The Strategic Customer Success Manager

A Blueprint for Elevating Your Impact and Advancing Your Career

By: Chad Horenfeldt

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

“You need to be more strategic.” Those dreaded words from your manager leave you frustrated and unsure of what to do next.

But what if you could stop reacting to problems and instead become a trusted strategic partner who commands respect from both your customers and colleagues? Chad Horenfeldt—who has spent over two decades as a customer success manager (CSM) and building out high-performing customer success teams at Eloqua (Oracle), Kustomer (Meta), and other companies—shares a battle-tested approach to elevate your impact and advance your career.

In The Strategic Customer Success Manager, you will learn:

• How to quickly build unbreakable trust with customers

• Proven techniques for mastering strategic conversations, using frameworks and insights from leading CS practitioners

• Strategies for aligning with cross-functional teams across your organization

• Proven methodologies for conducting impactful kickoffs, QBRs, and renewal and expansion conversations

• Practical strategies for identifying and handling at-risk accounts and preventing churn

This comprehensive playbook includes ready-to-use templates, actionable exercises, and scripts designed to immediately improve your effectiveness as a CS professional.

Don’t wait for someone else to define what “being strategic” means. Take control of your career today and master the skills that will transform you and your team from ordinary CSMs to strategic advisors who drive measurable, exceptional results. Level up before you’re left out.

Praise for Chad Horenfeldt and The Strategic Customer Success Manager

The CSM of the future isn’t buried in tickets—they’re in the boardroom, speaking the language of value, building trust, and guiding accounts toward outcomes. That’s the vision this book delivers.

If you’re building a CS org or developing your own practice, The Strategic Customer Success Manager is required reading. It’s not just timely—it’s timeless.

— John Gleeson, General Partner at Success Venture Partners, Former VP of Customer Success at Motive

The days of reactive, support-focused CSMs are behind us. Today’s CSMs must be consultative, commercially savvy, and capable of delivering meaningful value. The Strategic Customer Success Manager meets this moment. Chad has written an engaging, practical, and powerful guide that helps CSMs become true business partners ready to thrive in an AI-driven world. Every CS team should have this on their desk, and in their enablement programs.

— Donna Weber, Customer Value Realization Expert, author of Onboarding Matters

With customer expectations evolving at record speed, this book is the essential guide for forward-thinking CSMs. It builds on existing resources and elevates customer success to a strategic discipline.

— Wayne McCulloch, Chief Customer Officer at Alkami Technology, author of The Seven Pillars of Customer Success

Few people have the credibility and depth of experience Chad brings to this book. His journey, insights, and frameworks combine storytelling and strategy in a way that resonates and empowers. This is the CS book we’ve been waiting for.

— Maranda Dziekonski, CS Executive, Customer Success and Insights MBA Program Advisor at the University of San Francisco School of Management

The Strategic Customer Success Manager is a must-read for CS professionals who want to drive measurable impact for their organization while developing critical skills to accelerate their career growth. Chad offers a first-of-its-kind playbook that is relatable, practical, and easy to read.

— Rod Cherkas, CEO of HelloCCO and author of The Chief Customer Officer Playbook