Quick summary: CSM training gaps are holding back growth. Customer leaders should prioritize commercial skill-building, enable managers to coach effectively, and create leadership pathways to retain ambitious CSMs.
In this year’s CSM Confidential report, we asked customer success managers to assess their training, skill gaps, and career readiness. The results show a profession eager to grow but under-resourced, with the biggest gaps in the skills that tie customer success to revenue and leadership.
Fifty-two percent of CSMs say their company provides enough support, tools, and training to help them reach their goals. 13%, however, report receiving no training at all in the past year.
When training is offered, it most often takes the form of online courses or e-learning (45%) and occasional coaching from a manager (36%). About one-third (32%) of CSMs have access to instructor-led training. Far fewer benefit from mentorship (23%), regular coaching (23%), or conferences (16%).
Report contributor Sabina Pons of Growth Molecules sees this pattern play out across the industry.
“Training is often ad hoc, underfunded, and focused more on product than on developing the strategic, commercial, and leadership skills CSMs need to thrive,” she says. “Companies that invest intentionally in structured L&D, meanwhile—especially in sales, negotiation, executive presence, and data storytelling—consistently report higher renewal rates, faster time-to-value for new hires, and improved internal mobility.”
How to close the biggest CSM training gaps.
Our report suggests three actionable takeaways for leaders serious about growing CS talent.
1: Prioritize commercial skills. Training your CSMs in selling, negotiation, and business acumen has a direct effect on renewal and expansion.
2: Invest in manager enablement. Teaching your team leads and managers to coach will multiply the impact of your CSM training.
3: Build a leadership pipeline. 45% of CSMs aspire to leadership in the near future, so provide hands-on leadership experiences to prepare and retain future managers.
1: Tackle the top CSM training gap: selling and negotiating.
Our data suggests that the biggest CSM training gaps, unfortunately, are in the skills that tie customer success directly to revenue.
We asked CSMs to identify the skills that they consider weaknesses, or obstacles to getting ahead in their CS careers. Sales and negotiation topped the list at 42% of CSMs. Business skills (37%) and analytical skills (32%) also ranked high.
“Companies are still moving people into CS from related disciplines like account management and support,” says contributor Kristen Hayer of The Success League. “These CSMs often have great company and product knowledge but lack skills in these areas.
“The top three reasons our own customers pursue training are: to improve selling skills (asking questions, negotiation, handling objections), to improve the ability to engage at the strategic, executive level (communication, business strategy, research), and to become more value-focused and proactive.”
“Sales and negotiation training isn’t hard to deliver when prioritized,” says Sabina. “When paired with coaching and practice-based reinforcement, it becomes a powerful lever for both CSM confidence and revenue impact.”
Even without a dedicated training budget, customer leaders can take immediate steps to help their CSMs become more effective:
Institutionalize negotiation readiness. Require a one-page BATNA plan before renewals/expansion calls; review it in pipeline checks so CSMs know their walk-away and trade-offs.
Run monthly role-plays as deliberate practice. Short, focused drills with immediate feedback beat long lectures for building skill. Capture recordings, score against a rubric, re-run until proficient.
Upgrade QBRs with data storytelling. Teach CSMs to choose the right chart for the message and to frame insights around business outcomes, not features.
Understand the right sales approach for CSMs. One of the most important skills that a CSM can have is the ability to take a consultative approach to conversations, writes Kristen. Consultative selling approaches tie in well with this skill, and become a natural extension of the work that CSMs already do to understand customers and their needs.
Related resource: Apply the REACH Framework to drive expansion in customer success.
2: Nurture your managers’ coaching skills and peer learning opportunities.
When managers don’t prioritize coaching their CSMs, training is less likely to land. In many customer teams, this comes down to a structural problem.
“Often, managers are still carrying a customer base of their own,” says Kristen. “The practice of making someone a ‘lead’ and giving them a team while still asking them to keep a set of customers is rampant and unrealistic. The lead’s attention is divided and they never really have time to do the work it takes to keep their team engaged.
“Second, most managers never receive training in management basics—conducting one-on-ones, coaching, and delegating—so they aren’t sure how to engage their team members. Both of these things result in a big disconnect between what the manager thinks is going on, and what CSMs are actually thinking.”
If this sounds uncomfortably like the managers you manage, consider the following steps:
Underscore the importance of 1:1 time. The most effective and highly rated managers tend to be effective coaches. Encourage your managers to maintain at least a 30-minute weekly or bi-weekly coaching cadence with their CSMs.
Coach your coaches. Run short manager workshops on feedback models and observation checklists. Publish templates so every manager can run consistent skill practice.
Create peer communities for organic coaching. Facilitate monthly CSM circles to share playbooks, review tough calls, swap assets, or analyze recent incidences of churn together.
Related resource: Mindset before skillset: Rachel Provan’s secret to effective customer success leadership.
3: Build a leadership bench to keep and grow top performers.
Nearly half of CSMs (47%) say they feel mostly or very prepared to step into a leadership role immediately. While we don’t know how this would play out if it happened, we do know that promoting half of your team to leadership isn’t realistic. However, you can still provide meaningful leadership opportunities to equip ambitious CSMs with the leadership skills they’ll need one day.
“Given that a concerning proportion of CSMs report receiving no initial training, it’s likely they lack adequate preparation for the demands of CS leadership,” says contributor Naomi Aiken of Techtonic Lift.
“Companies should offer hands-on CS leadership training opportunities, enabling them to evaluate leadership potential and identify CSMs who are truly ready for management responsibilities.”
In other words, to discover and keep your future leaders, train CSMs to lead. Consider these steps:
Stand up an aspiring manager cohort. Assign a quarterly capstone project (e.g. redesign onboarding) in which aspiring managers design a project, present the business case, and receive feedback from execs.
Run “acting lead” rotations. Give senior individual contributors four-week stints of owning stand-ups, escalations, and reviews, then debrief with structured feedback.
Use the 70-20-10 model. This popular learning model states that 70% of learning happens through on-the-job experience (e.g. owning a segment), 20% of learning happens socially through colleagues and friends (e.g. coaching and mentoring), and 10% of learning happens via formal training experiences.
Related resource: The Leadership Leap: from first-time manager to confident leader.
Read the 2025 CSM Confidential Report in full.
2025’s CSM Confidential Report focuses on how CSMs really feel about their career goals and aspirations, with actionable, expert commentary on how to retain your top performers and nurture their growth. See more key findings from the report and download your copy in full.
