Senior Vice President of Global Support and Customer Success

Actian is seeking a Senior Vice President of Global Support and Customer Success to lead global support and customer experience initiatives. This executive role involves defining and executing a world-class strategy to maximize customer retention, loyalty, and lifetime value across Actian's AI-enabled data management, governance, integration, and analytics products. The SVP will integrate proactive customer success methodologies and reactive support operations, leading a global team of over 100 people, and will also be responsible for the customer community and learning management system.

Must Have

• Develop and execute a comprehensive global customer success and support strategy.
• Oversee global customer support operations, professional services, and customer success teams.
• Champion the voice of the customer within the executive leadership team.
• Define, track, and manage key performance indicators (KPIs) such as CSAT, NRR, and churn.
• Recruit, mentor, and inspire a high-performing, customer-centric team.
• Build and maintain strong relationships with C-suite executives at key customer accounts.
• Lead the global technical support organization, ensuring rapid, efficient, and high-quality resolution.
• Ensure adherence to Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and deliver exceptional customer support.
• Oversee the escalation process, coordinating with engineering and product teams.
• Implement processes and technologies to enhance support efficiency and effectiveness.
• Optimize global coverage to provide 24/7 support capabilities.
• Develop a world-class global team of Customer Success Managers.
• Own the strategy and execution of Actian's learning and enablement ecosystem.
• Lead the strategy for building and nurturing a vibrant customer community.
• 10+ years of leadership experience in customer-support roles within the software industry (B2B enterprise software and SaaS solutions in data management or analytics).
• Proven track record of building and scaling global, high-performing support and success teams.
• Specific expertise in managing customer success for cloud-based offerings and global support operations.
• Proven executive presence and excellent communication abilities.
• Capacity to lead, inspire, develop and manage a diverse global team.
• Strong understanding of recurring revenue business models, financial forecasting, and linking customer success and education initiatives to financial performance.
• Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field.

Good to Have

• Experience managing technical documentation, content creation, education departments, or online customer communities.
• Familiarity with data management practices, cloud computing concepts, and AI and ML.
• MBA or related Master's degree.

Senior Vice President of Global Support and Customer Success

Our Vision is to be the Most Trusted, Flexible and Easy to Use Hybrid Cloud Data Platform. Actian is transforming industries by empowering companies to accelerate application modernization and simplify the Cloud journey. Our customers use the Actian Data Platform to unify their siloed data, explore and securely exchange data to run a variety of analytic workloads that provide real time business insights at a fraction of the cost. We have 24 of the Fortune 100 companies using Actian technology in some of the most mission critical applications that impact your daily life.

Actian is seeking a dynamic and strategic Senior Vice President (SVP) of Support and Customer Success to lead our global support and customer experience initiatives. This pivotal executive role is responsible for defining and executing a world-class strategy that maximizes customer retention, loyalty, and lifetime value across our portfolio of AI enabled data management, governance, integration, and analytics products. The SVP will integrate both proactive customer success methodologies and reactive support operations leading a global team of over 100 people. In additional to executing the strategy for customer support and optimized customer experience you will be responsible for the customer community and the learning management system.

Key Responsibilities:

• Strategic Leadership: Develop and execute a comprehensive global customer success and support strategy that aligns with Actian's business objectives and drives revenue growth through high retention rates and expansion opportunities.
• Operational Excellence: Oversee global customer support operations, professional services, and customer success teams, implementing scalable processes and best practices for customer onboarding, training, technical assistance, and issue resolution.
• Customer Advocacy: Champion the voice of the customer within the executive leadership team, collaborating closely with product development, engineering, and sales to ensure product enhancements and go-to-market strategies meet customer needs.
• Performance Metrics: Define, track, and manage key performance indicators (KPIs) such as customer satisfaction (CSAT), net revenue retention (NRR), and churn, using data-driven insights to optimize service delivery and customer engagement with a high customer net promoter score (cNPS).
• Team Building: Recruit, mentor, and inspire a high-performing, customer-centric team of leaders and professionals, fostering a culture of innovation and collaboration.
• Executive Relationships: Build and maintain strong relationships with C-suite executives at key customer accounts, acting as an escalation point and ensuring long-term partnerships.
• Global Support Team Management: Lead the global technical support organization, ensuring rapid, efficient, and high-quality resolution of customer issues. This includes:
• Service Delivery: Ensure adherence to Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and deliver exceptional customer support experiences across all product lines (on-premise and cloud).
• Escalation Management: Oversee the escalation process, coordinating with engineering and product teams to resolve complex technical challenges swiftly.
• Operational Efficiency: Implement processes and technologies (e.g., AI/ML-driven support tools) to enhance support efficiency and effectiveness globally.
• Follow-the-Sun Model: Optimize global coverage to provide 24/7 support capabilities leveraging teams in different regions.
• Global Customer Success Management: Develop a world-class global team of Customer Success Managers responsible for driving adoption, ensuring value realization, and managing relationships across all our cloud offerings. This includes proactive engagement, retention/expansion initiatives, and building a globally scalable function.
• Technical Content & Education Systems: Own the strategy and execution of Actian's learning and enablement ecosystem, including content creation and curation (documentation, KBs, videos), and management of LMS/knowledge platforms.
• Customer Community Management: Lead the strategy for building and nurturing a vibrant and valuable customer community, driving engagement, fostering peer-to-peer support, and integrating community feedback into business decisions.

Qualifications and Experience:

• Experience: 10+ years of leadership experience in customer-support roles (Customer Success, Global Support, Services) within the software industry, ideally B2B enterprise software and SaaS solutions in data management or analytics. Proven track record of building and scaling global, high-performing support and success teams, with specific expertise in managing customer success for cloud-based offerings and global support operations. Experience managing technical documentation, content creation, education departments, or online customer communities is highly advantageous but not required.
• Leadership: Proven executive presence, excellent communication abilities, and the capacity to lead, inspire, develop and manage a diverse global team.
• Business Acumen: Strong understanding of recurring revenue business models, financial forecasting, and the ability to link customer success and education initiatives to financial performance.
• Technical Proficiency: Familiarity with data management practices, cloud computing concepts, and AI and ML is highly beneficial.
• Education: Bachelor’s degree in a relevant field; MBA or related Master's degree preferred.

We may use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to support parts of the hiring process, such as reviewing applications, analyzing resumes, or assessing responses. These tools assist our recruitment team but do not replace human judgment. Final hiring decisions are ultimately made by humans. If you would like more information about how your data is processed, please contact us.