Customer Support Leaders

Charlotte Ward
  • 5.0 (2)
  • Management
  • Updated Biweekly

Customer Support Leaders have been there, on the front line with customers. They understand how things work, and the value of support. They understand the needs and foibles of their customer base. Unlike most other disciplines, there’s no training for this role. No two CS Leadership roles are alike. No two CS Leaders are alike. So this is our opportunity to hear from those leaders and learn from them. Whether you’re a CS leader now, or you aspire to be, this is the podcast for you! Hear different leaders discuss a topic with me, Charlotte Ward.

  1. Jul 15

    311: Stop Escalating And Start Routing; with Alex Batchelor

    Send us Fan Mail “Escalate to engineering” sounds normal, but it quietly shapes how your whole company treats support. We challenge that default and replace it with a more accurate model: routing work to the right skill set, while keeping escalation for the moments that truly need higher priority and attention. Along the way, we explore how small language choices change ownership, expectations, and trust between customer support and engineering teams. Alex Batchelor, founder and CEO of Pebble, shares what happens when support gets the same technical context engineers use: logs, error monitoring, product analytics, documentation, and code-level clues. We talk about turning customer signals into product improvements without getting trapped at either extreme of the spectrum: raw data with no story, or vivid anecdotes with no proof. The goal is practical support operations that reduce context switching, shorten time-to-resolution, and create feedback loops engineering can actually act on. We also dig into proactive support and the future of AI in customer support. If your systems can detect an integration token expiring or a recurring error before a customer files a ticket, you can reach out first and create a genuinely delightful customer experience. And as automation handles the basics, we look at where humans add the most value: building the support system, solving the hardest technical tickets, and delivering consultative support that feels closer to a partnership than a transaction. If you want tighter engineering collaboration, cleaner ticket routing, and a more scalable technical support model, listen now. Subscribe, share this with a support or engineering leader, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway. Support the show

  2. Jul 8

    310: Bringing Cohesion To Chaos; with Colin Flanigan

    Send us Fan Mail Chaos in customer support rarely starts as chaos. It starts as “organic” growth, a few heroic workarounds, a helpful engineer jumping into Zendesk, or a fast acquisition that bolts on a new product and a new team without a shared operating system. Then the outcomes get unpredictable: escalations drag, customers hear different answers, and everyone feels busy while nothing feels steady. We dig into how to bring cohesion back without killing the good parts that made the team successful in the first place. Colin Flanigan joins me to unpack what he does in technical support leadership across B2B SaaS, including the messy reality of joining after rapid change. We talk about the first weeks on the job as a blend of journalist and analyst: running a genuine listening tour, collecting complaints as signals, building a friction map, and then validating the story with real support metrics. From there, we explore how to use proven frameworks (not rigid prescriptions), where bespoke work matters most (especially voice of the customer programs), and why many “technical” problems are actually broken communication systems across teams. We also go deep on the human side of change management: how to earn trust even when people do not fully agree, how to recruit champions from the people who care most about specific pain points, and why early wins in the first 60 to 90 days matter. We finish with practical leadership tactics like disagree-and-commit, time-boxed experiments, not optimizing for edge cases, and setting clear boundaries between support, engineering, and product so goodwill does not turn into resentment. If you want sharper support operations, stronger cross-functional alignment, and more predictable customer experience outcomes, listen now. Subscribe, share this with a support leader who is cleaning up chaos, and leave a review with the one boundary you wish your org would clarify. Support the show

  3. Jul 1

    309: Servant Leadership In Support; with Nadia Ivanova

    Send us Fan Mail Servant leadership gets talked about a lot, but it’s often treated like a vague “be nice to people” slogan. We take a sharper angle: servant leadership in customer support is competence plus care. That means knowing what you’re doing and genuinely caring about your team, then using both to remove obstacles so they can do their best work. Along the way, we explore why this approach applies not just to “the team” in the abstract, but to the day-to-day dynamic between you, each direct report, and the stakeholders around you.  We dig into what servant leaders actually look like at work: humble enough to admit what they don’t know, wise enough to set boundaries, and disciplined about not confusing compassion with complacency. We talk about the difference between being transparent and over-sharing, including the idea that a support leader sometimes has to protect the team from unnecessary stress while still keeping trust intact. We also unpack fairness and organisational justice, how favouritism can quietly poison a team, and how involving people in hiring and role design can prevent competition and build alignment.  If you’re new to management or moving from individual contributor to leader, this conversation gets practical fast. We cover the temptation to stay busy by “doing the work,” why early delegation matters, how to operate at the right level even when you still spend time in the queue, and how to say no in a way that validates feelings without dodging responsibility. Listen for concrete support leadership takeaways on stakeholder management, setting expectations, and leading with that rare mix of dignity and humility. If it resonates, subscribe, share with a fellow support leader, and leave a review. Support the show

  4. Jun 24

    308: Leading Without Trust; with Ash Rhodes

    Send us Fan Mail Trust doesn’t magically appear because you got the title, and it definitely doesn’t return because you delivered one heroic win. When a customer support team has been burned by toxic management, constant escalations, broken processes, or a product that keeps letting customers down, “prove it” becomes the default setting. We dig into what it means to lead from that reality and how to rebuild credibility without trying to play therapist or pretending everything is fine. Ash Rhodes returns to the Customer Support Leaders Podcast with a fixer’s view of customer experience leadership. We talk about why workplace trust starts lower than trust in everyday life, and how stress responses like fight, flight, fawn, and freeze can show up at work as silence, avoidance, hidden problems, or people checking out. From there, we get practical: earning trust through consistency, showing up every day, and making sure your advocacy is visible to the team that needs it most. We also unpack a mistake many new support leaders make, quietly working behind the scenes while the team assumes nothing is changing. Spending time in the queue helps you truly understand the pain, but the real job is fixing the ecosystem: processes, staffing signals, cross-functional relationships, and feedback loops. Finally, we talk honestly about burnout, the mental load of support leadership, and why community spaces like Support Driven and therapy can be essential, not optional. If you’ve ever stepped into a low-trust environment and wondered how to turn it around, this one’s for you. Subscribe, share it with a fellow support leader, and leave a review with the trust-building habit that has worked best for you. Support the show

  5. Jun 17

    307: How Customers Experience AI; with Shep Hyken

    Send us Fan Mail AI can make customer support faster, cheaper, and more consistent, but it can also quietly destroy trust when it becomes a wall between customers and real help. Charlotte Ward sits down with customer experience expert Shep Hyken to get brutally clear on what never changes: customers want to be happy, they want you to take care of them, they want it to be easy, and when something breaks they want it fixed. The channel is secondary. The feeling is the product. We unpack why Amazon is one of the few brands that can run an overwhelmingly digital service model without making customers feel abandoned, and what most companies get wrong when they use AI as contact deflection. Shep shares why the human touch is not going away, it is flipping into a competitive advantage that strengthens the digital experience. We also get into proactive communication that reduces anger (knowledge is power), why “silence kills trust”, and how to design escalation so customers do not have to repeat themselves. You will also hear surprising research on support preferences across generations, what it means when Gen Z starts choosing the phone more often for real problems, and why “time to happiness” may be a better north star than average handle time. If you are building AI customer service, contact center automation, self-service, or omnichannel support, this conversation will help you keep speed without sacrificing the relationship. Subscribe, share this with a CX leader on your team, and leave a review with the one place you think AI should never be the only option. Support the show

  6. Jun 10

    306: Outcomes Over Optics; with Carl Lenocker

    Send us Fan Mail Great support can look “perfect” on paper and still fail the customer in real life. That tension is what we dig into with Carl Lenocker, a senior customer success executive, executive coach, and longtime support leader, as we unpack a simple idea with big consequences: outcomes over optics. We get concrete about how traditional support KPIs like first contact resolution, time to answer, and fast ticket closure can quietly create the wrong behaviours. When the business rewards speed and box-checking, teams get pushed toward rushed calls, prematurely closed cases, and fewer relationship-building moments. Carl shares lessons from running global support at HP and why many of these pressures ultimately trace back to money, cost cutting, and the old “support as a cost center” story, especially during the outsourcing era. From there, we look forward. We talk about AI in customer support as a way to handle simple issues quickly, and why the real opportunity is to reinvest human time into premium, consultative, relationship-driven support that prevents the next ticket and protects renewals. We also call out action faking, including performative QBRs, and Carl breaks down what actually matters in a customer business review: business objectives, progress, and risks, not 50-slide theatre. If you lead support or you’re building a career in post-sale, you’ll leave with sharper language for executives, better internal alignment, and a clearer way to prove value beyond dashboards. Subscribe for more conversations like this, share this with a support leader who needs it, and leave a review with the metric you think your team should stop worshipping. Support the show

  7. Jun 3

    305: Measuring Your Support Maturity; with Neal Travis

    Send us Fan Mail Support teams don’t usually fail because they “don’t care” or “aren’t working hard enough.” They fail because they scale on instinct, accumulate tribal knowledge, and measure whatever is easiest until the whole system starts to wobble. We sit down with Neal Travis, Head of Customer Experience and Operations at AIHR, to talk about measuring support maturity in a way that leads to real decisions, not a prettier dashboard. Neal shares how a small team can support a large customer base by getting ruthless about what support owns and how the work is designed. We walk through Neal's support maturity framework built around three domains: knowledge, quality, and data and insights. On the knowledge side, we dig into self-service experience, internal knowledge management, and training that prepares the team for what’s coming next, not just onboarding. We also unpack why “supportability” is an outcome when documentation, enablement, and cross-team alignment are strong, and why customers learning changes before support does is always a red flag. From there we move into quality, separating communication quality (standards, coaching, QA programmes, onboarding for great conversations) from operating quality (channels, capacity, coverage, incident management, and the reality of a messy support tech stack). Finally, we get practical about support metrics and measurement architecture: choosing the right metrics, understanding trade-offs like handle time vs after-call work, building reliable data infrastructure, and turning voice of the customer into action that closes the loop. If you want a clear picture of where your support function is mature and where it’s fragile, this conversation gives you a map. Subscribe for more, share this with a support leader who’s trying to scale, and leave a review with the one domain you’re working on next. Support the show

  8. May 27

    304: Reverse One-to-Ones; with Greg Skirving

    Send us Fan Mail Your one-on-ones shouldn’t feel like a weekly status treadmill where we do all the talking and our team does all the nodding. Charlotte Ward sits down with Greg Skirving to unpack a deceptively simple leadership shift: the reverse one-on-one, where the direct report leads with their perspective instead of waiting for the manager’s agenda.  Greg walks us through his practical structure a three-slide monthly check-in covering accomplishments, challenges, and what the person wants to improve next. We talk about why this works especially well in customer support and technical support environments that are drowning in metrics like tickets closed and MTTR, while so much real value goes uncounted: mentoring, onboarding, process fixes, cross-functional help, and customer moments that protect renewals. The goal isn’t more paperwork, it’s clearer thinking, better coaching, and a more honest view of impact.  We also dig into the change management piece: why the first few rounds can be awkward, how to coach ICs who dislike “talking about themselves,” and how presenting internally becomes a safe way to build communication and confidence that carries into customer calls, incident leadership, and even career moves into pre-sales, implementation, or project roles. By the end, we connect the dots to a simple career advantage: building an ongoing evidence file that makes self-evaluations and promotion conversations easier because the proof is already collected.  If you want one-on-ones that create growth and not just updates, listen now, then subscribe, share with a fellow support leader, and leave a review. What would you change about your one-on-ones first? Support the show

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About

Customer Support Leaders have been there, on the front line with customers. They understand how things work, and the value of support. They understand the needs and foibles of their customer base. Unlike most other disciplines, there’s no training for this role. No two CS Leadership roles are alike. No two CS Leaders are alike. So this is our opportunity to hear from those leaders and learn from them. Whether you’re a CS leader now, or you aspire to be, this is the podcast for you! Hear different leaders discuss a topic with me, Charlotte Ward.

Information

  • Creator
    Charlotte Ward
  • Years Active
    2019 - 2026
  • Episodes
    374
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Customer Support Leaders
  • Show Website
    Customer Support Leaders