Sorry, but I don't find the owner stepping in on a support issue to be impressive. Very few founders have the time (and should be expected to) to actually handle individual support issues. It's a false promise that often makes realized customer support worse while achieving the "image" of good customer service. Individuals don't expect the leaders to be stepping into support issues. They expect leaders to be leading because their time is highly valuable. Not saying it doesn't have it's moments, but most of the time just have better support, and or spend your time listening/interacting, then taking that to your support team. Don't forget the support staff IS PAID TO SUPPORT CUSTOMERS and handle individual issues, just make it happen.
If you don't have a good support staff, get one, period. Everyone has bad support, it doesn't take much to be better than the competition. That is an example of reasonable people that still believe in the product for now, and need attention for retention. Don't lose them.
Yes I have a background in managing support and product.
leaders stepping in on issues is sorta ok but only if the project team is small
in my second shitcoin gig in mid 2021 i had the CTO write a bunch of code that could have written with his guidance
probably part of the issue here is that a good team has a benefit from the founder/dev stepping in to HELP THE LEAD... going from CTO to customer is really bad optics, IMO
> leaders stepping in on issues is sorta ok but only if the project team is small
Exactly, I think once you're over about $20million/year revenue and over 10 employees this applies
>going from CTO to customer is really bad optics, IMO
Exactly! Leadership is not taking control, it's proving to customers that you built a competent team/company and you trust them to help run your business.
the CTO in question at the time also took the side of a more established dev when i said that a proposal he made was ... i forget what adjective but it was taken as a slur... and yeah that was what led to the CTO doing my work for me even though it was a waste of his time when he hired someone who could do it
so, yeah, someone with an as established company the founder or CTO leaning in to help a customer is SUPER bad optics
and i discovered that he quit supporting Zap and hasn't made the effort to keep it running and that is just fucked up, i'm not hot on Mallers these days even though i generally regard him well
Maybe they don't have a support team. Maybe it's just him, jumping into random convos, or something.
If that's the case then sure, maybe make it clear the size of your company if it's that tiny.
When we were that small (just 1-2 people) of course you have to handle it individually, but you still attempt a support funnel so you can scale the support side of the business. Even when we were over 10 staff, and handled support ourselves we did so as the company and reached out as the company. Unified support image. You don't want to drive support issues to your handle. Because you're the same guy, if you're lazy on the offical support channel, people will funnel their requests to your personal channel. You have the incentive to funnel people away from your personal channel.
Oddbean new post about login | logout 