If CS is Not In the Room at SKO, You Are Planning in a Vacuum

By Kristen Hayer

Sales Kickoffs do more than establish quotas and set pipeline expectations. They shape how the company shows up for customers over the next year.

Decisions made at your SKO ripple outward. They influence onboarding timelines, delivery models, renewal conversations, and expansion strategies. When Customer Success is not part of those conversations, misalignment is not an accident. It is built in from the start.

Too often, organizations only discover the impact months later, when commitments made in good faith are already in motion and much harder to unwind.

What Really Happens When CX Teams Are Excluded

In many companies, SKO planning happens with the best of intentions. Sales leaders focus on growth, momentum, and clarity for the field. But when CX leaders are not included, a familiar pattern emerges.

Sales teams leave SKO with new positioning, updated packages, aggressive timelines, or revised expectations. CS teams inherit those decisions after the fact and are expected to operationalize them. Onboarding plans are rewritten. Delivery teams scramble to adjust. Renewal conversations start from a place of explanation rather than confidence.

None of this happens because teams are careless. It happens because the system was designed without all the voices that need to carry the outcome forward.

“We’ll Loop Them In Later” and the Trust Gap

“We’ll loop CS in later” can sound reasonable in the moment. In practice, it creates a quiet trust gap.

When CX leaders are excluded from early planning, they are positioned as downstream problem-solvers rather than strategic partners. Over time, that erodes internal trust. CS teams stop believing that commitments are realistic. Sales teams feel frustrated when post-sale teams push back. Leaders spend more time mediating than aligning.

Customers feel this misalignment even if they never see the internal dynamics. What they experience is inconsistency. Promises feel fluid. Expectations shift. Confidence weakens.

This Is a Revenue Risk, Not a Process Problem

It is tempting to frame this as a coordination issue. In reality, it is a revenue issue.

Misalignment that starts at your SKO shows up later as longer time-to-value, more escalations, and weaker renewal conversations. Expansion becomes harder when customers are still trying to reconcile what they were sold with what they received.

Revenue leakage does not usually come from one bad decision. It comes from a series of small disconnects that compound over time.

What Meaningful CS Participation Actually Looks Like

This is not about turning Sales Kickoffs into cross-functional marathons. It is definitely not about slowing down momentum or diluting focus.

Meaningful CS participation is targeted and intentional. It includes early visibility into strategy shifts that affect post-sale teams. It invites input on feasibility, sequencing, and customer readiness. It creates shared ownership of commitments that customers will live with long after SKO is over.

One of the most effective ways to reinforce this alignment is through shared training sessions tied to SKO themes. When Sales and CS teams learn together, they build a common language. Messaging stays consistent. Expectations are reinforced across the customer lifecycle.

Shared training does not need to be extensive. Even a focused session on new positioning, packaging, or customer promises can dramatically reduce downstream friction.

Building Coherent Commitments Across Teams

Leaders who want SKOs to drive durable results take a systems view.

They identify which decisions will affect customers beyond the initial sale. They ensure CX leadership has a seat in those conversations early enough to influence outcomes. They use shared training sessions to reinforce team alignment and clarify how commitments translate into action.

The payoff is real. Teams spend less time correcting. Trust across functions improves. Customers experience the company as coherent rather than fragmented.

Why This Matters

Customers do not experience Sales and the Customer Experience as separate entities. They experience one company.

When SKOs happen in isolation, misalignment becomes inevitable. When CS is in the room, commitments are more realistic, trust is preserved, and revenue is more resilient.

This is not about inclusion for its own sake. It is about building plans that the entire organization can stand behind and customers can believe in.

The Success League is a Customer Success training and consulting firm that offers corporate training. Reach out to us to discuss customized, virtual or on-site training for your team or visit TheSuccessLeague.io to view our full suite of offerings.

Kristen Hayer - Kristen is the Founder & CEO of The Success League, a global, customer-focused consulting and training firm. Kristen’s background includes leading award-winning sales, marketing, and customer success teams in early and growth-stage tech companies. She is the host of several podcasts on CS and leadership, and has written over 100 articles on the field of customer success. The book she recently co-authored with 5 other CS thought leaders - The Customer Success Talent Playbook - recently hit #1 on Amazon in 5 categories. Kristen received her MBA from the University of Washington and splits her time between San Francisco and San Felipe, Mexico.