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Welcome to
After the Close
the Blog
Thoughtful insights and honest perspectives on Customer Success and leadership, focused on the work that happens after the deal is done.
After the Close is a space for reflection, insight, and the conversations that don’t always happen in the meeting or the deck. This blog is here to share real stories, practical lessons, and honest perspectives on Customer Success and leadership.
Whether you’re a CSM, a CS leader, or an executive, you’ll find insight on what happens after the deal is signed. From navigating adoption and retention to leading teams and driving impact, the goal is simple: help you think more clearly, act more intentionally, and build work that lasts.
Article
Stop Counting Meetings. Start Measuring Impact.
How to actually track whether your EBRs and QBRs are working One of the things I hate most about EBRs and QBRs is how they’re tracked. I see teams all the time mark a completed meeting as a success. Maybe they go a step further and track who attended, but it usually stops there. A meeting happened. A box gets checked. Everyone moves on. But let’s be honest. A meeting is not an outcome. Recently I was on a call with my friend Berit Hoffmann, CEO and Co-Founder at Korl. If you’
Kristi Faltorusso
4 days ago3 min read
Accept Feedback with Grace (Easier Said Than Done)
“Accept feedback with grace.” This was one of the best pieces of advice I’d ever been given. Also, one of the hardest for me to follow. I’m a Words of Affirmation girlie. I like knowing I’m doing a good job. I like hearing that things are working. So early in my career, feedback didn’t feel like guidance. It felt like a report card. If someone had feedback, my brain immediately translated that into: you’re not doing enough or your work isn’t great. It felt like failing a test
Kristi Faltorusso
Feb 83 min read
REPOST: More Than Capital: How Stage 2 LPs Help Portfolio Companies Win
Most founders know they need capital. Fewer realize how valuable the right investors can be once the check clears. This piece from Stage 2 Capital explores what it looks like when limited partners do more than fund companies. They actively help them win. The article breaks down how Stage 2’s network of experienced go-to-market leaders supports portfolio companies through real execution support, not just advice. Their LP community gets involved in everything from strategy and
Kristi Faltorusso
Feb 41 min read
How I Learned to Prioritize Risk (Without Treating Everything Like an Emergency)
Prioritizing risk took me a long time to figure out. Early in my career, I treated every issue like it was urgent. Every problem felt like the problem. I wanted to fix everything, immediately. On the surface, that sounds noble. Responsible, even. In reality, it was exhausting and ineffective. Not everything can be a priority. And when everything is a priority, nothing actually is. What finally changed things for me was getting far more disciplined about business impact. Inste
Kristi Faltorusso
Feb 22 min read
The Quiet Damage of Being Wrongly Accused at Work
“Hi Mary, resending the email I sent last Tuesday at 2:37pm EST in case you missed it.” There are very few moments at work that feel as satisfying as being able to send that message. It’s a small sentence, but it carries a lot of weight. Proof. Receipts. Vindication. And yet, the reason you need to send it in the first place usually feels awful. Being accused of something you didn’t do is one of those experiences that sticks with you. It’s frustrating, demoralizing, and surpr
Kristi Faltorusso
Feb 12 min read
Leadership Blind Spots in the Age of AI
The teams struggling most with AI don’t have a tooling problem.They have a leadership one. Many organizations adopted AI expecting faster execution, sharper thinking, and better outcomes. And on the surface, it looks like that’s exactly what’s happening. Decks are more polished. Emails are clearer. Processes feel tighter. Even task lists look more strategic. Objectively, the work looks better. But when you step back and look at the actual value being created for the business
Kristi Faltorusso
Jan 282 min read
If You Want to Grow Customers, Sales Has to Stop Giving Everything Away
If you want to grow your customers, tell your sales team to stop giving everything away. That sentence usually makes people uncomfortable. Especially when growth targets are aggressive and deals feel hard-won. But it’s a conversation that needs to happen and it usually lands squarely on Customer Success to clean up the mess when it doesn’t. Where Customer Growth Quietly Breaks Down I talk to Customer Success leaders all the time who are being tasked with growing their custome
Kristi Faltorusso
Jan 192 min read
Learning to Trust Your Own Timeline
I spent most of my career measuring my journey against everyone else’s. Their timelines. Their promotions. Their successes. Their failures. Even though I knew the phrase “comparison is the thief of joy,” I still compared. Constantly. It took me years to stop. Years of reminding myself that no two journeys are the same. No two people are the same. No two organizational conditions are the same. And that even when you want something badly, sometimes painfully badly, there are fa
Kristi Faltorusso
Jan 192 min read
There Is Such a Thing as Good Churn (And No, That’s Not as Horrible as It Sounds)
It will always sound wrong when I say it out loud, but there is such a thing as good churn. And no, this isn’t me saying that when a customer churns, it’s time to pop champagne or throw a party. Loss is still loss. But there comes a very specific moment in a company’s journey when leadership has to take a hard look at who their Ideal Customer Profile actually is… and whether the customers they currently have still align with it. That moment is uncomfortable. Necessary. And of
Kristi Faltorusso
Jan 193 min read
The future of CX Is contextual: AI is the new standard
Every year tons of brands rush to release their industry trend reports, and while I save most and read some, I do so with a mix of excitement and skepticism. Let’s face it, some feel completely out of touch. I literally sit there wondering who fills out these surveys. And then there are some who feel aspirational. Like yes, in some alternate universe with unlimited budget and resources that could possibly be a reality. And then there are the few that hit so painfully close to
Kristi Faltorusso
Dec 9, 20255 min read
Stop Asking More Questions. Start Asking Better Ones.
I was recently scrolling through LinkedIn and came across a post encouraging CSMs to ask more questions. At first, I barely paused. It felt harmless enough. But the more I sat with it, the more it bothered me. Do we actually need more questions? Or do we need better questions? Because if we just pile on more basic, surface level questions, we are not doing real discovery. We are filling the air with noise and still walking away without the insight we need to drive impact. Qua
Kristi Faltorusso
Dec 8, 20253 min read
The Coaching Mistake That Almost Broke Me and the Framework That Saved Me
Coaching is one of the hardest parts of leadership and I learned that the hard way. When I first moved from being an individual contributor to a leader, I thought coaching meant carrying my team. I believed my job was to have every answer, jump in at every sign of trouble, solve every problem, and of course, do it all faster and better. At least that was the story I was telling myself. In reality, all I did was exhaust myself and unintentionally signal to my team that I did n
Kristi Faltorusso
Dec 6, 20253 min read
The Hidden Risk in Customer Success That No One Is Talking About: Feature Ideas
Every Customer Success leader wants to talk about churn, forecasting, onboarding, product adoption… but there’s a quiet little monster living in the background that most teams aren’t paying enough attention to: Feature ideas. Not the ideas themselves, those are gold. The way we manage them, that’s the problem. Most companies have figured out how to collect requests: forms, spreadsheets, portals, Slack messages, emails with subject lines like “Quick thought”… even the occasion
Kristi Faltorusso
Nov 20, 20253 min read
When a CSM Resigns: How Resilient Is Your Operating Model, Really?
There is a moment every Customer Success leader knows well. A moment that feels like your stomach drops through the floor. A CSM resigns. And the first thought that hits you is the one none of us says out loud: How the hell am I going to redistribute these accounts? Because let’s be honest with ourselves. Your team is already at capacity. You are already at capacity. And while you are trying to stay composed and strategic, everyone on your team is quietly thinking the exact s
Kristi Faltorusso
Nov 19, 20253 min read
The Empowerment Gap: Why CSMs Don’t Feel Empowered (Even When Leaders Think They Are)
I’ve coached hundreds of Customer Success Managers over the years. Different companies, different products, different regions, different markets. Yet the same pattern appears over and over again. CSMs do not feel empowered. They are not empowered to say no. They are not empowered to drive change. They are not empowered to raise red flags. They are not empowered to make tough decisions. They are not empowered to prioritize for their customers. They are not empowered to deviate
Kristi Faltorusso
Nov 14, 20253 min read
The Customers You Swear Have “No Growth Potential” Might Actually Surprise You
Here is a hard truth we do not talk about enough in Customer Success. Some of the customers we write off the fastest are the ones sitting on the biggest opportunities. I know. I know. It feels easier to focus on the shiny, well-funded, “textbook” expansion accounts. They show up to calls. They read your emails. They know what they want. But not every customer is that obvious. And honestly, thank goodness, because the obvious ones are only half the fun. The real magic lives in
Kristi Faltorusso
Nov 12, 20253 min read
Customer Success Isn’t Just Growing, It’s Defining Market Value
I love when data validates what many of us in Customer Success have been saying for years: customer-led growth is the engine of modern business performance. The latest Public Market Pulse Report from Certinia analyzed more than 4,000 public company earnings reports and the findings are a massive win for Customer Success. The data shows a clear pattern: companies that talk about Customer Success are creating more value, and the market is rewarding them for it. Let’s unpack wha
Kristi Faltorusso
Oct 28, 20252 min read
Six Years Strong: Celebrating a Journey of Influence in Customer Success
When I saw the 2025 SuccessCoaching Top 25 Customer Success Influencers list drop, I had to take a second to breathe it in ... six years in a row. Six. Years. That’s wild. And honestly, it’s not something I ever expected when I started sharing my thoughts on Customer Success all those years ago. I didn’t set out to be an “influencer.” I set out to make an impact, to share what I was learning, to help others avoid some of the same mistakes I made, and to build a community wher
Kristi Faltorusso
Oct 16, 20252 min read
Where Does All the Time Go? A Candid Look at How CSMs Really Spend Their Day
Every week, I hear Customer Success leaders making the same case: “We need more headcount.” And sometimes, they’re absolutely right. The demands on Customer Success teams are higher than ever, more customers, more complexity, more responsibilities that bleed into Sales, Product, and Support. But before we make the case for more people, we have to ask an uncomfortable question: 👉 Do you actually know where your team’s time is going today? Most leaders don’t. They can tell you
Kristi Faltorusso
Oct 15, 20253 min read
Why Context Is the Missing Ingredient in Managing Product Ideas
One of the hardest parts of my job as a Customer Success leader is managing product ideas that come from customers. Every week, my team reviews dozens of requests, everything from new integrations to workflow enhancements to “nice-to-have” features that customers swear will change their lives. And while it’s incredible to have customers so engaged in shaping the product, managing these ideas strategically is one of the most complex parts of the job. Because every product requ
Kristi Faltorusso
Oct 14, 20253 min read
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