Kirsten Helvey of Cornerstone OnDemand: Scaling from 30-1,500 in SaaS: Lessons From the Frontlines

All right, let's give it up for Kirsten Helve from Cornerstone on Demand. So thanks for coming.

Thanks.

I'm from la. This is a treat, this.

You are a wonderful host in your team. This has been an amazing event and I'm really happy to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

So this is fun for a couple of reasons. Cornerstone's an interesting company. It's one of the. I mean, was Cornerstone always sassed from day one, I think day one, day one. Right. So it was pretty, pretty much the early two or three companies that have been doing. When was Cornerstone founded?

1999.

1999. Did we even call it SaaS in 1999?

What's interesting is, and I started in 2003, March of 2003. My primary role as an account manager. So think about this. There were roughly 30 people. We had eight customers. And I came on as account manager. My primary job was to sell SaaS already to. To companies that we had already sold. Right. Because we were dealing with large enterprise customers. SaaS was very new and we spent our time talking about what it was and the benefits, which I no longer have that conversation. Today I have different conversations. But that was the focus because back then nobody was really adopting SaaS.

What are the maintenance fees again? You've gotten it wrong.

Exactly. Hey, there are none. Oh, guess what? And we back in the day, I won't tell you how often we released, but we did it more than we do today. And little to no change management did. I admit that on stage. Now we have robust processes and everybody gets their seamless updates. We have one code version and yeah, it's been a good ride.

So you have an amazing story. So you join one of the sort of iconic SaaS customers early is employee 30. You join, you go through that, you eventually run the whole customer success organization, which is super important topic to talk about. IPO 2000 employees and now you're COO, right? Yes. So it's quite a journey. And I want to talk briefly, talk about all the things that have changed. Right. What changes from 30 to 2000. And you've had an amazing seat. Right. And that seat has changed over the years.

Yeah, it really has. And firstly, I'll say, when I joined, I did not know what I was getting into and didn't really even think about it that way. For me, I wanted a job closer to home and didn't want to be on the road 24 7. So I found a company and I thought that job's a no brainer. I'm down enabling technology. I'm kind of good at that business process I'm in and after that, getting on the ground, starting and really understanding what the company was about, I set out to really make some changes because of my consulting background. And I think one of the things that we needed to do was marry up all those business processes with our customers to the solution that we were selling. And that journey has taken many turns through the years. It's changed a lot. My role has changed a lot. One of the good things is I make a lot of mistakes and I move on from those. And I think that's key, right. The evolution is you have to keep changing what you're doing, being agile. And somebody just asked me yesterday, right? Not the thing that I hate about my job, what's the thing that I like. And the like is the building. And as a startup you're building. And I think the fallacy is when you get to a certain size or scale, you stop. And if anything, it's more important to keep building and keep changing how you're operating, whether it's interfacing with your clients or the market. Right. Even your competitors. Right. Coop petition is life. That's the way we do things. And I think the journey along the way, one of the things for me is that I fundamentally believe if I don't learn something new every day, then I need to go be doing something differently. Because that to me is what life is about, it's about experiencing. So I've been able to kind of put those two things together with my job. And while I do the non sexy HR stuff, it's something that is so important to companies as a whole. Right. Because employees are your greatest asset. We've heard a lot of talk about culture through all the sessions. Hey, guess what? Stop talking about it. It's table stakes if you don't have culture. Because culture is about your people, right? So I'm always fascinated that we talk about the culture and that's table stakes. And it's not about a ping pong table or an arcade or a candy wall. And the candy wall is on my floor. I don't really like that. I wish they put the candy wall on a different floor because I like candy. But you know, those are things. It's about the people and it's about connecting the people. You're at war, right? You need to be in the trenches. You need to trust each other and that to me needs to be inherent. And if you don't have people who are signed up for that, yeah, they shouldn't be there.

Actually, let's dig in on that a little bit because it's interesting because I agree with you and you've been a cornerstone from 30 to 2000 or COO. I love to hear the stories of the founder that wrote the seven principles on the Google Doc and posted it and that was magic. But I think it's table stakes and doesn't matter either. Right? The employees are the culture, period. The color of the foosball isn't. But so Cornerstone has managed to have an enduring culture and it's managed. And maybe it's a benefit to do it in LA outside of us. But how do you then, what do you say? How do I create a great culture for my company? Everyone here has something. Consider for most of the folks here are a lot like Cornerstone when you joined. How do I. And they probably have a good culture. And so how do I build a great culture?

And I think what's most important is that you acknowledge it and then work hard to maintain it. And you know, my boss, Adam Miller, who is the founder and still is the CEO today, always had a vision. And I think that vision drove the culture. And I'm really lucky that I had someone who cared about the vision of what we were doing and that it was a lifelong goal. And for him at the time, it was educating the world. Right now we're about realizing people's potential and that evolution has changed slightly. But educating the world and helping people realize their potential are not that far off. So I think the one thing is you gotta have a mission and stay true to that mission. And everybody needs to be there for that mission. Now, we've made mistakes along the way because as you get to certain stages, you start hiring people for different things, right? And I think that's where you need to be really certain of what you're hiring for for each stage. And you also need to be certain that, you know, folks that are going to get you from A to B may not get you from B to C and so on. And I think taking a step back, I heard a lot of of that. It's absolutely true. You need to evaluate at all times, at all stages who's on the team. Are they the right people on the team? Because you always have to be a step ahead and committed to that vision. So you have to follow the vision. You need the skill sets and the people to follow that vision.

How do you. Let's talk about that a little bit. And we talked about it a little bit with Phil before. I've got these great people on my team, but then I hit 10 million, 20 million. I mean you've seen the whole journey. How do I think about great employees? But they don't have the right, they're not in the right fit for the next stage. Right. But they're great, they're a players. I'm loyal. How do I deal with that scenario?

So I think that Cornerstone is actually particularly good at that. And in the unsexy HR world we call that talent mobility. And I think we're very good. Most people at Cornerstone have had three, three to four jobs at Cornerstone. And we, especially if they're talented people, we'll move them in a role that they're better suited for at that time. Right. Look, some people you just gotta cut bait and in some cases they self select out because they realize it. But I think offering the career paths and the mobility is critical, especially for folks who have done an excellent job for, for you at that period. There's probably something else that they can do and be a superstar at. I think what happens also in the startup world, you got a lot of a players and the culture is a player. The other key thing is you tend to have a lot of individual heroes, especially as you're growing rapidly. And then what happens, there comes a time where actually an individual hero is a detriment to your success and you gotta make that switch because then it becomes, it's no longer I, I can get that done because the I's don't scale, the we's do. And having people who can make that transformation is critical. And you know, personally, yeah, I've had challenges. I think Adam, my boss will tell you I've had some bad years, but I've had some good years. And hopefully he'll say mostly good years. But you know, part of that is that journey of being able to scale and having the foresight to know what you personally are either not good at or maybe you're not scaling and having that self awareness to then change that. And I think that is critical as you go through the stages. The other key thing, as you become an individual contributor to a manager making that switch, some people are successful and some are definitely not right.

How do I know if I'm an individual contributor here? How do I know when I'm ready? And how do you coach people?

Yeah, I think part of that is having that plan with your manager around, making that switch and understanding exactly what it takes to be a good manager. And that goes back to one of my sayings is forget the mba get a psychology degree, right. If I give anybody any advice, and that's my next reincarnation, I'm going to be a psychologist to all you startups, right? Because it's all about people motivating people, helping people achieve their goals or realize their potential. And you know, that is communication, right? If you can't communicate what you want and how to get there. I had one employee who for many years was the go to person. Not scalable. Things were breaking down and that person didn't understand why he was not getting promoted. And finally we created a plan. And that plan is we tried to give this person direct reports and it just, it failed. And the one thing we did was create a clear pass and plan and we measured it and monitor it. And now that person, superstar manager, doing really well. But there was a point in time where we actually took a step back and we're like, what are we going to do with this person? Yeah.

How much longer did it take her to grow eventually into a good manager? How much longer than she'd hoped? How long was that?

Yeah, look, I think it took a lot longer than that person.

Couple more years.

Couple more years.

Couple more years, yeah.

And part of that though is the lack of self awareness.

Right.

And I think that I don't know if you can do anything for yourself. Take a look in the mirror, right? Know what things are going well or not. And people will tell you. People will tell you if you're being successful or not and what are the things that you need to change. If you ask, they may not proactively share it with you, but if you ask them, they'll give you that direct feedback. And on my team, everybody knows, you know, I'm pretty, pretty direct with the feedback, good and bad. And I'm an equal opportunity jerk as it will, you know that. You know, you gotta give the feedback.

It's meritocratic jerkiness. Right?

Yes.

There you go. It comes from honesty in the right place. Yeah.

Yes.

Yeah. Well, let me ask you a related question. I see this especially often in sales, but I think it happens in every functional area related to this point. I see someone that's killing it as an individual contributor, you know, they need a couple more years seasoning to be a manager, but they're not gonna listen like they have to. And they, and even though they love Cornerstone or wherever it could be any company, they're gonna, they've gotta be a manager tomorrow. Like, how do you, what's your advice? How do you manage that one? And they just they have such drive. They've gotta do it.

Yeah. Firstly, you know, I always love the drive. I love the people who want to go after it. And as my boss, Adam always says to me, you always like the disruptors. Yeah, I do. I like the people who are gonna, you know, shake the boat, rattle it. Because that's how we get our best work. Right. Is when we're thinking not about the norm. And a lot of that, you know, around all of that is that one on one coaching. I often tell people to go talk to people in the roles that they want and what are the things that, you know, that person does to be successful. You know, all of this is people. It's the people business. And, you know, a lot of folks, you can learn some of that and some of it you can't. Like, I'm all about street smarts, right. You gotta be street smart. You gotta be able to read a room. You have to know, you know, how to adjust either in a sales conversation, a service conversation, or even an internal conversation. And those skills are really what's paramount. And having people focus on some of that and looking in the mirror is one of the key things that I do. I have told some people, look, you're just not ready. And sometimes they need to hear that. And if they choose not to take that advice, and in some cases they'll leave. Right. That hopefully you've taught them a lesson and that lesson will help them in their career moving forward. Right. Sometimes you have to fail, and a lot of the times they fail. Right. And then they want to come back and, you know, are they allowed back? Certain folks are allowed back, but as a rule, we have a policy that, you know, in certain departments, no, you're not coming back.

There is. By the department.

Right.

Let me ask you a related question because this is such an interesting conversation. The other one that I think a lot of founders struggle with. So one is if someone can't scale to an existing role, you try and find them another place they can be, which is great. That's how you build an enduring organization.

Yes.

A related one is how do you approach the tough topic of topping someone? Right. And for some folks, it's not tough. They just are like, I'm going to top Linda tomorrow. But for most of us, it's a tough thing to think about. Right. And so how do you, how do you top someone? What's your advice to that challenge?

That is actually a tough question.

And here's your boss, Linda. Yeah, I know. You didn't even meet her. Before today, but now she's your boss, you know, like RSVP one of.

You know, I've had that happen and I've also been the person who has come in right over.

Yes, well, you're the coo, so apparently I've been a topper early in my career.

I actually became the boss of my boss. Super awkward, by the way. Yeah, super awkward. And look, there are conversations that have to be had and it's all about the vision and getting to that next stage, right? One of the things that I try to do and it's really hard in today's environment. You can't think three years out, right? Crap. I think six months out from a goal standpoint because everything's changing so quickly. But I need to know, where do I need to get to? I'm a dreamer. I'm a dreamer. As an individual. I always have this in my head, this big thing out there that I want to achieve. And part of that is having those conversations, getting people to know what that big dream is related to business. Sometimes it's personal too. And having those discussions, I do them directly. I don't like to beat around the bush and I always give the folks the opportunity to go along for the ride. But part of, I think the one thing that we don't hear so much and I had this conversation last night at a meeting is nobody tells you all the bad stuff you have to deal with, right? In startup land and scaling and growing and having to have those tough conversations with folks about whether or not they can scale, it's tough.

How transparent should you be?

Look, I think in some ways you have to be transparent. It's better for the individual. And I am a no bullshit type of person. I rather tell you straight. I think it's better to have people know where you stand than to surprise anyone. That's just not good. Because guess what, it's a small industry, right? Technology is very small. You will always run into someone whom you've worked with that you know, that knows someone. So I think if you can do it graciously, classy. And it's never about putting the individual down. It's about the business. It's never personal in the sense of, you know, it's about you, the individual. Right. I always try to focus on where is the business going and what do we need to drive the business. Business fair.

There's something, let's ask, because a lot of us struggle with this. When you go to make a hire and you're just not sure you hire a VP or now director, whatever. I hope that in a year you grow and you're still the vp, but I just don't know. Right. You're an overachiever, you're a stretch hire. Do you tell that person that's hyper ambitious when you hire them that? I don't know if you're going to be the VP or the director here?

Absolutely.

Tell them.

Even on, I think you absolutely let that person know because you gotta give them the motivation too, to really be at their best and perform the best. And a lot of times I will hire people, especially into new things we're creating. And I will say, I don't know what your path is, but trust me, if we're performing and working together, I will create a path. And I think that is truly important. I think transparency overall is. You have to have it right. Because that goes back to our beginning discussion around people. People are your biggest asset and you want to keep the people who are driving the vision of the business. And one of the ways you do it is you treat them with respect.

Yeah. So let's. I want to make sure we spend some time on customer success because I had to figure out what the heck customer success was. I didn't even really understand it until like year three, because then you get real renewal, like year three of a startup, you start getting real renewals and you start getting real churn. Right. And so you've seen customer success, I think, go from something that was sort of account management to a hack thing, and now we're trying to make it a science. So what is state of the art and customer success today and what's changed?

Yeah, I think firstly when I got hired to save a big customer. Right. So that was the sole purpose for my.

You have one account.

Yeah, well, I ended up having eight. But yeah, you've got one account and it's up to you to save that account. So I think that we've always had customer success. Now it's grown into something different. But you know, knock, knock. If you don't have customers, you don't have a business. Right, Right. So I think there's always been. I love what Phil said about the cocaine of a new sale. Right. Well, I have always been about the crack of the clients. And hey, your clients are your biggest. They're your business. Make them successful. Focus on your clients. And I think along the way, part of what I have spent my time at Cornerstone is really evangelizing that client centric DNA. So start with it. Right. Don't be a product Company, be a client company. Be a company that is, you know, providing a solution or solving a problem for your clients who by the way, pay your bills. Right. That's. I mean that to me, I'm kind of logical, you know, not that bright. No, I'm just kidding. But you know, it's just logic. Right. And I think that along the years we've done many things and I think the best thing we did is make the investment. Right. It costs a lot less to upsell than to acquire new customers.

A lot less.

So I think knowing that and spending the time, I'm particularly proud of our retention rate. We're at 95, just above 95% dollar weighted retention rate, which since inception and I think, yeah, we focus on really delivering the right experience. And it has changed, actually it almost changes every year in a lot of ways because based on, you know, wonderful new technologies and data, right now we're all software and data companies and it's. What do you do with the data to help you drive your business? And customer success today is about knowing, right. The science of your customers and knowing all aspects. You know, back in the day we tracked it on spreadsheets. We. Yeah, that sounds about right. You know, now it's very metrics driven and thankfully to some of the new SaaS companies out there, you can automate a lot of it. Right. And having that touch, right. The one to many is obviously the way to scale at when you have thousands of customers and depending on the segments, but every client is important and having that focus, no matter how big or small. And we've got some whales and we have very tiny customers. They all need to feel that they're getting value and that you are giving them what they need to be successful. Because at the end of the day the outcomes of your clients are what you need to hang your hat on. Right. Of course it's new sales, but those new sales need to translate into multi year contracts. So I think the focus on that retention and the renewals is critical and there's often a significant amount of revenue to be tapped in that install base. And one of the things that Phil mentioned too was a lot of times you don't focus on that and it's right, it's right there, it's in front of your face. So knowing that and focusing on it and setting up the processes to support it is critical.

And when you're running customer success, were you focusing Adam on it? Did you have to compete for mindshare? Did you give them quotas and budgets for Customer visits or, or how did you get the resources that you needed?

Yeah, so I think that in particular Cornerstone has been good at understanding, working with our clients. Services as a whole has always been a laggard to anything sales related. It's just the way you grow your business. Right. You're not going to spend the money that you don't have on necessarily servicing versus acquiring. So it is a balance and it is about figuring out how to do it with less. Like you're always going to be behind on resources. So you have to be able to. And that's why some of the new science out there is amazing. Because you can do what you need to do with fewer people and still have a very high touch, very personal connection with your clients. And I think one of the things about Cornerstone, many of our clients say we buy you because of your people, so you want to have the people touch, which obviously costs more. But it's balancing that with automation and science to really create the right methodology and ultimately being able to show a retention rate, an uptick in renewals. All of our CSMs are bonused on a number of those metrics. So it's in their best interest to get a renewal or have an upsell.

And how do you juggle those two? Because. Because sometimes renewal and upsell, there's a conflict. Listen, I love the upsell, but the last thing I want to do is lose GE or Google as a customer. So what did you learn about that conflict between upsell and renewal?

It's a lovely dance, a nice waltz together. And look, it's really a partnership. Our client sales team or account management really does all of the renewals and truly the upsells. But the client success team is the business development team for the account management team. And that's critical.

Right, okay, so walk us through that.

What does that mean in fact? So if you think about it, right, this client success manager is responsible for developing relationships at certain levels, right. In our world. They're responsible for the utilization of our solution and really making that solution stick sticky. And number one is helping clients realize the value and the outcomes that they expected. So that's their number one objective. But with that they are uncovering the needs. Right, because we're talking about, you know, what are the goals of that organization, how do we align? So out of that the opportunities flow and so connecting the dots and having that close partnership with account management or client sales, whatever you call those folks in your world is critical. And they should partner, whether it's meeting weekly or doing it With a solution. However, that works for you at your particular scale. When you have large teams, and we now have fairly large teams, I think my team alone is a third of the company. You have to facilitate the relationship building internally to benefit the client.

Right.

Those relationships have to happen to then benefit clients.

So one last thing, I want to get in because we're over in time. But when you and I were talking before, we had a great conversation because you've gone from employee authority to COO, and especially for folks here that are VPs and driven folks, about lessons you learned about promoting yourself and raising your hand and being recognized versus being the heads down a meritocratic. Right. How do you, you know, how do you. If you want to be successful, how do you promote yourself? And does this get easier and what do you have to do to become a coo?

Yeah, it's a great question. And I would argue that I actually haven't done a great job at that. So I do have a lot of lessons learned. I was always focused on doing a good job.

Doing a good job. You'll be recognized.

I will be recognized. And yeah, it just doesn't work that way. It really doesn't.

Necessary but not sufficient.

Yes. And why do I say that? Well, it's because you have to articulate your value and the things that you're bringing, people aren't just going to see it. And part of that is relationships, Right. I think one of the ways that I more recently is having those relationships and partnerships and being a trusted person, but then being able to translate that. And I think for me, one of the defining moments was when I finally realized, you know what? I don't need this shit anymore. If I want to leave, I will, but I don't want to leave because I love this. I love what I do. And having that attitude, I think actually changed really how I perceived myself and the value of what I was doing and where I could go. I think that was a very defining moment. I'm also, you know, a mother with kids, young kids. And I think that happening in my life forced me to be way more specific about how I spend my time and what I really wanted. And I think ultimately I go back to, I love what I do, I love the company, I love the people there. You know, we have a foundation that, you know, really embodies what we do. And I would never leave my job for another job. Right. Because I have an awesome job. And that, I think is something you got to look in the mirror and figure out, right? Is this what you want to be doing. And I said before I'm a dreamer. So I put stuff out there and then not even consciously, I have stepping stones to get there and I make decisions that lead me down a path. I think if there's one thing I learned too, a little bit of luck helps. So make sure you're on the lookout for the luck or the introductions and the people. And Saster Annual is a great place to do that is making those connections because that will lead to either a next step or luck. Whether it's in your current role or your next role and creating that web, there are people who do that wonderfully and I would say focus on that.

Everyone's got to get better at developing the web.

Yeah.

It wasn't great idea either. Right. It's great advice. Kirsten, thank you very much. This was terrific.

Thank you.

Yeah, really great. Thank you.