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He Cut Exec Prep From 4 Hours to 10 Minutes ft. Simon Farthing (Bloomreach)
[Un]Churned – The No. 1 Podcast for Customer RetentionShow Notes
Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.
Simon Farthing, VP of Customer Success at Bloomreach, joins Josh Schachter to discuss what it actually takes to lead a customer success organization in the AI era. Drawing from his experience leading a 100-person CS and services team, Simon shares the lessons he's learned from experimenting with AI tools at scale, building internal tools, rethinking team structure, and preparing for what's next. It's a candid conversation about moving beyond AI hype and turning it into measurable operational impact.
--- What You'll Learn - Lessons from testing 60+ AI tools across a 100-person CS organization - How Simon built a personal AI command center in Claude - A practical framework for build vs. buy vs. build-on-top decisions - Why AI accuracy becomes non-negotiable at the executive level - Why "tool migration" is becoming a core professional skill - How Bloomreach rebalanced CSM compensation around GRR and NRR - Why Forward Deployed Engineers are emerging and where they fit
--- Timestamps 0:00 - Preview & Intro 1:28 - Meet Simon Farthing, BloomReach overview 2:48 - 60+ AI tools tested, tool proliferation problem 6:00 - Building "Mission Control" in Claude 8:57 - Bottoms-up AI leadership structure 11:00 - The accuracy problem: when AI slides hit the boardroom 13:52 - Tool migration as a critical human skill 15:05 - Build vs. buy vs. build-on-top framework 17:00 - CSM comp redesign 18:33 - The rise of the Forward Deployed Engineer (FDE) 21:10 - Smaller customers and customer marketing, agentic AI
--- Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com
--- Where to Find the Guest Simon Farthing: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simon-farthing/
--- Where to Find the Hosts: Josh's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/ Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.
Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.
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