74 - Tips on Preventing Burnout in Tech - Ejieme Eromosele

Foreign. Hi everyone, this is Maria Skobepillai and you're listening to Women in Customer Success Podcast. The first women only podcast where remarkable ladies of customer success share their stories and practical tools to help you succeed and make an impact. If you want to learn more about customer success, get career advice and be inspired, you're in the right place. So let's tune in. Welcome to the new episode of Women in Customer Success Podcast. Today I have a privilege of talking to Ejimi Romoselli, GM of Emea at Quick. Welcome to the show.

Thank you so much for having me. Excited to be here with you.

Ajimi, tell us firstly where are you currently based?

I am currently tuning in from London, England. I am about three weeks here in the uk. Originally been living in New York.

Welcome to London. I'm probably around 10 miles away from you. Jimmy, quick rapid fire questions. Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

I am an introvert. Socialized to be an extrovert, but natural tendency is introversion.

That's a nice spin. And tell me, would the 16 year old you be surprised to find you in this current job?

I don't think so. When I was 16 I wanted to be a pediatrician. I wanted to help people, help little people really. And I'm still getting to help people in my current role. So I don't think it's too far off from what I wanted to do when I was 16.

Excellent. You are helping people and that goes so well into my next question. If you could be remembered for one thing, what would that be?

I would love to be remembered for compassionate and empathetic leadership. It's so dear to my heart to be a woman, a woman of color in leadership roles and to put the human aspect in business.

Jimmy, I think it's about time that you properly introduce yourself to the audience. You will do a better job than me, but I'm just honored to talk to you today and you're still having a fantastic career and your career journey is extraordinary. So tell us a bit more about it.

So as you mentioned, in my current role I am opening my company's first international office as the GM of EMEA and quic, for those that are not familiar, is a business messaging and conversational AI company. We help the world's best brands connect with their customers as easily as we all as consumers connect with our friends and family. And that's over messaging channels. Prior to this specific role, I ran customer success and Account Management. I've been with the company almost five years now. Really Grew our customer success practice and then started to inherit revenue over time. I was really curious about being more on the commercial side of our business and owning revenue, so I grew my role into that. Prior to tech, I was a career management consultant. So I started my career right out of undergrad at Accenture, where I focused on customer experience strategy and customer service strategy. So building call centers all across the world, back when a lot of large businesses were outsourcing their call center teams across the world. And that's really where I think the foundation of this customer led growth, which I'd love to talk about, or this customer view of how businesses can thrive, that's really where I got that initial grounding. And so that's been a common thread through my career. So I did management consulting for about 10 years and then I wanted to do something different, a little different. And I got an amazing opportunity at the New York Times to lead their customer experience team. This was right when the New York Times really had to pivot their business model from being a advertising based revenue source to actually getting individual subscribers like you and me to pay for their amazing journalism. So I was part of a founding team that had to help the Times grapple with what does that mean for business operations, for marketing, to the newsroom, to product and how do they actually produce a subscriber first mentality. So I did that for a few years. That was really fun. And then that was my pivot into customer success.

And then you really accomplished a lot within the world of customer success as well, became an executive. And for me this is just a really interesting move into becoming like the highest executive, like really general manager of a region, which is just another proof of how important the role and skill set of a customer success executive is and how important is that seat at the table and decision making power in the revenue generating team. So I wonder if you could tell us just a bit about that journey. Like when you are at the pinnacle of customer success career and thinking, you know, what is next? Okay, sometimes the opportunities almost naturally happen within the same company. But what would you tell to the audience who are maybe at those executive levels at customer success and thinking what is next and where to look, what makes sense. Obviously it's very personal thing, but what was that journey for you like?

Yeah, it's a really great question. And I still think of myself as a customer success leader because I do think that the ultimate foundation of what makes customer success so valuable to an organization, especially if you're Talking about a SaaS organization where you need Recurring revenue, that source of recurring revenue is better sourced from your existing customers. It's just more efficient and it's more valuable. So I still see myself as a customer success leader. I think for customer success leaders are looking for the next thing. It's really about what is of interest to you. I think to make it into the top level of business and tech and SaaS, you really have to have a handle on the economics of the business, starting with how the business sources customers in the first place, what type of customers, how are those aligned to the product or the services that you're selling and really, truly deeply understand what is that sales motion. So now you have customers in your pipeline. How do you sell to them? What are the things that resonate? What are the promises you can actually deliver via your product and via your team? So it's really being more comfortable with the commercial aspects of the business and the operational aspects of the business. So on the back half, depending on the type of customer success leader you are, you may also be privy to how the product team works, how your services organization works, right? How you actually deliver the outcomes that you're promising. So I think also being open to learning the operational, the technical, the product side of the world will really make you a more well rounded executive. My path specifically was to really deeply try to understand the commercial motion. So I started with owning renewals. When I first took the job as a CS leader, it was just non commercial ownership. We didn't even own renewals. So I said, you know what, we're the closest to our customers. I want to start owning the renewals more directly. Did that, did a pretty good job at that. And then I said, you know, we're also really close to when customers want to do more with our product. So I want to take on a little bit of the expansion and upsell quota and cross sell quota. So I took that on as well. And so that's been sort of my journey into really understanding how to be a strategic seller. And that really is what opened the door for me to have this opportunity to run a region.

I think that's twice you said I asked to own this, I asked to own renewals and then I asked to tell me more about it. I mean, obviously it depends on the opportunity. Sometimes maybe leaders think that there are so many others, other sales leaders around them, so many different departments who own those different things. So how can you even become much more closer to that revenue or much more closer to owning different metrics where, you know, you kind of have to share it with so many different leaders. But tell me in general, how did you then lead the whole team to be focused on the typical conversation? Becoming trusted advisor to the customer and holding renewals and upselling. In a way it's a no brainer, it's just a natural flaw. But very often we find loads of almost controversy with that who owns what. So tell me more about that.

I would start with, you know, my situation might be unique, but I think that there are some learnings that hopefully people can pull out of it. So we are a very early stage business. When I joined, we were about 30 people, Series A funded, so there was a lot of opportunity. So I think the big takeaway is seek for where there is opportunity, search for that opportunity. So we had a small team, we had sellers, we had CSMs. Our sellers at that time were of course responsible for new business and also the contractual and the commercial relationship with our existing customers. So renewals and expansions. But we had a limited team and we had limited resources. So my pitch to making the ask of owning renewals is as an early stage business, we really need to focus on getting more customers. What if I could free up our sales team so that they had more time to focus on business and have me and some of my CSMs? There's a distinction. I didn't have all of my CSM's own renewals, but to free up some of the team's time to own renewals. And so that became an opportunity for our broader organization and tied to our broader organization goals. So as a leader, if you can spot those opportunities where you can help the organization be more efficient, free up more resources, time by raising your hand to take something on that's aligned to where you're going, that's a huge win. So in that conversation it was a no brainer. Yes, we needed more new business, we needed our finite sales team to be able to do more. So that was the sort of first foot into the door. So I think the learning there is really putting your head above your own functional area and seeing where there's opportunities, whether that's in marketing, whether that's in sales or new business, or whether that's even in product to where CS can really extend the value of the team that you have. And that value is your proximity and your closeness to your customers. Right. So that I think is a big takeaway in learning.

Absolutely.

And I think even now too, it's an interesting time. There have been layoffs in tech, customer success, teams have been reduced, sales teams even have been reduced. So it would be an interesting time being a CS leader to see based on the organization's goals, how can we extend our team and our proximity to our customers, which are our most valued asset, Right. To help the organization meet those higher business goals.

I just love so many aspects of what you said and I know we have so many other topics that we want to talk about, but I think this is such a wonderful lesson. Firstly, you spot the opportunity within the business, you ask for it, but you also are very aware of what is happening in the business and where could you free up some other resources and in that way you are getting the opportunities. I think that very often VC leaders who maybe think too much within their own department, not taking other responsibilities with the almost excuse, oh well, you know, it's not part of customer success, it's part of this other department or part of XYZ department. And there is just a huge opportunity to have that holistic mindset of the business, what is good for business and what you and your team can really contribute. There is always surely something more than what you are doing at the moment. More in a way not to ask for additional things on top of what you're having, but just to changing things in a way that your responsibilities may increase to the benefit of customers. And you mentioned something, layoffs, obviously the main topic on this new year and months and months ago. It is really, it is a difficult time in the economy, of course. And from one hand we are talking about how to increase visibility and perceived value of our department and of everybody's department so that that department wouldn't be potentially laid off. It's been probably more than six months since the layoffs started and it is very difficult time for people who are let go. But on another hand, people who stay are very often being given increased responsibilities. It is all going towards efficiency, right? But again the path to efficiency doesn't happen overnight to get you there. There are so many sacrifices that employees are most likely doing so. We have layoffs and that whole pressures on the economy, pressures of job, people being afraid of losing their job. And just recently we heard about Jacinta Ardern, the PM of New Zealand who openly speaks about burnout. And I can't not to connect those things. Us in tech experiencing burnout also as a result of layoffs. And a woman in such a high position, such an inspiration for us all actually talking openly about it. I know that you have your opinions and thoughts of it, but there is just a lot to unpack there. Where shall we start?

Yeah, Maybe we can start with the last point on someone, as I'm going to call her, iconic. Iconic as Jacinda Arden. You know, just a few days ago, saying that she's resigning, it was really, I think, a vulnerable moment and a lesson in leadership. I'm going to put a little bit of a stereotype out there, but I think it's rooted in some truth. As women in business, we often do a lot of emotional labor that's connected with being a leader. And being a leader is emotionally, mentally, sometimes even physically taxing. And I think as women, we take on more of that emotional labor at work and it can mean that we are more susceptible to burnout in the first place. So I think in her career arc, she has been very vocal about compassional leadership, leading with empathy. And I can only imagine how much of added pressure, added stress being an empathetic and being a compassionate leader was for her. It's almost like a double edged sword. You want to lead with compassion and empathy, but doing that means that you need to take up more of your mind share to be compassionate and be empathetic. Right. You just don't wake up. Doing that is an intentional practice. And so I am wondering what that means for women and leaders in business and other sectors that look up to her and saw her as a model, as an example. I still see her as a positive example. I think there's a lot of conversation on the Internet that oh, she shouldn't have resigned, she should have stuck it out. But I think again, the self awareness for her to say, I need to step back from this because it's more than me, it's for the greater good of her country. That she cannot continue to lead in this way was super powerful. And I think it's okay for us to give ourselves that grace to bow out and to give ourselves some time. Her career journey is not over. Right. She's in her mid-40s, she has another 40 years of amazing accomplishments. So I also want to challenge us in sort of the limited thinking of, oh, she should have just continued being PM of New Zealand. I mean, she can be so many other things.

Yeah, exactly.

Right. And she will and still have an.

Impact to the world.

Absolutely. And I think even again in her decision to resign, to talk about why she's stepping away is impactful for us and is a moment and a lesson that we can all take from.

You know, one of the interesting things about the whole resignation for me is to read how she said that she no longer had enough in the tank to do the job. Such a good illustration of, you know, the five love languages, right? Or what do we fill our tanks with for any type of relationship? And in our workplace, oh my gosh, how many hours in a day are we consumed emotionally? Just working with people, working with customers, of course with everybody, they all are people. But it consumes our emotions, it consumes our intellect. How do we feel those tongues? What has worked for you? Obviously that's again a personal thing, but.

What has worked for me? You know, right before we started the session I talked about how I had just completed my gratitude journal. And so I've been on a journey, I'm still on a journey for gratitude and seeking deeper understanding of myself and being able to really tune into my feelings, my emotions, my present state and evaluating what's next. And so what has been really working for me? Therapy is amazing. Again, time to self reflect. The privilege of that time to self reflect. I want to acknowledge that that is something that I'm privileged to have and the opportunity to take time away and to recharge. As I mentioned at the start, I'm an introvert. So I recharge by stepping away from others and stepping into myself. And that has been a way that I've been able to really reground myself re establish what is important for me and the impact that I want to have. So that's I what been again gratitude, practice therapy and sort of taking time within myself has been amazing for me.

That's really a wonderful way to fill in your tongue. Interestingly, just before we started the session I mentioned how I walked around five miles this morning. Again I felt privileged because it doesn't happen always very often it is dropping kids to school, go straight into calls and you know, little, you know and it's five o' clock in the afternoon but just taking few moments of a day to see the sunshine, even if it is all frosty outside. But it is a beautiful again privilege walking just looking into that sun. And for me I'm just thinking about not even things that I have to do. It is more of a life and kind of soul searching and all of those soul warming exercises that are really helping me in my day. Another thing, if I may ask, I don't know why it became such a thing for me especially in winter. I like going to the gym when I can and and sometimes evenings can only work for me but then I'm kind of cheating a bit. I do a little bit of exercise now during the winter and then I reward myself by going into the Spa. So a little bit of sauna or steam and I don't know why, but for winter time it's just the best thing ever. And I'm getting so many business ideas and ideas about my work in the steam and sauna. It fills my tank. After that I just feel very accomplished because I got so many new ideas. Again, it's not something you can do every day, but kind of an interesting thing of filling my tongue. But what are all of those pressures that we women put on ourselves? Yeah, we already took Prime Minister of New Zealand as an example, but she's also, you know, a woman in her 40s having children, having the most prestigious job in her country. Obviously loads of pressures on all sides. And then on top of that there was always the pressures of media that probably majority of us don't have to that extent. But that's a lot for us. For women in tech. What are those typical pressures that we always feel that they are around us but we are still trying to make it all work for us in a way to have it all.

I'll speak for myself and maybe this will resonate with, with other women in tech in general and then at more of the senior levels as well. I think in tech in general there is this idea that there's not that many of us, not idea, there isn't that many of us oftentimes. And so we can feel like outsiders a bit. It can feel like the old boys club quite often. So, you know, I'm sure others have experienced experience, but I have experienced, do I really belong here? Do I have the right to be in these rooms? Because there are not a lot of people that look like me. And so sometimes that shows up as imposter syndrome. That shows up as just simply, you know, self doubt. But that's something that I think we experience quite often. I think the other thing that women experience in tech and in leadership general is being able to be yourself. Sometimes I think that there are certain unspoken rules of engagement, unspoken types of behaviors that are more encouraged. Whether it's you're outspoken, whether it's you're highly extroverted, whether it's you make decisions quickly, you know, those things are often rewarded and early stage, high pressured environments. And if you're someone that is not exhibiting those characteristics, it again makes you wonder, can I be successful here? Do I have to emulate those characteristics to be successful? Or can I be myself and still find a path of success? And so that's something that I've struggled with because I am not highly I would say extroverted all the time. I am not making decisions as quickly as other people, but I know that I have other strengths that I bring to the table. So I think sometimes we do question, is there room and space for people that don't all look and act the same? Right. Can I be successful in being myself? Those are some of the pressures and some of the self doubt that I've had in my journey.

I wish that more leaders are aware firstly of their strengths and how important it is to hone into strengths. Lead with your strengths and don't apologize for your strengths. Right. Imagine any type of workplace when there is a conversation at the table, when it is not only about how the majority works and how the majority makes decision, but when you are not judged by being yourself, but when you can openly, with pride, talk about what makes you you, what are the things that you value and really lead by that. I started to just believe much more into if I as a leader do it even in spite of maybe everybody else, there will be somebody else who will start doing it again. So there is the triple effect that I have seen happening even in my company. I'm sure that's the case everywhere else. But I think that we can intentionally put that at the table and lead with that example. And I'm sure that many others will join.

Absolutely. I love that. That point of leading with example and that, and that's something that I've challenged myself with, is to be more vulnerable, to actually be the initiator of certain conversations. Knowing that again, in my privileged seat of being a leader at the company, I have a platform and I have a voice and if I get started and if I share something that's vulnerable or if I start the conversation that others may feel more comfortable to also contribute. So I think leading by example is really big for us in general as women in tech, as leaders in tech, so that others can see, see that it's okay to show up differently, it's okay to have a different style, it's okay to bring yourself to the table as you are and hopefully still be able to be successful, still be able to accomplish great things and have a great impact.

You did mention you have the seat at the table, which in a way makes you privileged. But on another hand, you made something great, which I really appreciate, applaud you for. So many women in a similar position perhaps haven't done it, but you created a whole community success in black. And that is absolutely helping other women raise the awareness, diversity, loads of issues that women of Color are faced with and you recognize it and did something about it. Tell me more about success.

I love the way that you put it is that, you know, I did have the privilege of knowing that I can gather people in this way and I can create more opportunities for us. You know, the analogy of having a seat at the table I think is really important. I think because it's even the idea of which tables we would like a seat at to begin with. Right. Are these tables that we've built, are these tables that are built in a sense of community and understanding and belonging, or are there tables that are built on maybe more negative characteristics? So I would like to have a seat at certain tables, but I would also like the opportunity to build our own tables. And I think what you've built here with the Women in Customer Success podcast is also an example of that. So for me, creating success in black was an opportunity to create safer space for black professionals and customer success to show up, learn more about this amazing career, advance their careers, and to also give back to others. And it's just been an amazing learning experience. And I've met so many wonderful people and so many allies and advocates that believe in our mission, which is a greater goal of really advocating for diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging and customers customer success. So it's just been an amazing journey.

Thank you for that. For all the listeners who are interested, please check out successinblack.co for more information about the community. As you met, this was such a wonderful conversation and I feel so privileged talking to you. There are so many takeaways, but I think I will really remember the one you just recently said. What is the seat at the table that you want to have or at which table do you want to have a seat? Because you can influence it. No matter what is your level in the company, with your behavior, you can always give the example. You can influence the table that is currently there. But I very strongly believe every individual, and if we speak about women, and probably even more, every woman can also create her own table and bring others into the conversation about what do we need? What are we dealing with? What can we do to help each other and take away from us? Because some of those pressures that we spoke about, not only we can do without, but there are so many of them that are brought on us by others and we can do something to remove them. So that would at least be my invitation. What is something that you would like to share with the audience at the end?

Just to maybe put a cap on that last point on the analogy of the table and the idea that we have unlimited opportunity and potential. The scarcity mindset of there's only one table and there's only so many seats, right? But we can build bigger tables, we can build new tables, right? So I'm really challenging listeners and myself with thinking in abundance and thinking that we have unlimited potential and that we have not figured out all the problems in the world. There's still ways to make being a human on this planet better for us all. And we all have capacity, we all have the potential. And so how can we work together to really create better outcomes? Whether that's for our organizations, whether that's for our customers, our friends, our families. So much of business and personal life are interconnected. And I want to challenge us with thinking more in an abundant mindset and not putting limits on our own potential.

This was a wonderful message. Instead of thinking about our limitations and thinking about how we may have been victims to all the pressures potentially, let's think about the ab abundance of all the tables, initiatives and things that we can do. Eduma. This was so powerful. This was wonderful. Thank you so much for coming to the show.

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you.

Thank you for listening. Next week New episode. Subscribe to the podcast and connect with me on LinkedIn so you're up to date with all the new episodes and the content I'm curating for you. Have a great day and talk to you soon.