A day in the life as a Customer Experience Lead
Meet Rebecca Acree, Customer Experience Lead at Slab. After studying Political Science at Williams College, Rebecca spent several years working as a supervising paralegal before transitioning into tech.
What are the core requirements of your job?
My ultimate responsibility is to ensure that customers have a great experience, both when using the product and when engaging with the company. Internally, I’m the expert on our customers, and externally, I’m the expert on our product. That means I need to be able to:
● know the product inside and out
● understand the needs of all different types of customers
● build strong, lasting personal relationships with customers
● educate customers on best practices, strategies, and use cases
● anticipate customer needs and solve problems as proactively as possible
● advocate internally for customers in product decision-making
What characteristics and skills do you think make someone successful in your job?
● Communication — mastery of all types of communication, from video onboarding a new customer, to troubleshooting a bug over email, to writing up “how-to” product documentation
● Empathetic listening — being able to learn from customers, understand where they’re coming from, and make sure they know they’re being heard
● Solutions-oriented — anticipating and fixing problems, suggesting proactive solutions, and designing and teaching effective workflow strategies
● Technical mindset — picking up new technologies quickly, understanding how they work, and distilling them for a non-technical audience
Before Work
What’s your morning routine and how does it look different because of quarantine?
I’m usually up around the same time as pre-quarantine, but since all I have to do to get to the “office” is go downstairs, I have a lot more free time in the morning. Now, the first thing I do is a 50-minute yoga flow — my favorite studio is offering livestream classes, which has made my quarantine mornings really wonderful! Then I walk my dog, make some black tea with steamed milk, and catch up on my daily newsletters before logging into work.
What media do you consume before getting started on work?
My daily constants are the Axios Pro Rata newsletter for financial news and the Elpha morning digest for updates from the women in tech community. A few times a week, I also check out the Robinhood Snacks newsletter for market updates and the Ellevest newsletter for financial guidance tailored specifically for women.
In the mornings
What’s the first thing you work on when you get into the office?
I check Slack for urgent updates before I head downstairs to officially start my workday. Once I’m settled in, I check my email inbox, followed by our customer support inbox.
How do you structure your to-do list for the day and manage time efficiently?
My company’s product is an internal wiki, designed for sharing knowledge amongst teams — but I also love using it as my personal notebook! I keep detailed to-do lists in Slab and use those to manage every step of my day. Since my work involves a lot of context-switching between different responsibilities, I’m also very reliant on my calendar for time-blocking tasks.
Lunch time!
What’s the most common way you interact with customers?
I primarily engage with customers through our customer support software (we use Intercom), but occasionally over email, phone, or video as well. More rarely, I’ll jump in on a Twitter thread to answer a question or troubleshoot an issue.
What do you typically do during your lunch break? Are you a #desksalad person or do you take a break?
Lately, it’s been #desksalad! Before the pandemic, I really valued my lunches as a way to decompress, stretch my legs, and look at something other than a screen. But since I’ve been fully remote and am finding other ways to take breaks, I just eat at my desk and stay in the zone!
In the afternoons
What do you do to stay focused throughout the day?
Since I’m often bouncing between very different types of tasks, I sometimes find it difficult to stay in the flow and resist distractions. Lately, I’ve been relying on my Apple Watch to remind me to stand up every now and then. I’ve also been experimenting with 5-minute breaks on the hour for a quick stretch or walk around the house. I’m able to focus much more easily once I sit back down again!
What’s something you have to do for your job that might surprise people?
My new role has given me the opportunity to dive more deeply into user education, which has been really interesting. I’ve been doing a lot of research and learning on the best ways to teach customers about a product, and am really enjoying picking up some new skills, like video editing and production.
Winding down
How do you get to know your coworkers/teammates on a personal level?
I had started my current role about a week before my company went fully-remote, so it’s been a bit of a challenge to get to know my new teammates! Luckily, my company already had remote members, so there were some existing strategies for team-building. I’ve had a great time using things like a dedicated channel in Slack for random non-work thoughts, and Jackbox game sessions over Zoom.
While in quarantine, how do you switch off from “work mode”?
Lately, I’m ending most of my weekdays with a workout — it’s been really effective for turning off my “work brain” and releasing stress. I’ve been virtually trying out studios all over the country, and am loving Uforia in SF and Kamps in Miami for HIIT classes that are just as hard over livestream as in person!
Hone Club is offering a volunteer-based program to help people who’ve lost their jobs in the Services Industry due to COVID-19 fix their resumes and give them overall advice on transitioning into Tech. If you know anyone who might benefit or who could help as a volunteer, they can sign up here: https://www.thehoneclub.com/join
