Elevate through iteration | Christina Adderley

[Christina] (0:00 - 0:20)

I was very fortunate enough to have started this entrepreneurial journey going back almost seven, eight months ago. Now I've done like personal branding and things like that, but actual entrepreneurship, this business that I'm building in the financial services industry, first of all, parallels customer success perfectly. What I'm doing with my clients in that industry is customer success.

Our topic is just finance.

[Dillon] (0:28 - 0:40)

What's up lifers and welcome to The Daily Standup with lifetime value, where we're giving you fresh new customer success ideas every single day. I got my man, Rob here fiddling with his microphone. Let's see how he sounds.

[Rob] (0:41 - 0:42)

What's up people.

[Dillon] (0:43 - 0:47)

And we've got JP with us. JP, can you say hi?

[JP] (0:47 - 0:48)

Hey, what's going on?

[Dillon] (0:49 - 0:53)

And we have Christina with us. Christina, can you say hi, please?

[Christina] (0:54 - 0:54)

Hello. Hello.

[Dillon] (0:55 - 1:01)

Hello. Hello. And I am your host.

My name is Dillon Young. Christina, thank you so much for being here. Can you please introduce yourself?

[Christina] (1:02 - 1:20)

Yes. And thank you so much for having me. So my name is Christina.

I'm a CS leader. I've recently got my license in financial services brokering as well. I actually currently am not employed in a corporate role.

I was laid off about a month ago. It'll tie into a bit of my story. So I'll share that later.

[Dillon] (1:20 - 1:32)

You sounded slightly hesitant to say that, and you should not. I think there's actually more CS people looking for work than are currently working right now. I don't have any stats to back that up.

It just feels that way.

[Christina] (1:32 - 1:34)

Anecdotally, I would have to agree.

[Dillon] (1:35 - 1:51)

Particularly if you're out there looking for jobs and you see how many people are applying to the jobs you're also applying for, but I digress. Christina, you know what we do here? We ask every single guest one simple question, and that is what is on your mind when it comes to customer success?

So can you tell us what that is for you?

[Christina] (1:52 - 3:12)

Yeah. So I actually started thinking about what, what was on my mind before the layoff actually happened. I didn't know how relevant it was going to be to be by time we were actually sitting down to record this.

So my topic for today is actually using customer success principles for personal success. Right. So for me, what that really means is, you know, as CS professionals, we spend a lot of time developing those success plans for our customers, taking them through it, monitoring how it's going, you know, following up, helping them get, you know, the most out of it.

Cause we want to keep them on track for next year. But like, do we really do that for ourselves? And I've coached like quite a few individuals, like I said, in my previous roles, I ran commercial onboarding teams, customer success and onboarding teams, that type of thing.

And I've coached a lot of individuals in the field. And so the thing that I found kind of like the same between all of these individuals, whether they were looking for career growth, whether they were laid off and looking for another job is like, they weren't really putting a lot of strategy to it. And so it's like, come on guys, we do this every day.

Like it's so easy. So what I kind of came up with was like just a personal success framework. So same thing that we're doing in our jobs, right.

Strategizing those outcomes, understanding those metrics, cultivating proactive mindsets, communication as key. We have to elevate through iteration. We got to systemize that success.

And then we got to like sustain that growth mindset.

[Dillon] (3:13 - 3:19)

Okay. Elevate that iteration is like a form of alliteration. Did you do that on purpose?

[Christina] (3:19 - 3:22)

It just came to mind and it was elevate through iteration.

[Dillon] (3:22 - 3:23)

Okay. Yeah.

[Christina] (3:23 - 3:25)

I guess I was just being very literal. Yeah.

[Dillon] (3:25 - 3:57)

We have our title of the episode. Don't you do my job for me. There could be something we could find something else.

Maybe let's stay open-minded. I want to JP, I want to give you an opportunity because I know what Rob's going to do, he's going to say, Oh, I love this framework, but what about this? This and this.

So I JP, if you could, what is the, uh, what's the word filibuster his ass and not let him talk at all, give me that opportunity.

[JP] (3:57 - 6:29)

Yeah. So great, great call out, Christina. I remember when I was a little more active on LinkedIn, you know, I would see so many folks sort of posting who were, you know, just to keep it real, who were, who were like looking for work in CS and I used to have fun sort of just talking about using those CS principles, like in your job search, right?

Like those things I think are, are actually very, very helpful. And it's, it's kind of, I don't want to say sad, but it's like, it's like right in front of, it's like right in front of, you know, it's like right in front of us, you know? And so I would try to just sort of shine a light, I think on things where, you know, if you really thought about say, finding a job in a way, okay, this is your ultimate success plan for yourself, right?

It's like you were trying to arrive at X destination. If you are that CSM that you say you are, or if you want to become that CSM that you think you can be, I think that you can really put it to the test, you know, in terms of a job search. I think that one of the things I'll just share that I've done personally, cause I have done this for myself, which is there's a book, I know Rob would also love this, but there was a book I had, it's called the career, I think it's called the career success toolkit.

It's something, it's, it's a really good book though. And of course it talks about like having a plan for, for at least a couple of years and what you want to do, sort of the roles you want to have. And I think that this is very important because we talk about being, you know, strategic, like what's your next move.

If you're getting caught and like, you're thinking about your next move, like right in the moment. You sort of, it's easy to get overwhelmed by the emotion of it all. It's easy to get overwhelmed by the, like the unexpected, but this is why we have strategic plans because there are unexpected things.

If everything was going to expect that you wouldn't need it, you wouldn't need a plan. That's, I think that's the importance of it. Like you're somewhere you get, you get laid off.

Hey, that's a reality. You could get laid off. So how well your strategy is working is really, I think comes down to your, your level of preparedness when things go awry, that's when your plan really shows.

It's the same in customer success. You know, something happens with a customer. You can talk to someone.

You, you look good because you've planned for this. You're ready. It's not like something happens and all of a sudden you're like, Oh my gosh, I don't know what to do.

I'm freaking out. And it's like, well, your emotions are overwhelming you because you have a lack of readiness. Yeah.

[Christina] (6:29 - 6:30)

Yeah, exactly.

[Dillon] (6:30 - 6:47)

So Christina, I'd love to, let's keep Rob on the outside looking in. I would love to hear from you what this looks like for you. Like maybe like what's the easiest example you can give about the way you apply a customer success mindset to your, your personal life or your professional development, whatever you want to.

[Christina] (6:47 - 9:53)

Yeah. So I think ultimately for me, it comes down to strategizing those outcomes, right? Like JP was just kind of saying, if you, what is it, what is that saying?

It's like, if you don't plan, then you're planning to fail essentially. Right. And so at the end of the day, when I coach people or when I, when I work on myself, I always kind of say like, don't focus on, you know, like the exact job title that it is you want to have focus on the things you want to be responsible for the skills you want to be utilizing.

Like, what do you want your day to day to look like? Obviously part of your day has to include something that's making money, but what do you want that to look like? Let's work backwards from there, putting that plan into place to make that happen.

So I realized this like fairly early on in my management career, when, you know, I'll just say I'm neurodiverse and while I work well in teams, I always, my brain just likes to go in another direction sometimes. Right. And so I'm like, you know, I'm that type of person that's like, ah, I'm entrepreneurial.

I got to get out there. Like I could do this, I could do that. And so, you know, as I started thinking about that, it's like, I love these roles, you know, they're giving me something, but what am I going to do for myself?

And it's funny because recently when you guys were chatting with Brittany Casey, I think it was you Dillon that said, you know, we're not necessarily in control. Like we don't always have the key to the success in our career. And I think that's absolutely true.

And I remind people that all the time. However, I do think there are certain things we can take into control and that we should. And I think a lot of that comes down to ultimately our personal branding and what we're doing outside of our role.

So not only are we, you know, owning our development at work, are we, you know, keeping a portfolio of our wins, keeping our own kind of win playbook. Um, I tell everybody, by the way, if you're not doing that, like start doing it, then you're proud of just put it in a notes file on your personal device, because one day you might log into your work computer and it might just not work. So keep it somewhere that you always have access to.

Because you never know, right. That's yours. Keep it somewhere.

And, you know, very fortunate enough to have started this entrepreneurial journey going back almost seven, eight months ago now I've done like personal branding and things like that, but actual entrepreneurship, this business that I'm building in the financial services industry, first of all, parallels customer success perfectly. What I'm doing with my clients in that industry is customer success. Our topic is just finance.

And so having that literally I was laid off on Wednesday, on Friday, I was on a flight on Saturday, I was in Miami. And I believe on Monday I was on a beach in the Bahamas and like, I was already getting paychecks. Like I was getting paid in my bank account from this business that I'd already been setting up.

So like immediately I didn't have to worry about the layoff. And so the reason I actually hesitated at the beginning wasn't actually because I'm ashamed of being laid off. I actually tell everybody like there's so many factors outside of your control that have to do with that.

That's a whole conversation for another day. But ultimately if you can take control of those things, build your plan, analyze your metrics, see how you're doing. Like one day you're going to find yourself in a situation like I was where the unexpected happens and it just doesn't matter.

-: 10:22

So I want to call out really quickly. You mentioned Brittany Casey, and I will be, I will clarify that what I meant was people talk about luck is the intersection of preparation and opportunity. But you do not always control the opportunities.

You can control preparation all day. You can maximize the ways in which you can receive opportunities, but you do not necessarily control the opportunities actually coming your way. Rob, go ahead.

[Rob] (: 10:22

This is good. I had so many examples running through my head and I'll try to keep it quick. CS principles for personal success.

Immediately what came to mind was deescalating angry customers, which we're recording this right around holiday season and I can see that those skills coming into play around some holiday dinner tables, given the political climate, perhaps, no, no, just the turkey. Another, another example that came to mind is I probably told you guys about this, this soon funnel methodology, which I think corresponds to something you, you said, Christina. So it's, it's a really simple acronym.

What's that? Go ahead. It's just a simple acronym.

[Dillon] (: 11:14

When you're coaching someone for a situation. You know, damn well, you've never shared that with us, Rob.

[Rob] (: 11:19

That's what he said. I do.

[Dillon] (: 11:20

I don't know what I do, but so, so then once again, we have the receipts. We will, we will tell you what you've said before.

[Rob] (: 11:27

So, so the, the soon funnel is a method you can use when you're coaching someone through a conundrum. So it's S O O N success, obstacles, options, next steps. And it's fairly straightforward.

It's like, okay, let's start with a success statement. What does this look like as a solved problem? What are the obstacles you're facing?

Let's list those out. What are the options you've evaluated and tried or new ones we haven't tried yet? Pros and cons of each and then establish next steps.

And honestly, like, I hope my mom's not listening to this. Cause I think about this when I talk to her, there's some challenges. Family, your mom, a fan.

No, no, I don't think she knows. She's probably seen, seen some, some clips, but anyway, but yeah, so there's so many like personal applications of the same framework that like we use in, in our, our work lives that can work in our personal, personal lives. But you know, no matter what, I, I don't know, my, my wife still hasn't filled out her NPS survey for the last year of our relationship, but I'm going to let that slide.

[Christina] (: 12:31

He might not get a renewal.

[Dillon] (: 12:38

These are automatic renewals. Just so we're clear. Christina, fantastic topic.

We are out of time, but I would love for you to come back in a couple of months and tell us more about this business, how it's going, what that's been like standing that up. And we want to tie it back to CS. Let's talk about those principles you're using and how, but for now, we've got to say goodbye.

[Christina] (: 13:08

Sounds good. Thanks guys.

[VO] (: 13:16

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