Trim Size: 6in x 9in  Mehta572763 c01.tex V1-04/03/2020 11:45pm Page 5 Customer Success: What It Is and Why It Affects Everything 5 But, that’s not just my story and my irrational enthusiasm. That’s an industry story—actually, that’s the entire economy’s story. Up until now, the history of business can be condensed down to two phases: the making stuff phase (starting with the industrial revolution), followed by the selling stuff phase (the Internet has pushed this last phase by making it possible to market your stuff globally, instantly, constantly). Now we’ve moved into a third phase. We still need to make and sell, but that’s not enough. Our customers in the modern economy are looking for success—for their goals to be achieved—not just for “stuff” to be purchased. And if you’re reading this, it’s probably your story, too. You may be dealing with “vendors” that don’t seem to have a clue about what you really want. You might be running a sales organization and realizing that the end-of-quarter heroics can’t go on much longer. You may be in the Customer Success profession and trying to get your company to wake up to the movement. Butnomatterwhoyouare,youprobablycringeatthetoolsandsystems youuseatwork,onlytohopintoanUberorLyftandbemagicallywhisked wherever you want once you step outside of the ofoce.  In short, we all know the story needs to change.  The Business of Business Is Helping People Here’s how Allison found herself at the dawn of the Customer Success movement, which fundamentally changed her outlook on business. When I was in college, I spent much of my day poring over ancient philosophical texts, searching for the secrets of “the good life” and for the pillars of a healthy society. Like my peers, I hoped to do good in the world in some way. When an internship on Capitol Hill proved to be more about mailing form responses to constituents—leveraging a mechanical contrap- tion to replicate my Senator’s signature—than creating innovation, I realized that my eagerness to build things that helped people might be better suited at that point for the private sector. Two subsequent jobs in management consulting and private equity investing offered an incredible bootcamp in business knowledge and membership in a community of talented, inspiring people. But something nagged at me. How could I translate the skills I was learning into the positive societal impact that motivated me at my core? In an attempt to get