This blog is part of a series of posts exploring the different companies that have looked for or are currently looking for CS talent. Learn more about your potential employers, see if their values align with yours and whether you can see yourself working there. Going to talk about one of the bigger players in the market this week: IBM.
IBM – Building your AI capabilities in the Cloud
IBM is one of the largest all-encompassing IT firms in the world. When you ask anyone to name big IT companies, along with the likes of Oracle, SAP and Salesforce, IBM usually gets a mention.
While they originated out of New York, the United States of America, they are now based all over the world. As of last year, they hired over a quarter of a million people. If having access to the resources of one of the largest IT organizations in the world appeals to you, this blog is for you.
Like all big large IT conglomerates, it’s difficult to define just exactly what IBM does. Visiting their Australian website, you see that right now, the focus is on security online. There have been a number of security breaches, so to show that they are on top of what businesses and their customers are concerned about right now, that’s their focus.
The Software Itself
There’s a whole suite of software on offer at IBM. Instead of naming them all, here are screengrabs of the main categories they offer:
Phew! What a list! While not all of these would have Customer Success Managers per se, many would. Some might be looking for roles that are still customer-facing and involve the deployment more of a service, but if you have experience managing customer expectations, you can potentially also perform excellently in these roles too.
Job Description Example
Here’s a screenshot on LinkedIn for a Customer Success Manager role at IBM in Melbourne, Australia. A lot of it will be applicable no matter where you are in the world.
Let’s go through each of the dot points under Required Technical and Professional Expertise:
- This is pretty technical, to be fair. OpenShift is a cloud-based Kubernetes platform that helps developers build applications. If it’s your first foray into CS and you don’t have a background in this, might be good to skip this one. If you do have a background in this and are perhaps exploring a more customer-facing path, read on!
- If you’re a vendor who’s worked with IBM before, you will satisfy this requirement.
- Again, less likely you’ll have this coming from a side path, but if you’re been in the industry and are looking to side step into a Go To Market role like CS, this is right up your alley.
- Showing customers how to use offerings is the main reason for customer success managers.
- Growth or Success Plans are a key deliverable for CSMs. If you can write out a step-by-step guide to help people improve on how they use software, you’ll know how to do this.
- Yep having an analytical mindset helps here.
- Don’t be too stumped by these acronyms. Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) and the others just mean software in the cloud.
- This one is just about relationship building, which comes as second nature to you.
- And of course, you’re a good multitasker, aren’t you?
What They Offer
While they aren’t as explicit about their perks, assuming you’re a top performer, you’ll have the ability to have a long and fulfilling career, exploring different business units and career paths all within one organization. Things like paid health care and study stipends are also the norm here.
IBM might not be for everyone, but if you’re already in the IT space and want to step it up a notch, using your technical skills and people skills, a CSM role could be perfect for you.