Customer Support Leaders

Send us Fan Mail Ryan Klausner: The Difference Between What Customers Say And What Customers Do Ryan returns to talk about understanding customer feedback in the context of (and often the contrast to!) how customers actually behave! Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Andrew Rios: The Support Report Andrew Rios is a Global Customer Support Leader.  He combines an energetic leadership style with a strong technical foundation and a deep understanding of Customer Experience/ Support and Engineering Operations.        Andrew believes every Support leaders should develop their own “Support Report”. Have a listen to understand what this is, and how t...

Send us Fan Mail Matt Dale: Support Data Matt Dale joins me today to talk about Support Data: when to get started (clue: now!), and how to make it understandable - and therefore useful - for the rest of the business. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Panel: Welcome back for 2024! Welcome back to the podcast! After a full year off, we're all raring to kick off 2024 with a bunch of ideas and reflections.     Here, we get a bit meta at the start of the year. This panel brings back four of my favourite guests to talk about the podcast itself. What did they love about the first 249 shows? What would they like to see this year?...

Send us Fan Mail Specials: Fireside 49 Mike Redbord tells me how to show the actual value to the business in providing support to those users of your product or service who are on free or unpaid plans. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Specials: Fireside 48 Jason Yun, co-founder of Relay , returns to talk about the support that Support folk might need in the light of the recent spate of layoffs, at the worst time of year to be suddenly back on the job market. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 7 Topic: Managing Performance Issues Hilary Dudek tells me how she likes to coach for positive behaviours, rather than rely on metrics to measure performance. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 6 Topic: Metrics Craig Stoss talks about stories, and the Source of All Truth. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 5 Topic: Moving from Doing to Leading the Work Matt Dale returns to talk about why you can’t expect to successfully do two jobs at once. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 4 Topic: Personal Stories of Transitioning to Leadership Natalie Ruhl had a dream…. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 3 Topic: Awkward Conversations Hilary Dudek needs to practice her poker face. (Also, although the title is “Awkward Conversations with Hilary Dudek”, this most definitely was not one.) Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Specials: Fireside 47 Austin Emser , CEO of Stylo , joins me for the first time to discuss the art of prioritising those tickets! We compare whether FIFO is enough, or whether you need to bring other factors and practices in to what tickets get worked on first, and how fast. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 1 Topic: Empathy in Support    We round out this week’s topic with Ash Rhodes. How much weight should we place on empathy when we’re hiring for support? And Ash pulls some very funny faces (entirely for my benefit). Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 79 Topic: Building a Team from Scratch When is a full-time job not a full-time job? When it’s a two-person job! It’s been a while since Matt Dale built a team from scratch, but nonetheless, he returns to round out this week with his own wisdom and perspectives from further on in the journey. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 79 Topic: Building a Team from Scratch Ashley returns to tell us how she prioritised early definition of ‘Operating Principles’ for her nascent team, and how they’re essentially still holding strong 4 years on. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 78 Topic: Knowledge Management Simone Secci rebuilt a knowledge base from scratch, banking on being able to show its value much further down the road. It worked! From zero to knowledge hero, Simone talks about his journey. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail Specials: Fireside 46 Ethan and I discuss the relative merits of our favourite approaches to tagging support conversations. Neither of us is a fan of fluidity when it comes to this opportunity to carry Voice of Customer through into our organisations. Structure all the way! Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 78 Topic: Knowledge Management Cynthia Ng describes how GitLab approach all their knowledge with a ‘Handbook First’ ethos, and how their value of Transparency informs everything they do.  Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 78 Topic: Knowledge Management Aprill Allen, a Knowledge Management Consultant & KCS Specialist at Knowledge Bird, helps support teams stop being so overloaded with solving the same problems over and over, and start using their knowledge as the lever it really is. How do we even get started on our Knowledge Management journey in Support? Support the sho...

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Specials: Fireside 26 According to “Zee” (if I could only say it), we’re doing CX wrong! Nicholas Zeisler joins again to tell us why we’re doing it wrong, and how to get it right. A man after my own heart, he says it hinges on the process! But how do you leverage process, prove ROI for your Customer Office, and truly develop a customer-centric culture?  Support...

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Specials: Fireside 25 What a conversation! Ash comes on the podcast to talk about job hunting in Customer Support Leadership, but we only get there via comparing consulting notes and his insulting the average British meat pie. Honestly. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Specials: Fireside 17 Ethan explains how we can apply a scientific approach - semiotic theory - when trying to understand our customers context, and therefore meet them where they are. Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 67 Topic: Managing Change Lauren joins me for two milestones: the 200th episode of the podcast, and my birthday! It’s always an interesting chat with Lauren, and her academic background in human genetics and social behaviours.  Here, she brings her expertise to bear in helping us manage change. Always hard, Lauren brings advice on making it easier. Support...

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 67 Topic: Managing Change Lauren, a previous panelist, returns to the podcast for our first one-to-one chat, where we pick up our conversation on managing change. Lauren believes that providing training on this difficult aspect of leadership shouldn’t be a single course or workshop.  Support the show

Send us Fan Mail From The Archives: Week 66 Topic: The Perfect Support Email Ethan Walfish is a former panelist (take a listen to our discussion on Support Leadership 2.0 back in episode 105 ), and joins me today to discuss that most convenient and most misused communication - email! How do we approach getting this ‘just right’. Ethan believes there are 6 distinct elements to the perfect email, an...