David Lockie: So you’ve joined us as CSM in the last three or four months?
This is actually only my second month!
DL: It feels like you’ve been here a lot longer! So first of all, tell us what a CSM is at Angry Creative.
A CSM is a Client Success Manager. What’s unique about this role at Angry is that it’s not a typical sales role, like most agencies have. CSMs at Angry Creative have the role of starting with the client, managing their journey throughout the sales process, making sure that all contracts and all things are sent out in those initial stages. But then also making sure that the project goes from A to Z. So really taking the customer through all the project management processes, conducting the sprints, working on the workshops together with the customers or doing the reviews with the developers as well. And basically the unique thing about this role is that you can own an entire project right up until you actually go live with the website. So you really get to grow with the clients. And you get to build these relationships where you can actually really influence how they think about their business growth. And that’s great, because that’s not something that a lot of agencies do.
DL: I guess it’s a very involved role, because it involves both account management and project management roles that I’ve been more familiar with in the past. Does that create any tensions? Are you able to be an advocate for the client at all times, but also keep the company’s interests at the centre? If so, how do you manage that aspect?
It actually reduces the tension I would say. So in my past experience, being someone who is ultra-focused on sales, then you focus on really maximising the project budget. In this role, you wear multiple hats, sales or account manager and a project manager, so things can be done differently. What you’re actually doing is managing the budget, and you’re thinking about the business, but you’re also thinking about creating a scalable future-proof solution. So it feels like it’s a win-win situation. Instead of actually having that increased tension between those roles, you reduce the tension. Because you can manage expectations on both sides, you have that close relationship with developers working on the project, and you can understand the project issues on a deeper level, but you also have that close relationship with the client. And you really speak for them as well. So I feel it’s a very good position to be in.
But it’s also a tonne of work, you have to have a range of skills, you have to be able to be a good salesperson, a good project manager and be able to deal with times when those roles clash.
DL: It sounds like your role requires a lot of judgement and requires a lot of trust from both the company and the client. That must add to the pressure.
Yes, realistically it does add to the pressure because you have to manage expectations on both sides. It requires a certain set of skills, it’s a challenge to develop. And of course, we’re all better at one than the other, and you can see that in all the Client Success Managers at Angry. You can see a varied skill set where some of us are better project managers, better at using those project management tools. Some of us have a deeper technical understanding so we can chat to developers at a specific level, whereas some of us are great sales people and we can sell the big dream, we can do the big workshops. It’s great because whichever of the categories you fall into, you get to develop the other skills and Angry tries to give you clients that are best suited to the skills you have.
DL: That’s interesting. I guess that speaks to the size of the business we have, which means we need specific roles to make the machinery work. But we’re not so big that the role is predetermined from the start and is extremely strict. So it sounds like you’ve been given the opportunity to shape the role individually and creatively too, which sounds like a nice balance.
Yeah, I actually love that you can be creative in the role, and that you can call out when you’re stuck with certain aspects. So for me personally, it’s that I struggle with things like the financial aspects. I’ve had to learn a lot about how we invoice, I’ve had to really remind myself to keep on top of the invoicing, to make sure that I’m really on top of things like where time has been logged for certain projects. So that’s the part where I feel I have the least expertise, I learn a lot from the finance team. I often socialise with them and ask Hannah and Emma to help me understand how these processes work. And there I can actually mention that it’s really interesting because now I have my own personal budget, I’ve learned how to apply invoicing to my life, and I’m trying to figure out how much money I’m spending on silly things!
DL: What stupid stuff do you buy?
I don’t want to say shoes out loud, but shoes. I don’t.
Anyway, I feel very comfortable in the sales and project management parts of this role. So for me, it’s been really fun to get in a room with a customer and dream big. And actually being able to follow through. Dream big, but then bring in the solution architect and create a backlog, which is actually there and is doable. Seeing the client get really excited that their dreams are on paper, and that their dreams are linked to a budget and a timeline, making them more realistic. Those are the things that I’ve really enjoyed and felt more confident working on.
DL: It’s really interesting. One of the things I do is have a little collection of quotes, to remind me how to be a better person. And one of them is something like “spending time with the finances helps you to deeply understand the business” and I think that’s true, whether it’s business, your personal budget or a client project. People are very good at telling stories to ourselves and being subjective about things, whereas the numbers are, well, they’re much more objective. So when you look at the budget, you can see where you really are, compared to where you think you are.
Yes, absolutely. One of the challenges that many of our clients have is prioritising. So they all come with this thing that they want to achieve, and with a certain budget or a timeline. And it’s always a difficult conversation to explain to the client that it’s only part of these things that can actually be implemented within their constraints (usually time and budget). It’s always a really interesting session that you can have with a customer when you talk about priorities. And you find out a lot about them and how they think. It’s good, because if you are involved in a project from the beginning, you can be creative about how you can solve their problems within the budget, within the expertise that you have available in the team. That’s also another really challenging part of the role, making sure that you resource plan for your clients and then the team. So that you have the right development team on board, to have the right solution architect on board, to have the communication flow, to have the designers talking to developers, there’s a lot of work there as well.
DL: We’ve covered a lot of ground already. One thing I’ll indulge myself by commenting is that psychologically, what you want to avoid is this antagonistic feeling where you and the client are staring across the table at each other trying to solve a problem because that naturally causes us to be antagonistic. What I like about budgeting and allocating priorities is that you can put them on a whiteboard, whether it’s real or virtual, and both sit on the same side of the table and look at solving the problem together. And there’s something quite fundamental about that reframing, even though you’re essentially trying to do the same thing, it takes some of the ego out of the picture. You both start acting like you’re on the same team working to overcome the problem instead of fighting each other.
Yes, absolutely. And I think the key here is that you really have to win the trust of the customers, right from the start. It’s about making sure that they know that, yes, you work for this company. And obviously, we’re trying to make money, but you’re advocating for your client, and the client needs to know this from the beginning, because you’re their point of contact, when they have a problem, they’re going to come to you when they’re happy, they’re going to come to you when they have a problem. So as a CSM at Angry, you really have to work on building the trust with the customer. And it’s always much harder if you lose that trust, and then you have to build it up again.
DL: I’ve been there myself! So now, tell me about a day in your life.
My day starts with a really long dog walk. I walk 10 kilometres in the morning, every day.
DL: Do you run it or walk it?
It depends. I’m actually walking at the moment because my dog is feeling a bit unwell. I will run as well, I run on average about 100 kilometres a week.
Then I start work around 8.00am. I go through my emails and notes for the day and get ready for my stand ups. Every day we have two stand ups as CSM. One of them is the commercial stand up where the whole commercial team including the CEO and Managing Director who also happens to be my boss comes in. And we talk about any upcoming blockages or issues. So for example, if a problem has come up with a customer and you want to borrow a developer from someone else or you don’t know how to solve a problem, don’t know how to send a contract or something like that, then you bring it up. Then we solve it as a team, which I absolutely love. So that’s the first meeting of the day for me.
The second meeting I have is always a stand up with my specific unit. At Angry, we’ve structured the company in a way where we’re divided into different units. That means you get to know the developers much more from the ground up, you have a specific development team, you know who’s good at what. And within each unit you have a certain number of developers and a certain number of CSMs, so we are a smaller team within the bigger company. The second meeting is my unit meeting where we ask each individual developer what they’re working on that day, if they’re stuck with something. Then if there are any updates from the client, that’s where I come in and give the client updates. This meeting happens every day of the week. So that’s usually the first hour of my day, in terms of meetings.
Then I most likely have a sprint meeting with a client, I have one almost every day if not more than one. So I meet with my clients every week or fortnight, and we go through what’s on their agenda, how things are going during the week. It will be an internal or an external meeting. I do both and I keep them separate. So per project, I’ll have a meeting with my developers, to detect any issues there. And then the same with the customer, so that the developers don’t have to sit in customer meetings. Also, about once a week I will have a new lead to work with. So I’ll have an initial prospecting call where I can qualify or disqualify the lead, see if they’re a good fit for the company.
Then I have internal meetings. We have a commercial meeting that happens regularly where we look at the big picture, how to move forward or go through invoices. Making sure the right invoices are sent to customers and making sure developers are logging time correctly. And then a lot of it tends to be about what problems developers run into during the course of the project. And I’ll get a bunch of Slack messages during the day: “this has come up and this is a problem,” and “can you help me out and call,” or “can you get me another developer here? ‘ So I have lots of spontaneous meetings.
DL: Do you have lunch sometime during that day? Or is it just an overwhelming series of meetings!
There’s a lot of Google Meets, but I actually try to have my lunch hour free. I can’t do it every time. But I do sneak in food during one of the meetings if it’s an internal meeting, and apologise. But the reason I do this is because I actually sneak away three days a week during the day between three and five. I teach a class, so I teach this class, or go to the gym. So I have a new workout during the day. So I try to replace my lunch with training so I can eat afterwards. Don’t worry, I still get a good balance.
DL: You hang up your work clothes for the day. How do you relax? Because agency life, especially when you’re on the front line with clients and internal teams, can be quite intense. So yes, how is it for you?
Well, wine, David, wine! No, my evenings are either sport, going out for another dog walk, listening to some music or reading – I’m a huge book nerd. I’m very interested in art history. So I have lots of art books. And I actually like colouring books for adults. That’s something that most people don’t know about me. I might be watching something on Netflix. I’ll be fiddling with my colouring books. And if it’s a Friday, I might go out with my friends and have a drink.
DL: I have fond memories of the party scene in Belgrade from WordCamp.
That was a lot of fun. Yeah, it was. It’s a very, very intense scene here in terms of going out and stuff.
DL: Awesome. It sounds like a pretty busy day. You must be happy when it’s the weekend?
Yeah, I am and I really try to sleep in. But when you have a dog, it doesn’t always work!
DL: Well, dogs are one thing. If you ever have children, then you can forget about it completely. I mean, yeah. You can get away with a dog.
That’s so true. Can’t you do that with a child? I don’t know, mate. I’m sure I’ll find out!
DL: Legally? No, it’s not. OK, OK, OK. Okay, yeah. So what would you say is different or unique or unexpected about Angry Creative in contrast or comparison to other places where you’ve worked?
One of the things that I think is really well done is that there’s a very strong communication between managers, and for the management team and the employees. So I feel like in my case, Amy is my boss, she’s the Managing Director of a company, which you know is a big role. So she’s got a lot going on, but I always feel like she’s got time to solve my problems, which is great. So it always feels like someone is there to listen and support you. So that’s one thing to appreciate. And the other thing I appreciate is that, we’ve already addressed this several times, but as a CSM, your day never ends so you can literally always be online and still have a to-do list.
I’ve never had the satisfaction of ticking off my entire to-do list so far on Angry. And that’s okay. We’re very open about the fact that you simply can’t get everything done. And no one puts pressure on you to do so. The company culture is very understanding. So I really love that as well because I don’t feel like I’m failing, because I haven’t completed things, but I feel like it’s okay, I’m supported. If I have a problem, someone can help me to solve it. And it’s okay that I haven’t finished everything in one day. So I love that part and I think that’s a very specific thing for Angry that I haven’t felt in other companies.
I also have confidence in my unit because rather than having a huge company where you’re working with 100 developers or something, you actually have a unit so you really get to know the people that you’re working with on projects. You feel very comfortable talking to clients and knowing which developer is working on your project. You know if they are good with clients or if they are more shy, and you might need to help them communicate. You’ll know if developers are good at appreciating issues so you can help them, you might need to nudge them in the right direction, you can check in with an “are you sure” with them so it’s good that you get that little family feeling within a larger company within the units.
We share things about each other, we socialise. We actually chat and joke on Slack, we send stuff to each other and it’s just an everyday thing you know? So this sounds very cheesy, but it’s probably a bit of a work family feel.
DL: That’s nice. Yeah, I think that kind of human values is a European thing compared to the more American work paradigm, having talked to a lot of people in the industry. Something I’m grateful for!
That’s definitely one of the strengths of Angry: not expecting people to kill themselves for the job. It’s a good balance.
DL: Is there anything else you would like to add?
I think the other thing that we haven’t mentioned is that this role has a lot of responsibility. You are responsible for how much money the company makes. Developers will clock in and clock out (I don’t mean this in a bad way of course), they will come in, they will do their tasks, when they have a problem they will flag it, they will give an estimate and then they can clock out. As a CSM, you’re responsible for making sure customers come in with money and if you make a mistake on an invoice and you miss billing, you have to correct it.
DL: People get upset about money.
They will be. That’s something you should be comfortable with in this role, taking that responsibility.
DL: Thank you very much Nev, it’s been interesting talking to you!
If you’re the kind of person who likes to take responsibility and work with a company that likes to create more effective websites, get in touch!