CSM + TAM rules of engagement

Some accounts have both a CSM and a TAM. The point is depth: two people sharing the load so each can focus on what they're best at, and the customer gets a better experience than one person stretched across everything.

Both roles have a real relationship with the customer. Both are in the Slack channel. Both know what's happening on the account. The difference is _focus_, not ownership.

The customer should never have to figure out who to contact. They reach out to either person, and PostHog sorts it out internally.

What each role focuses on

tl;dr

• TAM is focused on and leading commercial conversations (product adoption, renewals, expansion, etc...)
• CSM is focused on and leading technical conversations (efficient implementation, product training, support escalation)
• TAMs and CSMs should meet regularly (every other week / once a month) to discuss where each person is focused on the account and agree to next steps and have a shared account plan documented
• These roles are not exclusive. CSM should be able to speak to product adoption, TAMs should be able to speak to efficient implementation

CSM

• Operational health and health score monitoring
• Support escalation and follow-through
• Credit usage optimization
• Onboarding, training, getting new users set up
• Renewal process
• Day-to-day responsiveness
• Health of the technical implementation
• Surface cross-sell signals from product usage and conversations to TAM

TAM

• Cross-sell strategy and execution
• Credit discount negotiation and deal structuring for new credit purchases, invoicing
• Use case discovery, mapping products to problems
• Renewal process
• Multi-threading into new teams and stakeholders
• Account planning (updated regularly in Vitally)
• Stakeholder management

Both

• General customer questions (whoever sees it first)
• Implementation reviews
• Retention. TAMs are not off the hook here. Understanding health and usage is a prerequisite for cross-selling, not work that gets delegated.

What good looks like

• Customer reaches out to either person and gets a fast, informed response. They never think about who to contact.
• Both go deeper on their focus area than either could alone
• Customer knows both people, trusts both, feels like they have a team
• Neither person is surprised by what the other communicated
• Both are visible in Slack, not just when they need something
• Both are aligned on the current state of the customer, risks, opportunities and what their counterpart is working on.
• TAM and CSM alignment on the account happens in public, not DMs

What bad looks like

• Customer gets told "that's not my area, let me get [other person]"
• Customer only hears from the TAM when PostHog wants to sell something
• Customer gets asked "how are things going?" by both people in the same week
• CSM discusses pricing without knowing the TAM had a deal in play
• TAM sends a cross-sell email without knowing the customer filed 3 support tickets yesterday
• Neither person responds because each assumed the other would
• TAM checks out on health because "the CSM handles that now"
• Customer has to explain the same thing twice

How to kick off the CSM + TAM collaboration

Both of you share the responsibility of making sure the other has enough context to be effective on the account.

Create an internal Slack channel

Create a channel using the naming convention #customer-[customer_name]-internal. Invite your counterpart, respective Team Leads and Simon to the channel. If there's an FDE on the account, invite them too.

This channel effectively replaces DMs between TAMs and CSMs related to the account. Your public collaboration here will be a huge service to future teammates who might inherit the account.

Get current on the account

If you're joining on and your counterpart has the pre-existing relationship

Take it upon yourself to gather as much context as you can before jumping in with questions. Share what you find and use any gaps to guide your questions.

As a CSM, treat this like your standard deep dive when inheriting an account, but oriented toward where you can create value immediately:

• Are there cost optimizations to surface?
• Opportunities to deepen value on products they're already using heavily?
• Implementation issues?

Cross-reference your findings against recent Slack threads and Vitally notes. You want a reasonably current assessment of the account and its needs that your counterpart can sense-check.

Go as far as recommending an initial action item for yourself based on your research - that's a highly effective way to take mental load off your counterpart. Once you have an initial grasp on the account, send a message in your internal Slack channel with your questions, ideas, and recommended action items if applicable (example).

Your goal: create value for the account as soon as possible, with the right context, while protecting your counterpart's bandwidth. This is an art, not a science. You're co-piloting a ship on a shared mission, but each of you are still responsible for your own controls.

If you're a TAM in this position, the principles are the same: gather context first, share what you find, propose an action item.

If you're the one with the pre-existing relationship

Proactively share any top-of-mind context in your internal Slack channel as a starting point for your counterpart. If a quick call is needed to convey context that isn't apparent in the paper trail (Slack, Vitally, etc.), do that.

Your counterpart is already gathering context from what's written, so you don't need to be exhaustive. Focus on:

• Key issues or active threads they must know about
• Important relationships or stakeholders
• Implementations in progress or recently completed

Add your counterpart to the customer's Slack Connect channel. Use your judgement for when to introduce them to the wider customer team, and relay that guidance so you stay aligned on timing.

When you do introduce them, frame it positively - the customer's PostHog team is growing, not that they're being handed off (here’s a solid example).

The underlying principle: The goal is to outdo one another in service. Getting current on the account and elevating relevant context makes you both better experts, which directly improves the quality of your customer-facing work.