“It’s all about ‘what I want the customer to do based on what I care about.’ Nobody says that explicitly, but underlying that is a mindset still focused on what we need for our business to succeed, rather than what we need to do to help the customer’s business succeed,” says Shakeel Bharmal, as he highlights the critical gap between claiming customer-centricity and truly living it. Organizations must transition from self-serving goals to genuinely prioritizing the success of their customers—a shift that fosters trust, loyalty, and long-term growth for both parties.

In this episode, Shakeel Bharmal of The Summit Group shares how third box thinking can transform account management by reframing how we see our customers. Are we truly understanding their challenges, or are we just focused on pushing our own goals? Shakeel argues that meaningful growth starts with empathy—seeing the world through the lens of the customer’s customer.

Shakeel explains why customer-centricity often falls short despite all the tools and data available today. He offers practical ways to shift this mindset, starting with a simple exercise: map the value chain from your company to the end user. How often do we really take the time to ask, “What does the customer’s customer care about?”

Leadership also plays an important role in driving this change. Shakeel points out how consistent reinforcement from leaders can shape a culture that prioritizes long-term success over quick wins. The result? Stronger relationships, better alignment, and exponential growth potential.

Tune in to Shakeel and Alex Raymond’s discussion if you’re looking to deepen your impact as an account manager and create genuine value for your clients. How could embracing third box thinking change the way you approach your work?

Quotes

• “It’s all about ‘what I want the customer to do based on what I care about.’ Nobody says that explicitly, but underlying that is a mindset still focused on what we need for our business to succeed, rather than what we need to do to help the customer’s business succeed.” (07:50 | Shakeel Bharmal)
• “Third box thinking says if you are Box 1—your company, your customer’s Box 2, their customer is Box 3… By beginning the analysis on your customer’s customer, otherwise known as Box 3, you are now looking at the world not through your lens of what the customer cares about, but you’re looking at the world through the lens of your customer's customer, and looking at your customer from their customer’s perspective.” (13:53 | Shakeel Bharmal)
• “Imagine what the world would be like if we all thought about how the people we serve can be more effective, more impactful at serving the people they serve. And imagine if every human being on this planet took that approach of wanting to help the people that they serve serve the people they serve. Can you imagine the ripple effect of impact and change that would happen?” (18:02 | Shakeel Bharmal)

Links

Connect with Shakeel Bharmal:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shakeelbharmal/

Website: https://www.summitvalue.com/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

“We’re diplomats, we’re orchestrators, we’re figuring out how to thread the needle of client needs and agency ambitions,” explains James Hidden as he reflects on the complexities of account management in creative agencies. This role isn’t about following a script but about balancing strategy and creativity, structure and adaptability.

In this episode, James, who’s a seasoned account management leader and former managing director at Ogilvy, joins Alex Raymond to share how the best account managers navigate client relationships and agency dynamics. Why is listening more important than speaking? How does tenacity outweigh experience in this fast-paced world? James provides answers to these questions while challenging the way we think about roles in account management and project management.

From the shift to project-based engagements to the value of building a brand, James offers insights for anyone who’s looking to succeed in a marketing or creative agency. This episode is a call to embrace curiosity, prioritize relationships, and see every challenge as an opportunity to grow in this ever-changing, creative industry.

Quotes

• “We often say that at the agency, you’re the voice of the client to the agency and the voice of the agency to the client. So we’re diplomats, we’re orchestrators, we’re figuring out how to thread the needle of client needs and agency ambitions.” (03:30 | James Hidden)
• “Great account leadership is more than just execution and delivery; it’s about navigating the gray areas, triangulating the ultimately subjective challenges of great creativity, brand building, client needs, and brand requirements.” (05:13 | James Hidden)
• “The very best account leaders have this superpower of triangulation, of understanding what’s not being said as well as what is being said, understanding the brief behind the brief, picking up on that seemingly throwaway comments someone made in a meeting that might actually be a massive unlock to how we get past the challenge or sell the creative idea or whatever it might be.” (13:42 | James Hidden)
• “If you want 20% growth from a customer, you can sit on a Zoom call and do it that way. If you want 10x growth, you’ve got to go walk the hallways and spend time with them. That’s when you see all the other opportunities you wouldn’t otherwise have visibility into.” (18:12 | Alex Raymond)

Links

Connect with James Hidden:

Website: https://www.jameshidden.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameshidden/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Most account plans fail not because they lack detail, but because they fall short as tools for proactive, strategic partnership. In this episode, Alex Raymond challenges account managers to rethink their approach to account planning, asking: Are your plans truly aligned with your clients’ goals, or are they just ticking a box? He identifies the most common mistakes—overcomplicating plans, treating them as static documents, and planning in isolation—and explains why these habits can damage trust, limit growth, and make account planning feel like a burden.

Through a more thoughtful, collaborative, and client-focused approach, Alex shows how account planning can become your competitive edge. He points out the value of simplifying plans to focus on actionable priorities, keeping them agile, and regularly revisiting them to reflect evolving client needs. With practical advice on collaboration and documenting key wins, Alex demonstrates how account managers can use account planning to build trust, drive meaningful results, and position themselves as true strategic partners.

Quotes

• “Account planning, when done right, is your roadmap. It’s your guide. It’s how you are going to execute on all the ideas and plans that you have. It’s what takes you from being a reactive order taker to being a proactive strategic partner.” (02:46 | Alex Raymond)
• “Avoid having lots of tabs and pages. A simple, clear plan that’s easy to follow and reference beats a 50-page document every single time. So, don’t overcomplicate your account plans.” (06:28 | Alex Raymond)
• “The real value of building an account plan is not in the final product. It’s not in the plan itself; it’s in the process of planning. So, what I mean by that is shift your mindset to see account planning as an ongoing process. It’s an ongoing conversation with your client, with your internal stakeholders, and you’re constantly revising and refining it. The plan isn’t the end state; it’s a tool to help you get somewhere.” (12:03 | Alex Raymond)
• “The plans were so often about us, as opposed to being about the customer. And guess what? Your clients can smell that from a mile away. They can tell if you’re truly being customer-centric or not. So my challenge to you, my invitation to you, is to make your account plans truly customer-centric.” (17:04 | Alex Raymond)
• “Document your wins and your learnings… Documenting these learnings will be crucial when you review the account plan in a month or a quarter. I always say, document everything you can and bring in perspectives from others. This will help you gain clarity on what you’ve done and how you’re progressing with your clients.” (23:05 | Alex Raymond)

Links

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

“There’s a mythology surrounding the concept of listening to the customer and being customer-centric. It comes from the fact that we think we’re listening, but the reality is customers don’t feel heard and understood,” says Bob London, the creator of the Radically Authentic Discovery Method.

Joining Alex Raymond in this episode, Bob challenges account managers to rethink how they approach client relationships. Are you truly listening to your customers? Or are you missing the deeper insights that could transform your understanding of their business needs?

Bob introduces his method of “radically authentic discovery,” which focuses on asking bold, truth-sparking questions, practicing silence to fully absorb answers, and connecting the dots between what customers need and what you offer. It’s a framework designed to uncover priorities and challenges that often remain hidden in surface-level conversations.

Curiosity, Bob argues, is a superpower for account managers. He shares practical techniques, like using intentional pauses, to create space for clients to share more freely. He also offers advice on shifting your mindset to prioritize meaningful discovery, even with packed schedules.

This episode is a wake-up call for account managers to embrace deeper curiosity and active listening. By understanding the voice of the customer, you can build trust, strengthen relationships, and bring valuable insights back to your organization. Are you ready to change the way you listen? Join Bob and Alex’s discussion today!

Quotes

• “There’s a mythology surrounding the concept of listening to the customer and being customer-centric. It comes from the fact that we think we’re listening, but the reality is customers don’t feel heard and understood.” (05:16 | Bob London)
• “Your customer doesn’t have to be in board meetings to be able to answer, but they have to understand that what you’re trying to do is ask them, start at the most important level for them. What’s driving your priorities as a decision-maker or a user? And so, I try to explain to them that there’s these four principles of radical authentic discovery.” (08:50 | Bob London)
• “Like many things in life, including—I’m sure—people’s relationships, people will remember that you made them feel heard and understood more so than the substance. I’m not saying the substance isn’t important. I’m saying that the main priority is to leave the customer feeling like this was a different conversation.” (38:31 | Bob London)

Links

Connect with Bob London:

Website: https://www.boblondon.co/

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/boblondon/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

Blind spots in customer understanding can hold companies back, but customer advisory boards offer a way to uncover them and strengthen strategic accounts.

Alex Raymond is joined by Betsy Westhafer, the CEO of the Congruity Group, to discuss how CABs reveal gaps in customer knowledge that companies often miss. Are you as customer-centric as you think? Betsy shares eye-opening stories, including one where a global company’s lack of account planning was laid bare in a CAB meeting. Insights from that moment led to significant improvements and pointed out the importance of truly knowing your customers.

Betsy breaks down the essentials of creating impactful CABs—aligning leadership, engaging a mix of customer voices, and encouraging honest conversations. CABs are about listening and acting on what matters most to customers. She also explains why bringing in a neutral facilitator can make all the difference and warns against half-hearted efforts that risk doing more harm than good.

If you’re an account manager or business leader ready to rethink how you engage with key customers, this episode offers actionable insights on building trust, uncovering critical gaps, and turning feedback into a competitive advantage.

Quotes

• “We did a customer advisory board probably about two or three months ago. And within the first few minutes, one of the customer advisory board members said to the host company, ‘Here’s what I want to hear from you: What’s your plan for my account?’ And it caught this company completely off guard, and they had to fess up that they did not have an actual plan for that account. This is a large global company.” (04:48 | Betsy Westhafer)
• “When you bring in an outside third party that can create an environment where these blind spots get uncovered, it’s really, really valuable.” (05:56 | Betsy Westhafer)
• “We do look at different metrics that are non-monetary ROI… the number of blind spots that have been uncovered or the number of advocacy activities resulting from CAB members. There are lots of other metrics beyond strictly sales dollars that we do track.” (32:58 | Betsy Westhafer)
• “One of the things we do at the very beginning of any engagement is create a value scorecard with our clients. Because it’s different for every client we work with… We build that value scorecard and then track it throughout the entire engagement using a red, yellow, green system to indicate whether things are on track. We pay close attention to whether the customer engagement activities are delivering the desired results.” (33:46 | Betsy Westhafer)

Links

Connect with Betsy Westhafer:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/betsywesthafer/

Website: https://thecongruitygroup.com/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

“Most QBRs suck,” says Alex Raymond, calling out the truth that too many Quarterly Business Reviews are boring, one-sided, and lack real impact. But what if QBRs could be more? In this episode, Alex gets into why so many of these high-stakes meetings fall flat. Are outdated beliefs holding you back from having the kind of QBRs your clients want? Alex uncovers four common missteps: seeing QBRs as presentations, handling them solo, taking a defensive stance, and focusing too much on past results.

Imagine instead a QBR where the focus is on the client’s goals, where data is shared in advance, and where the agenda is co-created with the client. Through practical shifts like these, account managers can turn QBRs into dynamic conversations that build trust and foster genuine partnership. Alex’s advice on limiting presentation time, encouraging real dialogue, and setting clear next steps brings fresh insight on how to make these meetings truly valuable. How often do you reconsider the structure and purpose of your QBRs? For those eager to level up, this episode provides a preview of Amplify’s upcoming QBR Mastery program in January 2025, designed to help account managers make every meeting count.

Quotes

• “If your QBRs are nothing but a 60-minute monologue, you’re missing a massive opportunity. And not only are you wasting your client’s time, you’re also losing a chance to position yourself as a true strategic advisor to them.” (03:38 | Alex Raymond)
• “If you’re thinking about the QBR as just a presentation about you, you’re thinking about it all wrong. And frankly, it’s not even a presentation; it’s meant to be a conversation. I’d like to invite you to reframe this and think about how we can use the QBR to align with our customer and create a dialogue.” (06:52 | Alex Raymond)
• “Let’s make our QBRs forward-looking. This is an opportunity to strategize together, to look down the road ahead, and to use this time to ask open-ended questions about your customer—their future goals, needs, and challenges. It’s a chance to figure out what it will look like as we work together to achieve these goals. That mental shift creates a real partnership, where both sides are committed and focused on concrete goals that lead to long-term success.” (14:27 | Alex Raymond)
• “If we want to make our QBRs truly valuable, we’ve got to ditch this idea that it’s a presentation—that our job is just to ‘show up and throw up.’ That’s not the idea at all. We also need to remember, we’re not here to do all the work ourselves. We have to enroll our customers and get them to do their share of work as well.” (25:04 | Alex Raymond)

Links

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

“There are strategic accounts that will organically grow without proactive effort. Every account is strategic but you don’t have the time to grow them in terms of the way in which top performers do versus the rest. I think it’s a big mistake up front by trying to go for it all, because you end up winning less,” says Andy Springer, the Chief Client Officer at RAIN Group.

In this episode, Andy joins Alex Raymond to talk about the game-changing power of focusing on fewer, high-potential accounts. Why spread your resources thin when doubling down on the right clients can yield far bigger returns? Andy reveals how top-performing account managers know the value of strategic account selection—choosing which clients to grow proactively and which will thrive organically.

Andy also shares a fresh perspective on segmentation: how well do you really know your clients? The more you understand their goals and challenges, the more you can build trust and position yourself as a true partner, not just another vendor. Andy walks us through the essential roles of an account team, the importance of a flexible, evolving account plan, and why becoming a client’s trusted advisor can be the key to unlocking hidden growth.

Are you ready to rethink your approach and unlock the “ridiculous upside” within your accounts?

Quotes

• “What we find also separates those who outperform versus those who don’t in strategic account management is one very simple thing: it’s the accounts that they select to grow… As a practitioner, when you’re in, and when you’ve engineered the success in terms of shifting that dial to take someone from the rest to top performance, you go for less, you win more.” (06:48 | Andy Springer)
• “There are strategic accounts that will organically grow without proactive effort. Every account is strategic but you don’t have the time to grow them in terms of the way in which top performers do versus the rest. I think it’s a big mistake up front by trying to go for it all, because you end up winning less.” (09:30 | Andy Springer)
• “Top performers see account planning as a dynamic. The rest see it as a linear annual event.” (30:15 | Andy Springer)
• “The bigger the org, the more complex it is. The more demands that they put on really important people like you who help generate future growth and sustain current revenues for the business—it’s critical.” (45:25 | Andy Springer)

Links

Connect with Andy Springer:

Website: https://www.rainsalestraining.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andyspringer/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm

“I strongly believe that there’s a strong connection between employee experience and customer experience. Employee experience drives the customer experience,” says Annette Franz, the CEO of CX Journey Inc. She joins Alex Raymond to talk about how putting employees first fuels customer success. Annette challenges the typical focus on metrics, asking us to consider: Are we truly supporting our employees to deliver the experience our customers expect?

Annette’s perspective is clear: collaboration—especially between sales and account management—is the key to equipping teams with the resources and support they need to meet customer needs. She shares stories from her work that show how a lack of support for account managers can directly impact customer satisfaction and retention.

They also touch on survey fatigue and the value of a smarter approach to customer feedback. Are we measuring what matters most? Annette suggests customer effort scores and lifetime value over traditional metrics like NPS, which often miss the bigger picture of loyalty and engagement. By centering on the employee journey as much as the customer’s, this episode sheds light on how a collaborative, well-supported employee experience can elevate customer satisfaction and drive long-term growth.

Quotes

• “I strongly believe that there’s a strong connection between employee experience and customer experience. Employee experience drives the customer experience. If we don’t have employees to design, build, service, install, implement, and deliver all of these things, then who’s going to do it? And who are we doing it for? We’re doing it for the customer.” (04:48 | Annette Franz)
• “Customer experience is not technology. Technology is a tool; it supports and facilitates. The experience that customers have is very much human. And this feeling’s part of it. It really puts the human into the experience. And I think that’s an important thing.” (07:13 | Annette Franz)
• “You’re not customer-centric just because you’ve got a slogan on your website that says you are. You’re customer-centric when you truly understand who your customer is, what they need and want, and where they’re going.” (08:03 | Alex Raymond)
• “One of the questions I ask during interviews, and I think it’s fair for leaders to ask too, is: do you have what you need to do your job? That is the bottom line.” (12:29 | Annette Franz)
• “I’m not a fan of NPS for a variety of reasons... It’s just a metric... And to me, NPS only makes sense if your business is truly 100% driven by referrals... So for me, things like customer effort score, customer lifetime value, those kinds of things. Let’s talk about those kinds of things.” (25:09 | Annette Franz)

Links

Connect with Annette Franz:

Website: https://annettefranz.com/

Connect with Alex Raymond:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/

Website: https://amplifyam.com/

Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm