Anika Zubair (00:00.3)
Let me ask you something. When was the last time you actually sat down and wrote out a personal development plan? Not your team's OKRs, not your QBR prep, your plan for growth. Because here's the truth that no one talks about in customer success, you will never accidentally get promoted. You have to build a plan. You have to own the plan like a CEO, and you have to advocate for your own career trajectory.

This episode is going to cover how you are going to land your next promotion in customer success. And if you are listening to this at the time of release, it is the time of year where we have just gone through mid-year reviews. And I promise by the end of this episode, if you take my tips and tricks that we discuss, you will be looking at a promotion before the next review. So let's dive in.

Hello everyone, I'm your host Anika Zuber and welcome to the Customer Success Pro Podcast, your go-to space for real talk, expert advice and actionable insights in the world of customer success. I'm a CS executive leader, award-winning strategist, CS coach and customer success fanatic. I help CSMs and CS leaders build the skills and the confidence to become revenue driving pros and scale world-class CS teams.

So whether you're brand new to CS or a seasoned leader, this podcast is here to support your growth. Because customer success isn't a destination, it's a journey. And I'm here to be your guide and navigate every step of your journey. So join me every Wednesday where you'll get fresh CS tips, tricks, and strategies you can actually use. Some weeks I'll share my own insights and best practices from working in CS over the last 13 years.

And once a month, I'll bring on expert guests to dive into the most relevant and pressing topics in customer success today. So if you're ready to level up, hit subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you tune in, and let's make your CS journey a little bit easier together.

Anika Zubair (02:15.095)
talk to hundreds of customer success pros every year, whether it's inside of RevUp, through one-to-one coaching, DMs on LinkedIn, and of course, my own team. And there's always a common theme. I want to grow in my customer success career, but I don't know where to start. Have you ever felt that way? I know early on in my career when there was no clear career path for a customer success professional, I too felt lost.

or that I was spending time on the wrong things. And often most of these CS pros, they're waiting, waiting for their manager to offer them a path, waiting for a promotion cycle to kick in, waiting for validation. Now, I'm here to tell you, if you are waiting, even while listening to this podcast, your next promotion, you are going to be waiting a long time. Because here's the thing, if you're not clear on where you're going next,

How can you expect anyone else to take you there? Of course you have to have influence from your manager and of course there are people who are going to dictate whether it's time for a promotion or not. But if you don't know where you're going, how are they? And here are the three biggest mistakes I see when it comes to career development in customer success. First of all, people are relying solely on their managers. You think your manager will build your growth path

for you, but your manager is juggling 10 other things. Your growth, sadly, isn't the top of their priority list. It has to be yours. And I remember when I was a first-time manager or a first-time people leader, I too was juggling board expectations, exec expectations, customer expectations. I was just grateful that my CS team was doing the work that I asked them to do. But I often forgot

that there is a career growth path that I need to be carving out with my customer success managers on my team. Now, I didn't forget because I was just a bad manager, I was just busy. And most people think that people managers, their number one priority is to manage and grow their people. Now, I'm not saying all people managers don't prioritize this, but unfortunately, in the world of doing more and more in customer success, people managers are not just people managers.

Anika Zubair (04:41.561)
They are expectation managers to senior executives. They are building strategy and playbooks. They are implementing new operations within their customer success org. They are doing a lot. And managing people is a lot more to add to their list. And of course your manager wants to see you succeed and they might be a great leader, but they might just not have a plan for you. And especially if you are at a startup or a scale up or a business that doesn't have an established people or HR team,

A lot of time there are no clear paths to growth or a clear career trajectory for you. And that doesn't mean there isn't ever going to be one, but that means that you have to prioritize building one. Now another mistake that I see a lot of people come to me with is they're very vague about their goals. I've heard this time and time again, but I hear CS pros say, I want to be more strategic. Okay.

But what does that actually look like? Do you even know what strategic means? I want you to define it. If you don't define it, you won't know when you've achieved it. So instead of saying, want to be more strategic, define it. What does strategic mean? Does it mean unlocking more revenue? Does it mean a certain amount of upsells? Does it mean all your renewals happen early? Does it mean having meaningful conversations with your customers that are going to see value every week? Whatever strategic means to you,

define it because otherwise if you just say I want to be strategic, that is like chasing the end of a goal and never knowing where the end point is. You cannot just keep running and running and running towards a goal without knowing where you're running to. Okay, one other mistake I want to cover is something that I see time and time again and this happens way too often is most CS pros are only thinking about development or promotion or

anything about their career during review cycles. Now, career growth isn't a once a year thing. It's actually a weekly habit. And without a plan, it falls to the bottom of your to-do list, and it's going to fall to the bottom of your to-do list for your manager as well. If you really want a promotion, and if you really want to be seen as strategic or a senior CSM or the next head of customer success, you cannot wait until

Anika Zubair (07:07.246)
the company or your manager gives you the opportunity. All throughout my career, I actually created opportunities for myself. And I did this on a weekly basis, and we're gonna jump into that later on in this podcast. But I just wanna let you know that if you are waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting for the next cycle, you're never gonna get it. I'm sorry. You might get it a year or two years from now, but the people who end up waiting,

for a promotion are usually the people that are the most disappointed in the next review cycle because they end up just waiting. And when you put it at the bottom of your to-do list, it's at the bottom of everyone's to-do list. So let's stop the waiting and let's actually create a priority and plan for your promotion. Okay, so how are we gonna do that? First of all, we need to build your personal development plan together, the CS Pro way.

And here is my step-by-step framework. First of all, you need to define your next move. I want you to get as specific as you can. Take a weekend, take some time. This is your career and your next steps. Do you want to be a senior CSN, a strategic CSM? Maybe you want to move into CS ops, or maybe it's leadership and you want to be the next head of director or VP of customer success.

Whatever it is, I need you to be super clear on not only the role and the title, because that's pretty easy to define, I need you to be clear on the scope of the role. So what is this person actually doing every single day? I need you to define that and I need you to write it out. That's why I want you to take time on the weekend or off hours or whenever you're listening to this podcast, pause it.

and really be clear on the role, the title, and the scope of what you're working on in your personal development plan. Okay, step two, I want you to identify a skills gap list based on everything that you've outlined in that role. So say you want to be more commercial or you wanna be that strategic CSM. When you actually list out the role and the qualities of that role and the scope of that role, I need you to figure out

Anika Zubair (09:27.918)
where you're probably lacking. Maybe it's in data storytelling, or if you want to be a CS leader as your next career step, maybe that's actually in people management. So first of all, just list all of the skills that are needed to become either a senior or strategic CSM or a head of customer success. So just list it out. So list like commercial acumen.

people management, stakeholder management, data analysis, data storytelling, objection handling, you name it. List all of the skills down, okay? And then I want you to rate yourself from one to five on each of these skills. I need you to really be honest with yourself. If you are having a hard time having commercial renewal conversations, are you really gonna give yourself a three or is that more a one? I want you to be honest and rate all the skills from one to five, okay?

And then I want you to set up as your next step goals for development. So instead of saying, I want to be more strategic, set a goal like present a CS business case in our next team meeting by July 15th of strategic customer success plans. Whatever it is, give your goal a very clean definition and a deadline. I really want you to put in a date.

Because when you start building out your strategic goals and your personal development plan, don't be wishy-washy. Get straight to the point and give yourself a date. Now listen, some of you listening are probably overachievers and you probably are saying you want to hit this goal in the next week or two. That's great if you can, but be realistic with yourself. Really set realistic goals, whether it's two weeks, two months. Just be honest with yourself of exactly what you're doing.

the goal you're trying to achieve and the timeline that you need to do it with. step four is calendar blocking for your personal development time. Now I've done a previous podcast all about time management in customer success and I know we're all time poor out there, but like I said earlier on in this podcast, if you do not prioritize your personal development and career goals, no one else is going to do it. Not your manager, not their manager, not even your teammates.

Anika Zubair (11:47.694)
The only person in control of your career trajectory is you. You are in the driver's seat. Everyone else is in the car with you and you're going to take them along for the journey. But let me be clear, your manager or your team is not in the driver's seat of this. You are. So you need to block out the time, an hour a week, to really understand what is it you're doing to move the needle on your goals. What are you going to do to unlock the next step of your personal development plan?

Is that being strategic on the first hour every Monday? Or maybe that's blocking out Fridays for learning so that you can learn the new skills to become a people manager or a strategic CSN. Now, this is non-negotiable CEO time. That means that unless there is an actual emergency, like someone is dying, then you need to actually move the CEO time around. But if not, this is your time to actually focus on you.

not on your customers, not on your company, but on you. Because remember, if you grow in your career and you are happy in your career, that is when you can serve others to your fullest. If you are constantly putting your personal development last, you are going to be resentful to your company, to your customers, to your role, and you're just going to start really dreading your role because you're not seeing career progression. But career progression starts with you prioritizing your own time.

So let's make sure that you don't move that personal development time out of your calendar. Okay, if you've been nodding along in this episode, then this next part is just for you. Maybe you're doing great work in customer success, but you're still being overlooked for promotions. Let me just tell you that you're not alone. So many customer success managers feel invisible. They're hitting targets.

saving renewals, contributing to upsells, and yet when the next promotion cycle comes around, it's crickets. No recognition, no raise, no new title. Now imagine this, you walk into your next performance review with a record of everything you've achieved. Clear, measurable revenue impact. You show your manager the value you've delivered and make it obvious that you're ready for your next step. There's no begging, no hoping.

Anika Zubair (14:11.012)
just undeniable proof, and that's exactly what the Accomplishment Tracker is designed to help you do. This is the same tool that I use to go from individual contributor to head of customer success in less than a year. Not because someone handed me the title, but because I built a plan. I tracked my wins and I proved my value. It's the exact guide I give to every coaching client who wants to land their next promotion in months and not years.

And because you're one of my loyal podcast listeners, I've got something special for you. You can download the accomplishment tracker today for 50 % off with the code podcast50. That's podcast50 at the customer success pro.com forward slash resources. Remember promotions don't just happen because you waited long enough. They happen when you have a strategy, a system.

and a record of your results. Start tracking today. Your next raise starts here. Go download the guide at thecustomersuccesspro.com forward slash resources and use the code podcast50 to get 50 % off. All right, let's jump back into the episode. Okay, the final step, which is so, so, so important that I know a lot of us forget to do is to track

your wins. So once you have that goal list listed out, I want you to start to track when you make the wins. This is huge. This is what's going to separate you from getting a promotion in a few years time to getting a promotion in the next few weeks or months. I need you to start tracking all of those projects, all of those goals, everything that you have done that has led to more renewals closed or more commercial conversations that you contributed to or more growth.

that you have gotten into the business. It doesn't matter where it is, as long as it's contributing to the business growth and is contributing to your personal development plan, you need to track it because you cannot grow what you do not measure. I need you to start tracking all of your growth because tracking your growth is not only good for your mental health and being able to say, hey, I did that. That was awesome. That was really cool.

Anika Zubair (16:36.026)
Tracking your growth is exactly what you need to show your manager in order to get your next promotion. Because yes, your manager might remember this week or this month that you helped secure the renewal of the biggest customer in your portfolio, but trust me, they have 500 other things that is hitting them next week, and they are going to forget all of that growth and all of those wins that you did have. They might vaguely remember it.

but you need to track it all because you need to bring it up in your next meeting with them. Okay, let me tell you a story of how I've learned all of this the hard way. Back early in my CS days, I thought I was doing great work. I thought doing great work was enough. I was hitting my KPIs. I was the strongest CSM out there. I was building strong customer relationships. Honestly, everyone was raving about how...

strong I was and how much of a strategic customer success manager I was with my accounts. I stayed late to help my team, to help my customers, but I kept getting passed over for promotions. No matter what it is I was doing, I just felt like I was always behind on promotions, even though I was crushing my KPIs. It wasn't until I started to track my accomplishments, like an actual revenue saved or a QBR insight that led to upsells,

or that led to churn mitigation or that led to a renewal, that is when things changed for me. Suddenly, I wasn't just a nice to have CSM, I was a revenue generating asset to the business. And when I sat down with my leadership team and I had the data and the impact of months of works and stories to back me up, it was a no brainer for them to actually promote me. That's the power of owning

your personal development plan. And that's the power that I want you to unlock when you start to track all of your accomplishments. Okay, this is a part of the podcast where I'm going to challenge you to really develop yourself and make sure you have a personal development plan for your customer success career. And this week, I want you to do three things. First of all, I want you to block one hour in your calendar for personal development. Just one hour. I know I'm asking for a lot.

Anika Zubair (18:58.426)
but just one hour to really, really plan out what it is you want in your career, your goals, the outcomes, the deadlines, and how you're going to get there. Next, I want you to define your next career move in one clear sentence, by the way. Write everything you wanna do down, but please make it super clear and easy for you to understand exactly what you want next in your CS career. And then I want you to start to track

all over your wins using either the accomplishment tracker guide that I have or just a simple Google doc. I need you to start tracking everything because the next time you have a meeting, not the next time there's a promotion cycle, but the next time you have a meeting with your management team, I need you to start to use this guide to make sure they see your value. And in just these three simple steps, you will shift from being reactive

to proactive in your career. Okay, let's recap everything we talked about because honestly, this is one of my favorite podcast episodes so far because as a coach, I just don't wanna see you succeed today or with one customer. I want you to see ultimate success in your career. And that is why this episode is so powerful. So we started the episode by really sharing the importance of having a personal development plan.

not just for performance reviews, which I know is very topical and probably top of mind for you right now because we just did mid-year reviews, but I need you to have a performance development plan for yourself because you need to own your customer success career like a CEO. We also dived in some really big mistakes. Some mistakes I personally made early on in my career, but some mistakes that I see so many customer success pros making all the time.

They rely on others. They are very vague and they're only thinking about growth and promotions once a year. I need you to stop all of that because it's a myth. It's not true. Go ask some of the people in other businesses that you see getting promoted year after year or quarter after quarter. I promise you they are not waiting for a promotion cycle. They are being proactive in their career. I also outline my five steps.

Anika Zubair (21:24.236)
that will help you clarify your personal development path and also build new skills for you. And make sure you log those wins because that is the most important part of your personal development plan. And now you have all of the tactical tips and tricks to really build your personal development plan. And I challenge you to take action this week. So if you are really serious about your next raise, your next title change,

the next job opportunity that you're trying to get, or maybe it's the promotion that you've been working so hard for, I want you to go and get the accomplishment tracker right now. Go to thecustomersuccesspro.com forward slash resources. And I promise you starting to track your accomplishments in this way will unlock so much revenue potential for your career.

And if you found this helpful, I'd love it if you left a review or shared this podcast with another CS Pro who needs this plan in their life. All right, until next time, keep owning your impact. You've got this and know that you are in the driver's seat of your career and I believe in you. So please make sure you keep tracking your accomplishment and keep working towards that personal development plan.

and I'll catch you next week on our next episode of the podcast. Thanks for tuning in to the Customer Success Pro Podcast. I hope you picked up something valuable to take back to your team. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world to me if you took just 10 seconds to leave a review on Apple or Spotify. It helps more CS pros like yourself discover the show. And creating new episodes takes a lot of work, so leaving a nice review keeps me motivated to keep creating.

And don't forget to hit subscribe on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you listen to podcast episodes. I drop a new episode every Wednesday packed with practical tips. And if you've got a topic you'd love for me to cover or want to be a guest on my show, send me a message. All the details are in the show notes. I'd love to hear from you. And hey, if this episode helped you share it with a fellow CSM or CS leader. Remember sharing is caring.

Anika Zubair (23:45.092)
Cheers to your CS journey and I'll catch you next week for our next episode.