would have done it We have we had sent enormous or number of emails to her prior to this meeting Nothing worked. We have tried to you know work through her and her team and all that stuff did not work Not that I gave her any different message than what was already communicated in the email in terms of the Remediation plan and you know the cordial situation and all that stuff But it's just the fact that I took a four-hour flight for a one-hour meeting I showed up when things were getting tough for her, right? tough for me sure but tough for her you have to show that you are there for her because she is the one who is Going to stick her neck out for you when you are not in the room and that relationship Only this team here this every one of you the CS team CS leaders Only you can create that that that's the magic.

That's the magical power that we have been given In in our roles, right and I think you know, the the relationships is with with this customer is now Pretty good. We have a plan of action in place. We are working through it and you know We talked a lot about our wartime stories and travels and you know, all the kinds of stuff, right? I couldn't I don't think I would have pulled that off over a zoom call or a phone call or Anything else that that that's something that only CSMs can pull off or CS leaders can pull off when in person and as a result my strong strong belief is The churn will happen the surprises will be there You are going to get overwhelmed Customers are going to get over when they are going to be more demanding While you actually use all of your AI technologies to do that three levels of transformation What you should focus on is really outcomes, right?

The value realization ROI just if you are speaking outcomes language day in day out, I think you are safe. Your customers are safe Your job is safe and you are growing in my opinion, right and and use Opportunities to meet your customers build that trust because all of us are supposed to be trusted advisors, right? And and how do you become trusted advisor? Yeah, you you have to have domain knowledge You have to speak that language you have to understand the process all of that stuff, but also You know this this human to human connection is not something that's going away anytime soon And I think that's where we really are irreplaceable.

That's where we really belong, right? One thing I want to leave you guys with is if you're a CS leader or a CSM With so much overwhelming data that we see every day You know in in whether it's gain side whether whatever tools you guys use there's just overwhelming set of data But if if I were to look at one chart and say is it going in the right direction? I'm talking about a particular account or a customer or however you look at it Is it going in the right direction or not because imagine there is there are slack messages happening There's emails happening. There is product usage data happening.

There is Recordings of the meetings happening avo maa recordings and the Gong and you know, there's just so much of data That's that's happening. How do you make sure that? One you are not dealing with hallucination Second, you know, you really have a pulse on something. So this this chart is from a from one of the tools that we are Experimenting with it's called gain foresight how creative Right, but this this chart talks about the top line here talks about Effectiveness.

Sorry. I think I can't see the color importance That's the importance importance means how important is your product or services? Whatever you do for your customers how important that is and all of that is derived through all of the data that it's collecting and what's being Said in those meetings what's being said in those emails what's being said in those slack, right? All of that is being collected through that and then the bottom line here is the effectiveness which is We want to be important Whatever product or services you are doing we want that to be important for your customers And this one is telling you are you effective in delivering to that importance through your product or services that you are doing?

It's a much deeper discussion. I'm happy to stay back and talk about that But this is a chart that I have started looking for you know, some of the high-rr accounts and some of the Escalated accounts and stuff like that. Like are we going in the right direction? Obviously, the next phase is to how do you become predict, you know predictive because you want to prevent from all of this To happen and last but not least I'll leave you If this thing works, there you go Any time you come across AI Technologists I do believe there is a parallel path to what humans need to do or humans need to focus on so You know the the the row here which says the human layer.

I don't think any of that AI can replace now not yet. I'm not predicting the future Maybe five years ten years down the road will have will be talk about something different But at least for now none of those things is something that AI can actually help you with and definitely not Not something that it will help you deliver. For example, I talked about the ego intelligence There's no way AI would have told me, you know, how to feed that ego That's something that I will have to figure out. It's based on my experience is based on, you know, eye to eye contact and like understanding what's important To the other human human being and so on so forth, right?

So as much as we all are getting tired of hearing about AI But AI is here to stay we cannot run away from AI we cannot Ignore all of the AI stuff that's happening around us. The only path forward is really embrace All of the tools and technologies that are happening around us But as you are embracing really figure out your level one level to level three transformation and what really? how you want to use those technologies and Then focus on level four because if you do those level three three levels correctly The level four will allow you to focus on building trust and building relationships. Okay with that really Thank you so much for staying here on a second afternoon, but hope you find this useful.

Thank you so much