Customer Success - Team Manager at Canonical

About Canonical

Canonical is a leading provider of open source software and operating systems to global enterprise and technology markets. Our platform, Ubuntu, is widely used in breakthrough enterprise initiatives such as public cloud, data science, AI, engineering innovation, and IoT. Our customers include the world's leading public cloud and silicon providers, as well as industry leaders across many sectors. The company is a pioneer of global distributed collaboration, with over 1000 colleagues in 70+ countries and very few office-based roles. Teams meet two to four times yearly in person, in interesting locations around the world, to align on strategy and execution. Founded and led by its original founder, Canonical is profitable and growing. Most colleagues have worked from home since the company's inception in 2004.

Working at Canonical is a step into the future, challenging you to think differently, work smarter, learn new skills, and elevate your performance. We recruit globally and set a very high standard for joining the company, expecting excellence from our team members.

The Opportunity: Customer Success - Team Manager

We are expanding our Customer Success Manager (CSM) team globally and recruiting leaders to support and drive these teams regionally. Canonical views its Customer Success operations as an exceptional tool for sustaining revenue retention and growth, prioritizing excellence in delivering outstanding customer services within the new technologies sector. We seek exceptional candidates with a proven track record in Customer Success management and a strong passion for new technologies.

This role is ideal for individuals who are organized, persistent, analytical, diplomatic, excellent listeners, hard-working, and determined to continuously grow their skills and teams. As a lead, you will provide mentoring, coaching in post-sales account management, and constructive feedback to your team members. You will play a crucial role in proactively identifying areas for improvement, implementing process changes, and fostering high-performing teams. Comfortable with ambiguity, you will be equipped to quickly adapt to change. Collaboration with other teams is also vital to enhance the overall customer experience. Your key responsibility will be to analyze regional performance metrics, identify trends and opportunities for improvement, and implement changes to increase efficiency and achieve business objectives. You will work in close collaboration with the Global Head of Customer Success to drive results. We engage with a diverse customer base and utilize a variety of motions to provide the appropriate level of focus for every customer. The successful candidate will demonstrate the ability to adapt across this diverse customer base, regardless of culture, location, or focus.

Location: These opportunities are available globally and are remote positions.

Responsibilities

• Strategic planning and analysis: Prepare communication plans, team meetings, and other messages for broader management forums, setting yourself and your team up for success. Regularly review key performance indicators and metrics as your baseline. Develop strategies to enhance customer engagement, improve retention rates, drive up-sells or cross-sells where appropriate, and ultimately increase customer success.
• Customer interactions and support to your team: Resolve escalated customer issues requiring your expertise or intervention, ensuring timely resolution.
• Team management: Passionately guide and support your team members, helping them navigate complex customer situations, improve their skills, and achieve their goals. Conduct regular performance reviews with team members, identifying areas for improvement/development, celebrating excellence, recognizing team achievements, and setting goals for individual growth.
• Cross-functional collaboration: Collaborate with other departments, such as Sales, Marketing, Product development, and Support, is essential. This ensures alignment on customer needs, feedback sharing, and coordinated efforts to drive customer success. Establish trustworthy communication channels across the board.
• Documentation and reporting: Be creative! While building content with your team and manager, ensure changes are well documented, instilling quality and attention to detail in all your work.

What we are looking for in you

• Excellent academic results from school and university.
• Bachelor’s or equivalent degree in Business, Communication, or a STEM subject.
• Knowledge and passion for Customer Success, revenue management, and technology, with experience in SaaS or software industries.
• Proven track record of delivering exceptional Customer Success experience results.
• Commitment to continuous learning and improvement - curious, flexible, scientific approach.
• Creative problem-solving and cross-team collaboration skills.
• Experience growing and developing a CSM team.
• Hands-on approach to using data to drive team activities and continuous improvement.
• Willingness to travel up to 4 times a year for internal events.

Nice-to-have skills

• Whilst English is our business language, proficiency (both written and spoken) in Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Portuguese, German, French, or Italian will be valued.

What we offer you

We consider geographical location, experience, and performance in shaping compensation worldwide. Compensation is revisited annually (and more often for graduates and associates) to ensure we recognize outstanding performance. In addition to base pay, we offer a performance-driven annual bonus. We provide all team members with additional benefits that reflect our values and ideals, balancing our programs to meet local needs and ensure fairness globally.

• Distributed work environment with twice-yearly team sprints in person - we’ve been working remotely since 2004!
• Personal learning and development budget of USD 2,000 per year.
• Annual compensation review.
• Recognition rewards.
• Annual holiday leave.
• Maternity and paternity leave.
• Employee Assistance Programme.
• Opportunity to travel to new locations to meet colleagues from your team and others.
• Priority Pass for travel.

Diversity and Inclusion

Canonical is an equal opportunity employer. We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination. Diversity of experience, perspectives, and background create a better work environment and better products. Whatever your identity, we will give your application fair consideration.