PRECURSIVE PLAYBOOK
Risen from the dead!
A copy of this playbook has been sent to the email provided 📩
TRADITIONAL SERVICES DELIVERY IS
MAXIMIZE ARR WITH OUTCOMES-LED PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
FOREWORD
Our new reality in B2B SaaS sees customer expectations rising where they expect to get a return on their investment quicker than ever before. These demands plus the competitive landscape have altered traditional business models and see a revolution in professional services as SaaS continues to evolve.
Traditionally PS* in the software industry was seen as a driver of company financials that would deliver 30-40% margins. However leading companies are investing in professional services as a strategic lever to drive recurring revenues. Taking those opportunities to invest professional services hours, in order to drive more value, sits at the heart of a forward thinking SaaS company’s agenda. After all, sales is selling outcomes and professional services needs to deliver on that promise. As a result the best services teams continue to iterate and improve methodologies otherwise they'll get left behind by those who are innovating their existing PS models.
Welcome to the future of professional services where velocity and quality are key tenets for success. In this world, services and success groups are ever more symbiotic with a shared mission to drive customer success and ARR.
This playbook provides guidance and practitioner insights for how to win in this world. For when we help our customer win, we all win.
*PS = Professional Services
WELCOME TO THE
JUNGLE OUTCOMES ERA
We are IN a subscription based economy which has forced the hand of companies to move from legacy business models to a customer success strategy, creating a shift whereby customers demand the value delivered from your product, not the product itself. Your customers want outcomes, not implementations and they want them at the speed of light!
The new normal is customers wanting more value, more quickly. To build a scalable and repeatable growth engine, professional services and customer success need to have a shared mission to help customers achieve their goals. With the ongoing explosion of SaaS and the accelerating level of competition, we are in a world of continuous evaluation where if your customers aren’t happy they can take their business elsewhere easily.
Imagine a world where all the promises made to customers in sales are delivered. You get customers who are brand ambassadors in record time and happy to buy more from you and advocate on your behalf. Remember the faster the customer can see first value, the faster you recognise initial revenue and find new growth opportunities.
The promised land is one where promises are kept.
In this new reality you make every one of your customers a success story.
“I’m buying software for the sake of buying software”
SAID NO-ONE. EVER.
ANATOMY
What are the key components of a Professional Services Organization?
With Jon Harrison
VP Services & Success
My philosophy or my mission is simple – without devaluing the services you provide, or the knowledge, expertise and IP that you have in house - how do we, as vendors, remove professional services costs as a barrier to entry for the customer, drive fast time to value plus great product adoption and ensure the customer is achieving great ROI – as well as delivering a commercial return for the organization?
"
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EXECUTION
The new battleground in Professional Services
with Adam Maze
Associate Partner
Adam has lead operations and delivery teams for a range of mid-market technology and professional services organizations.
In this chapter, Adam shares best practices for services teams when managing these different stages of the customer journey.
The best companies can seamlessly transition between sales, professional services and customer success.
SCALE
Scale your business with repeatable services delivery
with Debbie Perrott
Head of Services
As you map out growing your professional services organization, consider the key components that will help you scale. There are 3 core tenets to how we think about growth with professional services
STRATEGY
What do we want to achieve
EXECUTION
How do we deliver on our strategy
TEAM
Who is going to help us get there
PARTNERSHIP
How professional services and customer success partner for success
with Alex Farmer
VP Customer Success
Alex Farmer is one of SuccessHACKER’s 2020 Top 100 Customer Success Strategists.
Customer Success and Professional Services have a symbiotic relationship where one can not function without the other. We need agreement on the cadences and ‘baton passing’ that needs to occur ‘below the water line’ (invisible from the customer).
PS will quantify success criteria in the implementation scoping phase so that CS can take this forward - hence CS needs to be paying attention during the preales and onboarding stage.
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HOW TO WIN
Workforce Science in the Outcomes Era
with Richard Cardwell
VP, MidWest
Richard Cardwell oversees 3,500 people at Infosys
and states:
I’m always wrestling with how we put the right person, the right skills, the right project - I force my leadership team to think through:
What do you have to do for the project work?
What do you want to do?
What are you educated to do?
Our job is to really make those things coalesce.
"
"
HOW TO
WIN IN THE
OUTCOMES ERA
OLD W Y
A
Poor ‘handovers’ between siloed sales and delivery teams leading to delayed starts
Heavy admin burden on project work with customers in the dark on what they need to do
Traditional resource planning managed in spreadsheets with no forecasting capability
Slow and ineffective decision making based on out-of-date data
PRECURSIVE WAY
Seamless transitions between sales, services and success teams
Customer collaboration leads to faster time-to-value with better client experience
Workforce Science based approach to mobilizing teams based on skills and passions
Real-time insight on key business metrics facilitates scalable growth with predictive hiring
THANK
YOUS
Precursive would like to thank you following contributors to this playbook for their stellar insights and time.
Jon Harrison, VP Services and Success, SAGE
Adam Maze, Associate Partner, GARWOOD SOLUTIONS
Alex Farmer, VP Customer Success, COGNITE
Richard Cardwell, VP Midwest, INFOSYS
Debbie Perrott, Head of Services & Support, PRECURSIVE
Additional Content & Layout: Robbie Burnell, VP - Marketing, PRECURSIVE
Additional Production: Prachi Shah, Digital Marketing Manager, PRECURSIVE
For more information please contact Robbie Burnell at rburnell@precursive.com
MAKE EVERY CUSTOMER A SUCCESS STORY
IT & Professional Services
FinTech
Communications
Find out more about the people and company. You can learn more about what makes us tick.
We are passionate about changing the game for the world’s best services teams.
Our mission is to help you improve time-to-value and make every customer a success story.
WHY PRECURSIVE.
