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Podcast
[Un]Churned – The No. 1 Podcast for Customer Retention
Hosted by Gainsight · EN
If you're experimenting with automation, questioning the traditional post-sales model, or trying to drive more value with less headcount, you're in the right place. AI won’t fix churn, but these conversations might.
Retention is the new growth, AI is rewriting the rules. Hosted by Josh Schachter, SVP of Atlas at Gainsight, [Un]Churned—the No. 1 podcast for retention and Customer Success leaders—features real talk with the sharpest minds in the Customer Success space. We dig into how teams are scaling smarter, activating AI agents, and redesigning the customer journey for lasting impact.
38episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
How AWS's Developer Community Grew 3,600 Builders Across 110 Countries ft. Jason Dunn
2d ago00:26:10Tap to summarizeTwo hands. A free Slack channel. A spreadsheet. That was the entire toolkit when AWS asked Jason Dunn to build a developer community. Jason Dunn spent five years on building something people actually want to belong to. He grew a developer community into thousands of members spread across more than a hundred countries, working with far less budget and tooling than you'd expect.This conversation digs into what separates a living community from a glorified contact list. Why your earliest members carry so much weight. When to keep the door open and when to guard it. How to prove value when your best wins resist a dashboard. Why technical people walk the second something smells like a pitch. And how one small, slightly absurd reward became a badge people chased for months. A Real talk on getting people to show up for each other.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com---What You'll Learn- Why the first members you pick set the tone forever- The day-zero choice: community for everyone or for someone- How to measure community when it's basically a vibe- The trick to getting members to report their own wins- Gamification with a lowercase G (and why it works)- The golden jacket story and pent-up demand- Why developers reject sales and marketing pipelines- Scrappy tools beat fancy platforms every time- The AI warning every new community manager needs---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview and Meet Jason Dunn2:22 - What community meant at AWS in 20193:45 - The day-zero decision every builder faces5:05 - From 200 invited seeds to 3,600 members6:39 - Keeping the gates too open, too early9:12 - Defining high-value member activity11:23 - Measuring & reporting up: output, reach, and Dev.to14:53 - The Content Reporting Tool (CRT)16:02 - The real motivation behind self-reporting18:24 - The Golden Jacket origin story & 130 jackets in one quarter21:28 - The AWS Community toolkit23:42 - Advice for new community managers51:00 — Don't fall in love with the tools53:00 — Humanity connecting with humanity---Where to Find the GuestJason Dunn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonrobertdunn/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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The Retention Killer Hiding in Your Product Demos ft. Kellie Snyder (LinkSquares)
5d ago00:29:07Tap to summarizeWhat if giving customers more value is exactly what's making them leave? Kellie Snyder, Chief Customer Officer at LinkSquares, joins Josh Schachter after a two-year replatform to fully agentic contract management. She unpacks how AI reshaped their customer 360, the retention mistake hiding in their onboarding, why digital-first went too far, and how to bring human engagement back without losing scale. A candid look at retention, migration, and rebuilding human engagement in the AI era.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com---What You'll Learn- How LinkSquares went fully agentic in contract management- Building a real customer 360- Why "show them everything" was killing retention- Migrating legacy customers without scaring them off- AI enablement when teams sit at different skill levels- Right-sizing human engagement after over-rotating on digital-first- Tying value realization to pre-sales business outcomes---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview and Meet Kellie Snyder1:50 - What LinkSquares does, new agentic platform3:10 - Kelly's remit as the CCO at LinkSquares3:50 - Rob's story and the golf scholarship6:06 - AI transformation inside the post-sales team7:39 - Building the customer 3609:09 - How Kellie personally uses Claude10:45 - Sharing skills and wins across CSMs11:30 - Biggest speed bump going AI-native13:48 - The two-year replatform & impact on post-sales18:29 - Migration & killing one-size-fits-all onboarding20:27 - Investing in customer education22:33 - Quantifying value realization23:23 - What's taken longer than expected25:40 - Success one year out26:52 - A question for other CCOs---Where to Find the GuestKellie Snyder: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellieasnyder/ ---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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The GTM Playbook Behind 133 Million Learners ft. Monika Saha (Articulate)
1w ago00:35:06Tap to summarize133 million learners. 100% of the Fortune 100. And the woman steering go-to-market behind those numbers will tell you to stop chasing churn. Monika Saha, CCO of Articulate, doesn't trade in best-practice platitudes. In this episode she takes the sacred cows out back: why "customer education is a cost center" is half-wrong instead of all-wrong, when fighting retention is a flat waste of energy, and why PLG companies are quietly light-years ahead while everyone else optimizes the wrong thing. Host Josh Schachter pokes the bear. Co-host Samantha Murray pushes back. Monika doesn't blink. If you run customer success, education, or GTM and you're tired of being told what you already know, this one's built to make you uncomfortable in the good way.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com---What You'll Learn- Why "customer education is a cost center" is partly true- How to standardize and modularize content so you stop reinventing the wheel- When improving churn is actually a waste of energy- How to segment a long tail so you invest where returns are real- Why PLG companies dominate in-app and digital motion- A simple QBR exercise to find AI-ready process bottlenecks- How to structure a number across a core product plus early cross-sells---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview and Meet Mac, Monika's dog1:08 - Meet Sam Murray, Gainsight & Monika Saha, Articulate2:11 - Articulate's Overview4:20 - Monika's remit as Chief Commercial Officer: trial to renewal5:37 - Lessons from her Gainsight CMO days9:00 - Customer education & internal enablement14:53 - Debate: is customer education a cost center?20:30 - Controversial take: when fixing churn is pointless23:43 - Why digital motion is foundational at a PLG company26:56 - Can non-PLG B2B companies experiment like this?28:48 - Embracing efficiency with AI32:30 - Hitting the number: core product vs cross-sell---Where to Find the GuestSamantha Murray: https://www.linkedin.com/in/samantha-murray613/Monika Saha: https://www.linkedin.com/in/monikasaha/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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Why Selling Software Isn't Enough Anymore ft. Chuck Ganapathi (Gainsight)
2w ago00:29:31Tap to summarizeMost companies think selling software is enough, but the real shift is owning the outcome.In this episode of the [Un]Churned Podcast, Josh Schachter sits down with Chuck Ganapathi, CEO of Gainsight, live from Pulse 2026 at Caesars Forum in Las Vegas, to unpack why the next era of SaaS isn't about selling seats, it's about delivering results.Chuck shares the thinking behind Gainsight's biggest strategic shift in 15 years, why the build vs. buy debate is a false choice, and how agentic AI is finally making it possible to serve every customer, not just the top 20%.They also dive into:- Why outcome-based services are the future of enterprise software- The "build, buy, or hire" framework redefining customer success- How the long tail of customers has been silently ignored and why that's changing- What human-agent collaboration actually looks like in practice- Why your smallest customers today might be your most strategic accounts tomorrowIf you're leading a SaaS business, scaling customer success, or trying to understand where agentic AI is actually creating leverage, this episode is a front-row seat to the next evolution of this category.---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Chapters00:00 – Intro to Chuck Ganapathi01:45 – Chuck Ganapathi on Taking the CEO Role at Gainsight04:10 – Why Chuck Is an AI Optimist in a Room Full of Doomers07:18 – The One Question Every CEO, CFO & Board Is Asking Right Now09:15 – The False Choice Between Build and Buy11:40 – Announcing Atlas: Gainsight's First AI Native Service14:05 – Why SaaS Has Always Struggled to Prove ROI18:45 – Build, Buy, or Just Hire Gainsight22:50 – The Long Tail Problem Nobody in SaaS Wants to Talk About27:00 – What Humans Actually Do in a Human-Agent Collaboration Model---Where to Find the GuestChuck Ganapathi: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chuckganapathi/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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What Happens When CS Teams Cross the Commercial Line ft. Chael Banks (Okta)
3w ago00:30:56Tap to summarizeEverybody can build with Claude now, but nobody figured out the responsibility part yet.Chael Banks runs customer success at Okta. 20,000 customers. Billions of logins a day. In this episode he breaks down a hard rule: his team will never sell. Ever. Why? Trust. In identity security, trust is everything. The moment money becomes the motive, the relationship tarnishes. Chael draws a sharp line between commercials and consulting. His team carries the value narrative instead. He also gets real about the AI supernova. Too much building, not enough consolidation. He shares how Okta uses AI to make people more effective, not just efficient. Plus: the identity maturity model, value realization at scale, the long-tail digital motion, and a personal story about Lane 6 that shaped how he leads.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com---What You'll Learn- How to split selling from guiding without losing revenue- Why trust beats commission in high-stakes industries- How AI makes junior reps sound senior- The identity maturity model as a value framework- How to scale one consistent conversation across all customer segments- Why efficiency only matters in service of effectiveness- How to run value realization without renewal panic- A leadership lesson on grit from Lane 6---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview & introduction1:30 - Overview of Okta & inside their CS org4:08 - Everyone is building with AI. Now what? 6:00 - The identity maturity model explained9:03 - Customers DO NOT want salespeople & why Chael's team will never do commercials13:30 - What's working at OkTa with the 20% AI transformation17:15 - Okta's long-tail digital motion20:10 - Value realization: the train analogy24:00 - Big rocks at Okta & Chael's message on AI & jobs28:10 - Lane 6: grit, persistence, and leadership---Where to Find the GuestChael Banks: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chaelbanks/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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The Creator of NPS Says It Was Never Built for Surveys ft. Fred Reichheld (Bain & Company)
4w ago00:48:14Tap to summarizeHeading to Vegas this May? Join Josh at Pulse 2026 and come say hi—your oversized fluorescent daiquiri is on him. No catch.Grab your ticket at gainsightpulse.com and use code UNCHURNED for a special rate.Most companies think customer loyalty is about retention but the real metric is referrals.In this episode of the UnChurned Podcast, Josh Schachter sits down with Fred Reichheld the creator of Net Promoter Score (NPS) & Author of Winning on Purpose, to unpack why the companies that grow the fastest aren’t just keeping customers happy they’re creating customers who bring others with them.Fred shares the origin story behind NPS, why traditional customer satisfaction metrics failed, and how referral-driven growth became the hidden engine behind some of the world’s most successful businesses.They also dive into:- The moral principles behind enduring companies- Why referrals matter more than repeat purchases- How customer experience connects directly to shareholder value- The viral nature of trust and word of mouth- Why entrepreneurs should obsess over “bring your friends” growthIf you're building a business, scaling customer success, or trying to create real word-of-mouth momentum, this episode is a masterclass in profitable growth.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com---Timestamps00:00 – Intro to Fred Reichheld & the Origins of NPS02:05 – The Hidden Pattern Behind the World’s Best Companies04:32 – “Back for More and Bring Your Friends”07:18 – Why Customer Satisfaction Metrics Failed10:41 – The Moral Foundation of Great Businesses14:05 – How NPS Went Viral Before Social Media17:12 – Why Trust Still Drives Buying Decisions20:46 – The Real Economics Behind Referrals24:18 – Investing Based on Net Promoter Scores28:02 – Why Referrals Are the Ultimate Growth Engine---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Where to Find the GuestFred Reichheld: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fredreichheld/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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Why The Best CS Leaders Start With The Boardroom, Not The Product ft. Adnan Rahman (Paycor)
May 2000:25:50Tap to summarizeHeading to Vegas this May? Join Josh at Pulse 2026 and come say hi—your oversized fluorescent daiquiri is on him. No catch.Grab your ticket at gainsightpulse.com and use code UNCHURNED for a special rate.Most CS teams are stuck in a loop. Monitor the health score. Chase the red account. Run the QBR. Hope the renewal sticks. Adnan Rahman saw the loop. And broke it.As the Head of Customer & Partner Success at Paycor, Adnan manages 35,000 customer relationships across different segments with a team of nearly 100 CSMs. That kind of scale forces clarity fast. And what became clear? The problem was never the metrics. It was the conversation.In this episode, Adnan breaks down the value realization framework his team built from scratch that is now deployed across 28 enterprise CSMs and 17 mid-market CSMs, with a goal of 75% active success plans by year end. He gets into the exact discovery questions that replaced fear with candor, why executives are now showing up to meetings they used to skip, and how joint success plans replaced the product demo masquerading as a QBR.Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com. ---Timestamps0:00 - Preview & introduction1:17 - Meet Adnan Rahman & Overview of Paycor4:50 - The value realization framework explained7:07 - Do customers arrive knowing their outcomes?8:05 - Bob London's UBR method & the most disruptive questions CSMs ask9:06 - Implementing the framework & outcomes11:56 - How to build your own value framework from scratch16:31 - How Paycor is drawing insights & enhancing efficiency with AI 18:38 - Paycor's agentic future: renewals, expansions, risk20:40 - Paycor's learning & community inititative24:29 - Where Paycor CS is headed by year end---What You’ll Learn- How to build a value realization framework- The exact disruptive questions that unlock executive conversations- What a joint success plan looks like vs a traditional QBRHow to connect every CSM touchpoint back to measurable business outcomes- How to ask about renewal without making it awkward- Where AI agents will hit CS teams first- What community looks like when answer engines exist- How to scale personalized outreach without scaling headcount---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Where to Find the GuestAdnan Rahman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adnan-rahman-irvine/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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The AI Acceleration Decade Is Coming. Are You Ready? ft. Scott Barker (Enfold Institute)
May 1300:37:26Tap to summarizeHeading to Vegas this May? Join Josh at Pulse 2026 and come say hi—your oversized fluorescent daiquiri is on him. No catch.Grab your ticket at gainsightpulse.com and use code UNCHURNED for a special rate.Most people in tech are sprinting toward AI. Scott Barker, Partner & MD at Enfold Institute, Ex-Partner at GTMfund, and the youngest director in Outreach history, is among the few who stopped, looked back, and said: I've seen where this road ends.He was the youngest director in Outreach history. Helped take the company from $20M to $250M ARR. Built a venture fund to $100M under management. Then walked away from all of it, not for a sabbatical, not for a rebrand. Because it was breaking him.Four months in Indian ashrams. Ten hours of meditation a day. No phone, no fund, no identity.What he came back with isn't a mindfulness pitch. It's a strategic argument: the AI era is about to force the entire tech industry into the same acceleration decade that nearly destroyed him. And unlike his, yours won't be a choice.This episode is the conversation the industry needs to have and keeps skipping over to talk about agents.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview & introduction2:07 - Meet Jenny Calvert & Scott Barker 3:35 - Scaling GTM Fund to $100M and why it wasn't enough6:33 - How to Prepare for the Next Decade (The viral article)10:28 - Strategy 1: Slowing down as strategy (the 6-hour silence block)16:50 - Strategy 2: Build depth, not route skills20:33 - The future of currency22:30 - Strategy 3: Train your nervous system daily25:33 - Give yourself permission 29:55 - Challenge your old programming & redefine success34:14 - Final takeaways + close---What You’ll Learn- Why AI acceleration is a forced decade of chaos and how to build a foundation before it hits-The 6-hour silence block and why your brain produces better output without inputs- Why skills are becoming a commodity and the one thing AI still can't replicate- How to identify and dismantle the old programming driving your definition of success- The daily non-negotiable practice (movement, stillness, breath, solitude) that trains your nervous system for chaos- Why the next scarce currency isn't money---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Where to Find the GuestScott Barker: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ssbarker/Scott's Substack Article: https://thewakeupcallnewsletter.substack.com/p/how-to-prepare-for-the-next-decade---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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Ironclad's CCO Reveals How AI Actually Predicts Churn ft. Rob Edmondson
May 600:26:52Tap to summarizeHeading to Vegas this May? Join Josh at Pulse 2026 and come say hi—your oversized fluorescent daiquiri is on him. No catch.Grab your ticket at gainsightpulse.com and use code UNCHURNED for a special rate.Rob Edmondson, CCO at Ironclad - an AI contracting platform - brings a military-grade operating philosophy to customer outcomes: mission first, people always.In this episode, he breaks down what happened when his team used AI to predict churn — and why the results blew up their assumptions about what "good adoption" actually looks like.Rob reveals how down-market customers who adopted AI features too early actually churned more, why enterprise renewal patterns look nothing like daily usage. He also gets honest about the governance-vs-freedom tension every leader is navigating with AI tools right now.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview & introduction1:40 - Meet Rob Edmondson, CCO of Ironclad4:01 - Rob's career origin story5:03 - "Mission first, people always" - leadership from the military9:15 - How Rob enables a people-first culture across his teams11:05 - Using AI internally to predict churn & the surprising findings14:22 - Building a four-stage maturity model from churn prediction data16:35 - The AI vibe check: governance vs. freedom balancing act20:20 - Can you mandate AI usage? 21:57 - Tying every AI agent to an OKR22:40 - Ironclad's OKRs & Driving AI feature adoption---What You’ll Learn- How Ironclad built an AI model that predicts churn six months out- The difference between enterprise and SMB "digital signatures" of healthy customers- How to build a four-stage customer maturity model with measurable adoption gates- Why Rob ties CSM compensation to stage-progression KPIs, not activity metrics- What "mission first, people always" means when translated from the military to SaaS- How Ironclad balances AI governance with giving teams freedom to experiment- What an AI roadmap looks like when every agent is tied to an OKR---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Where to Find the GuestRob Edmondson: https://www.linkedin.com/in/redmondson/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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The Surprising Way Microsoft Does Customer Success at Scale ft. Pradeep Raman (Microsoft)
Apr 2900:21:56Tap to summarizeHeading to Vegas this May? Join Josh at Pulse 2026 and come say hi—your oversized fluorescent daiquiri is on him. No catch.Grab your ticket at gainsightpulse.com and use code UNCHURNED for a special rate.When your customer success org covers all of Azure — Microsoft's $60B+ cloud business — "deployment" isn't a checkbox. It's a global operation spanning thousands of projects, 180+ people, and a fully invested delivery model where Microsoft does the first leg of the journey for free.Pradeep Raman, Vice President, Customer Success at Microsoft, breaks down Microsoft's "commit to consume" metric, why they staff at N-1 by design, how agentic AI is replacing intake teams internally, and why no customer celebrates signing a contract — only deploying one.Pradeep who has spent over 27 years with Microsoft started in consulting, learned new tech on plane rides to customer sites, once asked Bill Gates to pin a customer's logo to his shirt (security wasn't thrilled), and now runs the CS strategy and Cloud Accelerate Factory for Azure.---Timestamps0:00 - Preview & introduction1:24 - Meet Pradeep Raman & his 27-year run at Microsoft3:25 - The Bill Gates pin story4:30 - What "VP of CS" means at Microsoft's scale6:45 - Cloud Accelerate Factory: free deployment for all Azure customers10:45 - "No customer celebrates signing an agreement"11:48 - Goal-setting & OKRs: Commit to Consume & Next Best Action15:25 - Agentic AI and modernization as top priorities16:37 - Building AI enablement inside the CS team20:40 - "I didn't think I'd survive 20 minutes of the interview"---What You’ll Learn- How Microsoft measures CS with a single "commit to consume" KPI — and why it changes everything- What the Cloud Accelerate Factory is and why Microsoft offers free hands-on deployment to any Azure customer- Microsoft's N-1 staffing philosophy: hire fewer people than needed, then make it work- How Pradeep's team is using custom agentic AI (analyst agents, architect agents) to scale internal processes- Why AI transformation fails when your data and apps sit in legacy environments- The evolution of CS at Microsoft — from sales support function to growth engine---Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.---Where to Find the GuestPradeep Raman: https://www.linkedin.com/in/pradeep-raman-41a12a11/---Where to Find Josh:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
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