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CS Operations is critical to the success of any company’s Customer Success initiatives, and it’s a relatively new role and function. Today I had the chance to host an awesome panel of CS and CS Ops leaders, including Sonam Dabholkar @sonamdabholkar, Matthew Lind @matthew_lind, and Jessica Palmer @jessica_keenan_palmer. The conversation centered on how to grow and advance your career in CS Ops. 

If you missed the webinar, here it is

Also, here are a few great questions that we didn’t get to in the session. Let’s continue the discussion here!

  • What have been the best resources for Change management learning? Any documentation you point to every time and in every role?
  • What does the job market currently look like for CS Ops? Are there a lot of companies hiring roles like this and is there a surplus of candidates?
  • When searching for open roles, what are the most common job titles that do not have the term operations?
  • I'm starting a brand new CS org - at what point do you recommend hiring your first CS Ops person? 
  • What's the biggest challenge that you've faced in Ops? What advice do you have for us if we hit similar challenges?

So many good questions here that we couldn’t fit in. I’ll tackle this one:

  • What does the job market currently look like for CS Ops? Are there a lot of companies hiring roles like this and is there a surplus of candidates?

 

I see the market as tight, but most definitely still moving well. Companies continue to invest in new CS Ops roles, and are re-hiring for vacated CS Ops roles more often than leaving them open or eliminating them altogether.  As with many roles in the SaaS space, there are most definitely more candidates applying now than there were 12 months ago. Yet, I don’t exactly see a surplus of candidates.

Nearly every undertaking of any significance within a customer-facing team will require Ops resourcing. Want to expand digital offerings? You need Ops. Want to streamline processes and add automation? You need Ops? Thinking of re-segmenting your customers? You need Ops. Ready to maintain a Customer Success platform, plan for product telemetry and in-app messaging and facilitate a community. You need Ops.

Though admittedly I am biased, there wasn’t a single keynote or breakout session at Pulse where I didn’t think, “That’s some awesome insight, strategy or tooling. Hope there’s an Ops expert nearby to actually design and execute that.”

 

As for how to stand out in the field:

  • Candidates who showcase RESULTS are well-positioned. A resume that states you can administer a Customer Success Platform is good. A resume that emphasizes that you can administer a CSP which leads to a 20% increase in efficiency and a 10 point uptick in expansion opportunities is even better.
  • Supplement your strengths. If you’re great at data analysis, but have minimal experience with the CS tooling, then get familiar with CS platforms. Or study agile methods so you can deliver regularly once you land a role.
  • Consider finding a mentor or a group of people who can help you. I often conduct mock interviews with CS Ops job seekers, which I record and then we review together. Folks invariably start seeing things in their interview presence that they improve.
  • Network, network, network. Go to meetups in-person or virtually. Make productive and additive comments on LinkedIn or in communities like this one. Stay current on what’s trending and moving in CS Ops.

Also, this link will surface open CS Ops roles and related discussions right here in the community: http://bit.ly/CSOpsAdmRoles

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