Think globally | Viviana Bertinetto

[Dillon] (0:00 - 0:11)

What's up lifers and welcome to The Daily Standup with lifetime value where we're giving you fresh new customer success ideas every single day. I got my man JP here. JP, do you want to say hi?

[JP] (0:12 - 0:13)

Get done with my friends.

[Dillon] (0:15 - 0:18)

I got my man Rob here. Rob, do you want to say hi?

[Rob] (0:18 - 0:20)

Man, I can't even try. What's up lifers?

[Dillon] (0:22 - 0:26)

And we've got Viviana with us. Viviana, can you say hi please?

[JP] (0:26 - 0:27)

Hi.

[Dillon] (0:28 - 0:38)

Perfect. And I am your host. I don't even know what language that was.

To be honest with you. My name is Dillon Young. Viviana, thank you so much for being here.

Can you please introduce yourself?

[Viviana] (0:38 - 0:57)

Yes, absolutely. So my name is Viviana Bertinetto and I am the chief customer officer at Language.io. I have been in this role for about three and a half years, but with the company for seven years. And we are a series eight startup in the language technology space.

[Dillon] (0:58 - 1:03)

Very cool. Very cool. We don't have a ton of, have we had any CCOs before?

[Rob] (1:04 - 1:12)

No, particularly not at an early stage company. That's a unique title for an early stage. I like that the company's thinking about the customer experience that heavily at such an early stage.

[Viviana] (1:12 - 1:13)

Yeah, absolutely.

[Rob] (1:14 - 1:14)

That's cool.

[Dillon] (1:14 - 1:25)

Viviana, you know what we do here? We ask every single guest one simple question, and that is what is on your mind when it comes to customer success? And what is that for you?

[Viviana] (1:26 - 2:16)

Sure. Since I work in the language technology space, I thought I would talk about what it means to be in customer success in a very multicultural setting where a lot of your customers and team members as well internally may be from different countries and kind of what that means and what are some strategies that I've learned as an expat myself. I grew up in Italy.

I was born and raised there, lived there for over 25 years. So I have been in the States since 2010. And my experience during these 14 years, it has been mostly working in a multicultural setting.

And I think that is a little bit of a superpower these days, especially where the world is increasingly more global. And it's been very interesting to apply that to customer success.

[Dillon] (2:18 - 2:31)

So tell us where you want to start in terms of maybe why it's unique and then how to excel in that sort of environment. I mean, if that's what you wanted to bring to the table.

[Viviana] (2:31 - 3:45)

Yeah, absolutely. I think our company is headquartered in Wyoming in the United States, so it is a U.S.-based company. But again, being in the language technology space, what we do is we help our customers communicate with their own customers in any language, no matter the language combinations that may be involved.

So again, our mission is helping these companies go global. And we ourselves as a company are global. And I think what's been very interesting in my years in customer success, speaking with other executives and just in general people in the space in U.S.-based companies is that sometimes it can be a little bit of a challenge when the company goes global because then they do start dealing with customers that are in different countries. And of course, as part of your globalization strategy, you're going to have boots on the ground in that country and you're going to have customer success managers over there that can help you bridge that gap. But I still think that if you work at a global company, you do have to have that sensitivity and you do have to learn a little bit of the nuances of what it means to work with customers that may be based in different countries and may have, again, a different approach to business than American customers.

[Dillon] (3:47 - 4:01)

I have more questions, but I'm actually going to send it over to, well, I guess both of you are a little bit more learned about different cultures than me. But JP, you nailed the language to begin with. So why don't you start us off?

[JP] (4:02 - 4:09)

Yeah. Chintani, if my pronunciation is correct, is like a 100 years my friend. Oh, it's like a good...

[Rob] (4:09 - 4:14)

You're teaching the Italian Italian? Come on, man. No, he's telling me.

[JP] (4:17 - 4:35)

So first of all, I would say it's not language, but there was a company that was on my list. I'm not going to say it because I'm not trying to step on your company, but there was a company that I was looking at for a while that was actually in the similar space that you are. So now I'm like, I wonder if they're doing okay.

It sounds like y'all are doing great.

[Viviana] (4:35 - 4:37)

No, we're doing better, so just...

[JP] (4:37 - 6:27)

Yeah, clearly. So on a personal note, growing up, my mom was getting a PhD, so I was always exposed to people from all around the world and different languages. So I already had an appetite for that.

And I think the way that it served me in customer success is one of those things that, of course, we talk about day in and day out about customer success managers is a sense of curiosity, which I think is very important because curiosity can come across in different ways. I think that your curiosity is going to be limited by how open-minded you are. And there's literally a book I have, it's actually about different business cultures in the world, because some people, like in Germany, they may be a bit different with the way that things come across.

You may think that they're ice cold or something, but they just may not open up until maybe later in the interaction. You could be dealing with people who are from India, and maybe their culture is very different around the way that they do business. And so if you take everything at a face value, we can begin to misinterpret what's going on.

We're not really taking that extra step to understand where people are coming from. And so the language software, the translation is really the tip of the iceberg, because what we really need is context. We really need context to understand what we're truly trying to say.

Even in English, when we're communicating, we need a lot of context, which is why you don't want to just be texting and emailing. That can quickly get out of hand. But when we get on a call, we can have tone, we can have gesticulations, and we can have all those things that sort of inform, right?

That inform the way that we talk. Yeah, I love this topic. I love the software and languages.

So I'm going to pass it over to Bobby Ganesh. He's over in Jordan right now. Over in Jordan.

[Viviana] (6:27 - 6:32)

You're going to start gesticulating and show us really how- That name's Nambito, by the way, Viviana.

[Rob] (6:33 - 6:42)

So I got the... Because mine's mostly Southern Italian side, but Italian American. So I feel like I'm that episode of The Sopranos when they go to Italy, and they're like, buongiorno.

[JP] (6:43 - 6:45)

Like, no.

[Rob] (6:48 - 6:59)

Folly walnuts. But listen, this topic lives rent-free in my head. This is the thing.

The guys know that I think about this all the time. I literally had to go... I don't know if this was the book you were talking about, the culture map.

[Viviana] (6:59 - 7:03)

Yes, yes. That's what I was going to ask if that was the book.

[Rob] (7:03 - 7:34)

So I was just giving this as a gift because I did a little customer success tour around different parts of Europe and the Middle East. Still on it, I guess. And I've just been binging different cultural impressions of customer success and finding all these little fun facts.

For example, the fact that evidently, if you send a follow-up email after a meeting in Japan, it's often seen as offensive. It's like, there you go. It's like, why do you think I wasn't there?

That I wasn't keeping notes? That I wasn't present in the meeting?

[Viviana] (7:35 - 7:35)

Exactly.

[Rob] (7:36 - 7:37)

Super interesting.

[Viviana] (7:37 - 9:02)

And think about how that comes into play when you put together documentation for your CSMs about playbooks and what they're supposed to be doing. And I think, again, a lot of the times, especially when the company is headquartered in the US, maybe it starts with just US customers, that's your perspective. It's very anglo-centric, right?

And so if you think about it, giving your customer success managers these tools, especially again, as the company goes global, we all know as the company grows, of course, like I said, they're going to have those people on the ground in those countries, and inherently, those things are going to get easier. However, until that happens, and until they have boots on the ground, and they have someone that can really just help them with the organization in those countries, I think it is important to communicate that there are differences. And again, it can impact the way you can be successful or not in customer success, how you approach a renewal, right?

How you talk about money, budget, how you, like you said, approach a follow up, which is something so obvious for us. But I think, again, and especially for a culture like the Japanese one, some people tend to brush things off, like I think, especially Americans, but even for me, I'm used to things like this. But I think in Japan, a lot of those sensitivities really can go a long way, and on the other hand, can be detrimental if you ignore them.

[Rob] (9:03 - 9:11)

I'll have to tell you a story another time about my wedding in Rome. It was a completely different type of customer success.

[JP] (9:11 - 9:14)

He can't help himself, Dillon. He can't help himself.

[Rob] (9:14 - 9:32)

I'm just saying, it was, look, the number of times, they literally threatened to cancel the wedding on the day before the wedding, like when we had 130 people there, like it was a different type of customer. I love my Italian folks. I love my Italian roots, but- I'll have to follow up because I don't need the story.

[JP] (9:33 - 9:36)

It's a hell of a- Was there some popcorn involved?

[Dillon] (9:38 - 9:39)

Yeah. Oh, my goodness.

[JP] (9:40 - 9:41)

Best wedding I've ever had.

[Dillon] (9:41 - 10:00)

Okay, well, incredible topic. One, I bring very little to. So I'll say, always maintain perspective, everybody.

And be respectful of people on the other side of the table.

[Viviana] (10:01 - 10:04)

It's been a learning opportunity for you though, right?

[Dillon] (10:04 - 10:52)

A hundred percent. No, I think, but that's what I mean is you talk about all of this stuff. I think about it a lot from a neurodiversity perspective, even regardless of culture, gender, anything like that.

There's also this entire thing about how people think and how they like to be approached. And so I think it is just this general concept of, not necessarily empathize, like feel what somebody else is feeling, but you've got to have at least a bit of a foundation about what their experiences have been to this point and how they view the world before you're ever going to communicate successfully with them. So I love this topic.

The culture thing, the fact that you all have this frigging book that I've never heard of though, JP, I think you showed a picture of it in our group chat before.

[JP] (10:53 - 11:06)

Yeah, check it out. Well, this has been such a great show. My personal favorite topic, let me say.

And so the way that we're going to close this thing out, I'm going to say, Arrivederci my friends, Viviana, we would love to have you back.

[Viviana] (11:07 - 11:10)

Anytime guys, anytime. Ciao.

[Voiceover] (11:14 - 11:45)

You've been listening to The Daily Standup by Lifetime Value. Please note that the views expressed in these conversations are attributed only to those individuals on this recording and do not necessarily reflect the views and opinions of their respective employers. For all inquiries, please reach out via email to Dillon at lifetime value media.com.

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