We’re at our final episode, the ultimate episode if you will. Over the past few weeks, we’ve been collecting your questions for this rapid fire episode. So grab a coffee and listen as we dive into very important questions like “Is it better to be a dragon or have a pet dragon?”. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Machine Learning: New and Collected Stories I Am Pilgrim The Martian An Unfinished Life Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind The Five Dysfunctions of a Team Support Driven HelpU Support Breakfast We Support Elevate Summit The Helpful Newsletter Carolyn from Buffer – Twitter | Website Chase L. from Automattic – Twitter | Website Jeff from Wistia – Twitter | Website Chase C. from Basecamp – Twitter | Website Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

We’re down to our final two episodes! With our penultimate episode, we’re chatting about supporting your team both at work and in life. As a manager, it can be tough supporting a teammate going through something big outside of work, especially if you’re a newer manager. From happy moments like a new baby or a more sorrowful moment like a death in their family, it’s your job to support the team member as well as the rest of the team. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Option B Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

With only three episodes left, we wanted to take a look into the future of customer support. Are the bots coming for our jobs? Will you be doing the same job in ten years? Let’s take a look into that crystal ball and talk through what we expect to happen. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links The AI Revolution: The Road to Superintelligence That Time 2 Bots Were Talking, and Bank of America Butted In Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

This week, we’re talking about customer support career paths. We all agree that a career in customer support is worthwhile. But what does that look like? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links How to prepare for a one-on-one meeting as an employee Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

We’ve seen more and more companies set up support as a reactive, first line of defence. Meanwhile, success teams don’t handle cases like that and focus instead on helping the customer achieve their goals by using your product. Is that a smart way to split up your team when it comes to onboarding new customers? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Breaking Our Addiction to the Queue Troubles and Triumphs When Re-Building Our Customer Onboarding Process at WordPress.com Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

When it comes to customer onboarding, we’ve seen a growing trend of the white glove approach. Dedicated account managers, personalized training, and anything else that you can tailor to that one customer in hopes of convincing them to buy. On this episode, we’ll look at how successful the white glove approach really is. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Chelsea Stroh – Twitter | Medium SUPCONF Fall 2017 Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Customers love online classes and demos that help get them up-to-speed on a new product. From the team side, it’s often easier to host weekly trainings like this rather than individual ones for everyone. With today’s episode, we’ll take a look at how effective those classes are and if your team should be offering them. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Alison Groves – Twitter | Instagram Highrise Soapbox by Wistia Badass: Making Users Awesome Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Up to this point in the series, we’ve talked about how onboarding works when it’s a single person signing up to try your product. If you’re in the B2B business though, it’s often a group of people that need to both try your product and decide if they’re going to buy. How does that shift from a person to a group change your onboarding process? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Chelsea Stroh – Twitter | Medium Mercer Smith-Looper – Twitter | Website Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Remember Clippy – the fun yet kinda irritating assistant from Microsoft? Onboarding tools have come a long way since then. There are all sorts of guided setups, wizards, tours, and more that companies use to make sure new customers are set up for success. But how effective are those guided setup tools? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Chris Bowler – Website | Twitter Wildbit Google Equates “Design” With Endless Testing. They’re Wrong Why Google has 200m reasons to put engineers over designers Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

We touched on a few manual options for contacting customers in the earlier episodes of this series. That made us wonder – if you notice a certain company signs up for your product, does that prompt you to reach out to them? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Mo McKibbin – Twitter Help Scout Support Driven Bank of America Advertisement “Portraits” Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Most new customer onboarding flows tend to be one size fits all. Everyone who signs up goes through the same steps, receives the same emails, and gets the same advice. But is that the right approach to take? Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Mercer Smith-Looper – Twitter | Website Trello Directly Appcues Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

It’s a new series from your favorite support crew! When a customer signs up for your product, you want to give them the best onboarding experience possible. With this series, we’ll take a look at best practices and ideas for helping every customer learn your product and convert to a paying customer. For this episode, we’ll take a look at personalized messages to new customers. While this often takes the form of some welcome email, there’s other things you can do too. Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Alison Groves – Twitter | Instagram How we send onboarding welcome videos at Highrise Drip campaigns — How we do them differently at Highrise Highrise Bonjoro Pressable Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

On the last episode, we looked at how to actively seek out feedback from your team for yourself. But what happens when it’s you and your boss? With this episode, we tackle how you can give feedback to your own manager and C-suite team. This week, we’ll fill in the blank with “Regardless of seniority, every good manager gives feedback upward.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Officevibe Culture Amp Libby Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

With support teams, our empathy often creates a culture of nice where it can be tough to have candid discussions. We hold our opinions back rather than risk being confrontational. But a good manager will create a culture that encourages candor and open discussions. On this episode, we’ll fill in the blank with “Regardless of seniority, every good manager actively seeks out feedback from their team.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Nick Francis Help Scout Kill the Culture of “Nice” a16z Podcast: Giving and Getting Feedback — for Bosses and Employees Radical Candor — The Surprising Secret to Being a Good Boss The Five Dysfunctions of a Team The 6 Exercises We’re Doing to Help With Artificial Harmony Libby Loomio Suffering from Busyness? Create More Yutori In Your Work Eager Labs Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

It’s rarely a good idea to bottle up all the knowledge you have that makes you a great manager. But how do we make sure others on our team are ready to step into our shoes? On this episode, we’ll talk about the idea that “Regardless of seniority, every good manager trains their replacement.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Firing Myself, Again HEADWAY: A Practical Guide to Running One-On-Ones for Humans What We Got Wrong About Self-Management: Embracing Natural Hierarchy at Work Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Everyone makes mistakes, even super managers and team leads. It’s how we handle those mistakes that set good managers apart from the not-so-good ones. On this episode, we’ll look at the idea that “Regardless of seniority, every good manager will admit mistakes and not hide them.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Conner Burt Lessonly The 5 Whys Process We Use to Understand the Root of Any Problem Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

One of the things we’ve been talking about at Basecamp is the idea that 40 hours is plenty of time for work. Is that enough time for your team though? And how do you make sure they stick to 40 hours, especially when you’re a remote team and can work any time you’d like? On this episode, we’ll fill in that good manager sentence with – “Regardless of seniority, every good manager helps balance the team’s work/life schedule.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Yes, You Only Get 40 Hours of Your Employees’ Time. Here’s How to Best Use It The 10 Slack Agreements of Buffer Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Jeff started a great conversation on the last episode around the idea of growth paths and grow-outs. We’ll continue that conversation this week and look at the idea – “Regardless of seniority, every good manager creates growth paths for their team.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Turn the Ship Around!  Trust, Empower, and Clear the Path Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Leading a team is all about knowing the strengths and weaknesses of others on the team. It helps you to put the right people in the right roles for the project. But how do you find out the strengths/weaknesses of individual team members? And what happens if if someone has outgrown their role on the team? On this episode, we’ll fill in that good manager sentence with – “Regardless of seniority, every good manager knows their team’s strengths.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Technically StrengthsFinder Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.

Everyone talks about the power with regular 1:1s between you and your team. But are they really worth it? And how important is it go have them regularly scheduled? On this episode, we’ll talk about the idea that “Regardless of seniority, every good manager will keep regular 1:1s.” Subscribe: iTunes | Android | YouTube | RSS | Overcast Notes and Links Unlock Honest Feedback with this One Word The Skip Level Meeting: Everything you need to know about Skip Level 1 on 1s Find your next job with a company that values support and support professionals. Intro Music – “Happy Rock” from Bensound If you enjoyed this episode, Tweet about it or share some love with a review.