Uncovering your professional strengths
Let's dig into what makes you uniquely effective as a CSM. This isn't about listing every skill you have. More so, it's about recognizing your distinct approach and natural talents.
Value creation
What unique approaches have you developed?
Think about how you get results differently than other CSMs. What do colleagues ask you to share or teach them?
Maybe you've created your own way of running business reviews.
A special method for driving adoption.
Your approach to relationship-building.
How you spot expansion opportunities.
What did your previous managers highlight as your unique value to customers and/or your teams?
Think back to performance reviews and feedback conversations.
Consider what managers consistently praised or relied on you for.
Reflect on times they chose you for specific challenges or opportunities.
Remember situations where they showcased your work to others.
Which customer challenges do you most enjoy solving?
Look for patterns in your best work:
Are you the go-to person for technical implementations?
Do people seek you out for strategic planning?
Are you known for handling difficult conversations?
Do you excel at getting buy-in from stakeholders?
The challenges you naturally gravitate toward often reveal your strengths.
Where have you had the most significant impact?
Consider your track record:
Types of accounts where you consistently succeed.
Problems you solve faster than others.
Situations where you often exceed expectations.
Results that come naturally to you.
Successfully managing and resolving critical escalations.
Building strong connections with specific levels/types of stakeholders.
Specific situations where you've earned and leveraged trusted advisor status.
This isn't about bragging - it's about recognizing your genuine areas of excellence.
Professional energy
Which parts of your role consistently engage you?
Notice when you lose track of time because you're so absorbed:
Is it during strategic planning sessions?
When analyzing customer data?
While building relationships?
During cross-functional projects?
Identifying and qualifying expansion opportunities?
Creating and executing detailed account plans?
These moments of flow are clues to your natural strengths.
What types of customer interactions bring out your best?
Consider when you feel most confident and effective:
Executive presentations?
Technical deep dives?
Training sessions?
Crisis management?
Think about the feedback you get after these interactions - what do people consistently praise? Why do you excel in these areas?
When do you feel most confident and competent?
Identify situations where you know you'll excel:
Certain types of customer conversations
Specific challenges you love tackling
Projects where you always add value
Moments where your expertise shines
Presenting to senior executives
Demonstrating new functionality to solve customer challenge
Building your success stories
Choose 2-3 examples that showcase your unique strengths. For each one, complete the following exercise:
What was the situation?
Why was it difficult?
What made it important?
Your Approach:
What did you do differently?
Why did you choose that approach?
What unique insight did you bring?
The Impact:
What were the measurable results?
How did it affect the customer?
What longer-term benefits emerged?
Key Takeaway:
What does this story reveal about your strengths?
How has it influenced your approach?
What did you learn?
What made your solution effective?
Turning insights into action
Review your responses and look for:
Recurring themes in your successes.
The types of problems you solve best.
Situations where you consistently excel.
Your distinctive approaches or methods.
Use these insights to:
Focus your job search on roles that leverage these strengths.
Talk about your capabilities in interviews with real-life examples of when you crushed it.
Choose opportunities that play to your advantages.
Build on your natural talents.
Remember: Your strengths are more than just skills - they're the unique combination of your experience, approach, and natural abilities that make you effective in your own way.
Professional strengths FAQs
Q: I don't feel like I have any unique approaches. Aren't I just doing my job like everyone else?
A: This is a common feeling, but your unique value often lies in the details of how you work.
Here are specific ways to uncover your distinct approaches:
Look at your calendar from the last month. Find meetings that went particularly well. What exactly did you do in those meetings that others might do differently? Maybe you always start by asking about business goals instead of diving into metrics, or you have a specific way of preparing customers for QBRs.
Review your most successful customer accounts. What specific actions did you take with these customers? You might discover you naturally create more detailed implementation plans than your colleagues, or you follow up more frequently during critical phases.
Think about the templates or documents you've created. Which ones do teammates frequently ask to borrow or use? Even simple things like your email templates or project timelines might be more effective than standard approaches.
Ask a trusted colleague or manager what they notice about your work style. Often others can spot our unique approaches more easily than we can. They might point out that you're particularly good at spotting early warning signs of customer issues, or that you have a knack for explaining technical concepts clearly.
Notice your instinctive reactions to customer challenges. When a customer is struggling with adoption, what's your first response? Your natural problem-solving approach might be distinctive, even if it feels obvious to you.
Q: With so many CSMs looking for work, how do I identify and articulate what makes me distinctive?
A: The key is to find specific patterns in your work that showcase your unique approach and consistent value creation.
Look through your successful projects for your signature moves:
Special techniques you developed for onboarding
Unique ways you structure customer meetings
Specific methods for preventing churn
Original approaches to scaling customer success
Identify the tough situations where you succeeded when others struggled. Maybe you're particularly good at turning around unhappy customers, or you have a knack for getting buy-in from resistant stakeholders. These challenging scenarios often reveal your distinctive strengths.
Study your performance reviews and customer feedback. What specific phrases keep coming up? What impact do people consistently mention? These patterns point to your unique value proposition.
Think about the gaps you naturally filled in your last role. Did you create processes others now use? Build bridges between teams? Spot opportunities others missed? These contributions often set you apart.
Q: When I think about my successes, they all feel routine or lucky. How do I identify what I actually did well?
A: Success isn't about luck. It's about recognizing patterns in how you achieve results, even in seemingly routine situations.
Break down a "routine" success into small steps. What information did you gather before taking action? Who did you involve and why? Which steps did you prioritize first? What potential issues did you plan for? This detailed analysis often reveals careful decisions you made that seemed automatic at the time.
Listen for patterns in customer feedback:
What specific phrases do they use to thank you?
Which aspects of your support do they mention to your manager?
What do they say when referring you to colleagues?
How do they describe your impact on their business?
Compare your approach to standard processes. Where do you add extra steps? Which parts do you handle differently? When do you spend more time than required? The places where you naturally deviate from standard procedures often highlight your unique strengths.
Look for repeated elements in your successes. Think about common strategies you use, similar ways you structure solutions, or consistent communication approaches. These patterns aren't coincidence - they're evidence of your effective methods.
Focus on what you do naturally. The actions that feel so obvious you assume everyone does them often turn out to be your unique strengths.
Q: My work varies so much day to day. How can I find consistent patterns in what I do well?
A: While each day brings different challenges, your approach to handling them often follows consistent patterns that reveal your strengths.
Start with your calendar. Look through the last month of meetings and note which ones you felt really good about afterward. Don't focus on the topic - instead, look at how you handled each situation. Was it the way you structured the discussion? How you prepared? The questions you asked?
Pay attention to when others seek your help:
What types of situations do they bring to you first?
Which problems do they trust you to solve?
What advice do they frequently ask for?
Where do they use your work as an example?
Think about projects you've voluntarily taken on. Not just the official assignments, but the improvements you've initiated or the processes you've refined without being asked. These self-chosen tasks often point to areas where you see opportunities others miss.
Watch for moments when work doesn't feel like work. Those times when you're deeply engaged in solving a problem or helping a customer, and you're so focused you forget to check the time. The tasks that energize rather than drain you are often connected to your core strengths.
Notice your instinctive responses. When a crisis hits or a customer needs urgent help, what's your first reaction? These automatic responses often reveal your natural problem-solving style and strengths.
Q: I can spot my technical strengths easily, but how do I identify those harder-to-measure soft skills that make a difference?
A: Soft skills often create the most value but can be the hardest to recognize in ourselves. Here's how to uncover them.
Look for the emotional outcomes of your work. When tensions decrease after you join a project, or when customers seem more confident after your meetings, those are signs of valuable soft skills at work. These impacts might not show in metrics but they shape the overall success of your relationships.
Think about conversation patterns. Do you naturally ask questions that get to the heart of issues? Maybe you have a way of explaining complex ideas that makes others feel comfortable asking questions. Or perhaps you instinctively know when to push for more information and when to wait.
Consider how you navigate challenging situations:
Which types of difficult conversations do people ask you to handle?
When do teammates ask you to review their communications?
What sensitive situations have you helped resolve?
How do you typically turn negative discussions into constructive ones?
Pay attention to the unsolicited feedback you receive. When customers or colleagues say things like "I always feel better after talking with you" or "You helped me see this differently," they point to valuable interpersonal skills that you might take for granted.
Watch for the invisible problems you prevent. Suppose your projects tend to have fewer miscommunications. In that case, if your customers rarely escalate issues or if your team meetings run smoothly, you're likely using critical soft skills that others might struggle with.
Q: I've identified my strengths, but my current role doesn't seem to use them much. What now?
A: Understanding your strengths is just the first step. The real value comes from finding ways to apply them, even if your role isn't perfectly aligned.
Start by looking for small opportunities to use your strengths. If you excel at process improvement, document your own best practices. If you're great at stakeholder management, offer to help colleagues with challenging customer situations. These "side opportunities" often grow into formal responsibilities.
Look for problems you could solve using your strengths:
Where could your natural abilities help the team work better?
Which recurring issues match your problem-solving style?
What initiatives could benefit from your specific skills?
Where could you volunteer your strengths as a resource?
Talk to your manager about what you've discovered. Instead of focusing on what's missing, present specific ways your strengths could add value. For example: "I've noticed I'm particularly effective at turning around struggling accounts. Could I take on more of these cases?"
Create opportunities to demonstrate these strengths. Volunteer for projects that align with them, share relevant insights in team meetings, or create resources that showcase your unique approaches.
Q: How do I know if I'm identifying actual strengths versus just things I enjoy?
A: There's a clear difference between activities we simply enjoy and true strengths that create value. Here's how to tell them apart.
Look for the results your work generates. Real strengths consistently produce positive outcomes: increased customer satisfaction, faster problem resolution, or better team collaboration. Enjoyable activities might feel good but don't necessarily create measurable impact.
Watch for external validation. True strengths get noticed:
Do colleagues frequently reference your work?
Are you the person others come to for specific challenges?
Do customers specifically request your involvement?
Has your approach been adopted by others?
Notice where you both enjoy the work and exceed expectations. Strengths usually combine natural talent with genuine interest. If you're just good at something but don't enjoy it, it's a skill. If you enjoy it but don't excel, it's an interest. Look for the intersection.
Consider the feedback loop. With true strengths, you'll often get specific feedback about the value you created, not just general appreciation. People can point to exactly how your approach helped them succeed.
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