Customer Success Engine: A 6-Month Program for Entrepreneurs

1. Program Introduction & Benefits

This is an applied, action-oriented program designed to equip entrepreneurs and startup teams with the systems, frameworks, and discipline to architect a customer success function that drives retention to 85% or higher. Grounded in the 70-20-10 learning model, it combines customer success design, data-driven experimentation, and behavior change frameworks into a structured, milestone-driven journey. Participants will move from theory to a live, operational customer success system within their own businesses.

Strategic Benefits for Entrepreneurs & Startups:

• Increased Runway & Valuation: Systematically improving customer retention directly boosts Lifetime Value (LTV), reduces the cost of growth, and enhances company valuation metrics like Net Revenue Retention (NRR).
• Build with Confidence: Shift from guessing to knowing by establishing a clear, metric-driven feedback loop between customer outcomes and product/process decisions.
• Operationalize Customer-Centricity: Transform ad-hoc support into a repeatable, scalable engine for onboarding, adoption, and expansion, freeing founder time for strategic work.
• De-Risk Growth: Identify and address churn drivers early, ensuring that scaling efforts are built on a foundation of loyal, successful customers.
• Create a Competitive Moat: A superior customer success system becomes a defensible advantage, leading to higher referrals, lower acquisition costs, and stronger market fit.

2. Program Expansion Strategy

Evaluation: The core program is a structured business development curriculum focused on building systems and processes. While it includes peer interaction and expert-led workshops, its primary goal is a tangible business outcome (85% retention), not primarily personal or leadership development.

Recommended Supplemental Mentorship Layer: Adding a structured mentorship component would significantly improve outcomes by providing personalized guidance through the complex application of frameworks to unique startup contexts. Mentors (experienced founders, CS leaders, or growth experts) can help participants navigate specific obstacles, validate experiment designs, and maintain accountability.

• Value Added: Mentors accelerate learning by providing real-world perspective, helping avoid common pitfalls, and offering strategic advice on prioritizing initiatives with limited resources. This addresses the core challenges of limited time and poor measurement discipline directly.
• Implementation Note: Integrate a bi-weekly, one-on-one mentorship session using the GROW model (Goal, Reality, Options, Will). Pair mentors with participants based on industry, business model, or stage. Utilize mentorship software to schedule sessions, track discussion topics, and document action commitments that feed directly into the program's milestones.

3. Implementation Roadmap

Launch Phase (Pre-Program & Week 1)

1. Participant Onboarding & Diagnostics:
   • Conduct pre-program surveys to capture baseline retention metrics, current CS practices, and founder confidence levels.
   • Host a kickoff webinar to align on goals, introduce core frameworks (Lean Startup, JTBD, ADKAR), and set expectations for the 70-20-10 model.
   • Onboard participants to the primary collaboration and Learning Management System (LMS).
2. Tool Setup: Ensure all participants have access to basic analytics and communication tools (or provide templates).
3. Mentor Matching: Finalize mentor-mentee pairs and schedule first sessions.

Tracking & Operations (Ongoing Program Management)

• Weekly Cadence:
  • Content Delivery (10%): Release core video lessons, readings, and templates via the LMS corresponding to the current Pillar.
  • Social Learning (20%): Facilitate weekly peer group "Sprint Reviews" where participants present experiment progress and data. Host office hours with program facilitators.
  • Applied Work (70%): Participants execute on weekly action items (e.g., customer interviews, dashboard setup, experiment launches). Progress is tracked through milestone submissions.
• Monthly Cadence: Formal milestone review gates. Participants submit deliverables (e.g., Journey Map, Experiment Results, Playbook draft) for facilitator feedback and peer review.

Success Measurement

• Participant Business KPIs:
  • Primary: Increase in the defined cohort retention rate toward ≥85%.
  • Leading Indicators: Improvement in Activation Rate, reduction in Time to First Value, increase in Customer Health Score.
  • System Adoption: Implementation of a live CS Playbook and regular (e.g., weekly) internal CS review rituals.
• Program KPIs:
  • Completion Rate: % of participants reaching Milestone 5.
  • Metric Uplift: % of participants demonstrating a ≥10-point increase in their primary retention metric.
  • Satisfaction & Confidence: Post-program survey measuring Net Promoter Score (NPS) for the program and self-reported increase in founder capability.
• Feedback Mechanisms: End-of-pillar surveys, mentor feedback summaries, and analysis of participant-submitted milestone quality.

4. Approved Tools List

• LMS (Learning Management System): CRITICAL. This is the core delivery platform for the 10% formal content. It will host all video lessons, templates, reading materials, and serve as the submission portal for milestone deliverables. It provides structure and asynchronous access to the curriculum.
• Internal Social Network: HIGHLY RELEVANT. This facilitates the 20% social learning component. It will be used for peer discussion forums, Q&A with experts, sharing of resources, and forming accountability groups. It builds community and enables knowledge sharing beyond scheduled sessions.
• Mentorship Software: RECOMMENDED (for the supplemental layer). If implementing the mentorship expansion, this tool is essential for scheduling sessions, providing conversation guides (like GROW model templates), tracking mentor-mentee meeting notes, and measuring engagement in the mentorship component.

Justification: The program's 70-20-10 model demands a blend of structured content delivery (LMS) and community interaction (Internal Social Network). The Mentorship Software directly enables the recommended supplemental strategy to provide personalized guidance. Tools like Personality Tests or Onboarding Platforms are less relevant to the core goal of building a CS system, though an Onboarding Platform could be a result of the program for participants.

5. Resource & Content Library

General Program Content

• Video Lessons: "Retention Economics for Startups," "Defining Jobs To Be Done for Your ICP," "Building a Simple Cohort Dashboard in Sheets/Excel," "Designing Your First Lean Retention Experiment," "Mapping the Customer Journey: A Workshop."
• Templates & Guides: ICP Profile Canvas, JTBD Interview Script, Customer Journey Map (Miro/FigJam template), Lean Experiment Canvas, CS Playbook Outline, Simple Health Score Calculator.
• Readings & Case Studies: Curated articles on Net Revenue Retention, time-to-first-value benchmarks, and case studies of early-stage startups that scaled through customer success.

Supplemental Mentoring Content Table

To support mentors in guiding participants toward the hard business goal of 85% retention, the following soft-skill content is recommended.

Mentoring Topic	Description	Relevance to Program Goal
Active Listening for Customer Insights	Techniques to hear beyond the surface in customer interviews and feedback sessions.	Enables founders to accurately diagnose true churn reasons and identify unmet jobs, leading to better experiment design.
Giving Data-Driven Feedback	Framing discussions around metrics and hypotheses rather than opinions.	Helps mentors guide participants through experiment analysis and playbook refinement without prescribing solutions.
Asking Powerful (GROW Model) Questions	Question frameworks to unlock participants' own problem-solving.	Empowers founders to navigate obstacles independently, building lasting capability beyond the program.
Accountability & Commitment Setting	Methods for establishing clear action plans and follow-up.	Directly ties mentorship conversations to the program's action-oriented 70% and ensures progress toward milestones.
Change Management for Small Teams	Applying ADKAR principles to help founders lead internal adoption of new CS rituals.	Addresses the behavioral change needed to make the new CS system stick within the participant's startup.