I Didn't See That Coming: Red flags to look for in your next CS job interview

"As the World Churns" podcast Episode 3 transcript, featuring guest Erika Villarreal:

< Listen to the full episode here >

Host

Okay, Erica. Well, welcome to the show. You have a really good background to talk about finding a good job in customer success. So welcome.

Guest

Thank you very much for having Justin. I'm very excited to be here and talk about my journey and my learning so far. So thank you very much for inviting me.

Host

Great. All right, so let's get into it. I heard that you founded a financial technology company in Mexico, which is very interesting. How do you get from that to getting into customer success? What is that your you look

Guest

That's a very good question. So a little bit of background. My first 10 years of my professional experience in the financial industry had the opportunity to found a company, a startup company in Mexico. And because of my relationship and my closeness to customers and being able to work in multiple department doing sales, doing marketing, I even did accountability cuz were, it was a really small team because of my relationship with customers. I found a passion about helping them achieving their goals and it was an instance click. So once the company started growing, the CEO said, Hey, well, she's very good with customers. She's very with making them successful. So they said, okay, let's bring her in with, as a customer success leader. So I builded my team from scratch, hired three customer success managers at the time, then worked with them to build a customer journey and make sure that our customers were successful using our product.

Host

Okay. So customer success specialists has been super hot for the past two years. LinkedIn says the role has increased 34% annually and the customer success job report says there are 8,690 open jobs in November, which is an increase from the previous month of the previous month before that. So all these people getting into this field, what can they do to ensure they have a right fit in their job?

Guest

So the first thing that I would say for you is being able to build relationship with customers is, is a big part of it. So once you get into the role, a big, important aspect of it is being able to maintain a relationship for a longer term. Another thing is that you should know that you should have project management skills as well. Cause once you start implementation with these customers, uh, following up with these projects and making sure that they're successful is a big part of the role as well. You should have problem solving skills as well. Customer success is all about making sure that the customer is successful and you are solving a problem and a challenge that these customers are facing customers come to you with problems that they're looking to solve. And they're not looking for features in yourself, they're looking for success outcomes. Sure. So you being able to help them with those challenges and identifying all of these needs that these customers have and making sure that they start implementing this software and learn from the product adoption and make sure that they're successful with that.

Host

Okay. So you recently got a job as a senior CSM. Congrats. So what are some red flags that you kept on your mind to watch out for while you were interviewing for that position and others?

Guest

Of course, one thing that it's very important to note is that interviews should be bidirectional, right? Sometimes we feel that, uh, they are asking questions to ourselves and that we need to ask questions to the interviewer as well. So one thing to bear mind is that one of the things that I like to look into is the leadership team. So for that asking questions about who is going to be in charge of the customer success team, what they've done in the past, what have been their achievements, how long have they stayed in the different companies and which roles they have been getting into before in that company? So you can better understand if you are going to be able to learn from them. Right? So for me, one of the things that's very, very important is to be able to have a leadership team from where I can learn a lot from, cause that is what makes you advance in your career, right?

Guest

You don't join a company just to do what you have been doing in the past. You join a company so you can learn new things and you can advance in your career. Another thing that I would highly recommend customer success managers to ask about is a product. You want to understand the development of that product, how it works and that it's successful and that customers like it. Right? So one thing that I like to recommend as well is that when you are doing this interview, you need to make sure that during your research, before actual we going on into the interview, you look into their website, understand what type of products they are offering, what type of problems they're solving. And at the same time also look into customer reviews, right? What is g2.com saying about this product? Are customers happy with this product? How does it compare to other products in the market?

Guest

What is the root relationship between this product and other competitors? Right? Cause you don't wanna join a company where everyone's talking bad about the product that it doesn't work or that's, uh, that has a lot of books or it's difficult to implement, for example. So doing your research before and making sure that you have all of these questions raised from that research and ask these questions to the interviewer, to make sure that it's a good fit on, on the product side, right? Although as a red flag is understanding what the responsibilities of the customer success manager is gonna be. So a little bit of background customer success is well new many companies have different perspectives of what a customer success manager should be doing. Right, right. And a customer success manager covers a lot of the customer journey. So understanding what is in scope for your role, if it's going to be onboarding product adoptions and any other activities, uh, additional to that, you need to make sure what specifically is going to fall into your lap and what other customers, success managers or roles can complete into what you're going to be doing. And then the other thing is understanding how many accounts you will be managing, right? Because it kind of depends if you're gonna be managing SMB accounts or if you're gonna be managing enterprise accounts. So let's say for example, they say, Hey, you're gonna be managing an enterprise portfolio and, and you're gonna be having 50 to 60 accounts. That would be a red platform, right. That's way,

Host

Way too many.

Guest

That's way too many accounts for a high touch type of model. So understanding what type of responsibilities, what falls into your lap, and then considering the number of accounts that you will be given, seeing if it's not too much to ask from what's been required for your role. So that's another red flag that I would definitely look into as well.

Host

You mentioned bidirectional interviews. If they don't leave time for you to ask them questions, would you call that a red flag?

Guest

Yes, definitely. If you're in an interview and at the end of the interview, they don't allow you that time to ask questions. That would definitely be a red flag for me. And I would not even consider the job.

Host

Moving forward. I would agree one hundred percent. It's incredibly arrogant thing to do to expect that that person isn't interviewing you as well. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Well, great. Here's a deal. So interviewers are also putting their best foot forward when they're interviewing you. So I may not be revealing some things that you may not wanna know. How do you get the answers out of me if I'm not maybe open and honest with

Guest

You? First thing is I share what's important for me to join a company, right? So for example, so having information about the team is important. Having information about the history of the company is important. Having information about the product and the role is important. And if during the interview, I'm not getting the answers to my questions. Well, my reaction would be to raise my hand and say, Hey, I, I haven't heard about, uh, this is if process or I haven't heard about this specific part of the role. That's really important for me to make my decision or understanding how big the team is or anything related for me to be feeling comfortable in that, uh, company needs to be asked. And if they don't answer that question or if they don't share that information with me, that would also be a red flag absolutely. To say, Hey, this is somewhere where I don't, I wouldn't want to work for.

Host

Okay. Yeah. That's great. What are some red flags with leadership? Let's say you get to meet with the CEO or any other C-level and what are some things at a more junior can tell from that level of person?

Guest

That's a really great question that reminds me actually of my last interview with the CEO for Conde where I currently work. One of the things that would be a red flag for me is if they don't have a vision of where they wanna be in the next five years or ten years with their product. So if the CEO doesn't know where he wants to be, how can he lead the team or the company to that place? So asking questions about what the vision is for the company, what the mission is, what are the specific challenges that they're looking to solve? What are their main concerns at this moment? Them having shared that information with you and how the team will be growing, moving forward. That for me, helps me understand how the company is doing and where we're going to see if I can grow with that company or not. Right? Which everyone joining a new company is not thinking just joining that company to be there forever. You're looking for a place where you can grow in that company as well.

Host

How would you ask the CEO about his product vision?

Guest

I would ask questions about what the product roadmap is for the next six months or for the next year, understanding where the product is currently and where the product is going. Will me better understand what the CEO and the company is looking to change in the current product, so better understanding what the plans are and seeing if there's gonna be a switch on the product. So for example, when I joined Condeco we were discussing the new normal, right? Our product was due for workspace management solutions and giving that with that return to office and everyone working remote and flexible, the product needed to change for it to fit the needs of the current market. Right? Sure. So him being able to share that disability with me and the vision of what needed to change for the product to be successful in the next three years, that gave me a really good pause and said that, Hey, this company does really know what they're doing, where they're going. And that was a really green flag for me.

Like what you see? <Hear the whole "As the World Churns" interview with Erika Villarreal here.>