Why the best Customer Success leaders use AI to think better, not to talk more.
AI has made it incredibly easy to build a QBR.
Upload your CRM data.
Connect your product usage.
Pull in Avoma Conversation Intelligence transcripts.
Click one button.
Seconds later, you’ve got a beautiful 15-page document packed with charts, metrics, feature updates, risks, opportunities, action items, and enough information to keep everyone in the room occupied for an hour.
Then you take that crazy long doc and have AI put a deck together based on all of this info
And that’s exactly the problem.
We’re starting to mistake information for strategy.
The more AI improves, the easier it becomes to generate content. But generating content isn’t the same thing as creating a meaningful executive conversation.
In fact, AI-generated QBRs often make the meeting worse.
The AI Trap
I’ve been seeing the same pattern over and over.
A CSM asks AI:
“Create a QBR using our usage reports, CRM notes, support tickets, conversation transcripts, and product roadmap.”
The output is impressive.
It summarizes everything.
The problem isn’t that it’s wrong.
The problem is that it’s trying to say everything.
When you take that document, have AI put it into PowerPoint, suddenly you're presenting a 25-slide deck that feels more like a quarterly audit than a business review.
The customer spends most of the meeting listening.
The CSM spends most of the meeting presenting.
Almost nobody spends the meeting thinking.
And the next time you ask the customer for an hour of their time for a QBR they disappear!
QBRs Aren’t Presentations
A QBR was never meant to be a presentation.
It was designed to be a conversation.
The purpose isn’t to show customers everything you’ve learned.
The purpose is to help both sides discover what matters next.
That’s a huge difference.
If you’re talking for 45 minutes and the customer speaks for 15, you’ve probably missed the opportunity.
The best QBRs feel less like a presentation and more like an executive strategy session.
Customers should leave thinking:
“That was one of the most valuable business conversations I’ve had this quarter.”
Not:
“That was a nice summary of what your software did.”
AI Should Help You Find the Story
This is where AI is incredibly powerful.
Instead of asking AI to build the deck…
Ask it to find the story.
Questions like:
What trends surprised you?
What changed this quarter?
Which outcomes are improving?
Where is adoption slowing?
What risks should I validate with the customer?
What opportunities deserve discussion?
What assumptions might I be making?
Those prompts force AI to become an analyst instead of a presentation generator.
That’s where the value lives.
Every Slide Should Earn Its Place
One exercise I like is asking a simple question before keeping a slide.
If I removed this slide, would the conversation suffer?
If the answer is no…
Delete it.
A usage chart isn’t valuable because it exists.
It’s valuable if it creates a discussion.
A roadmap slide isn’t valuable because engineering shipped features.
It’s valuable if it changes the customer’s business priorities.
A renewal timeline isn’t valuable because procurement needs dates.
It’s valuable if it uncovers blockers before they become problems.
Every slide should exist to create dialogue, not consume time.
Let Curiosity Do More Work Than Content
The strongest QBRs don’t answer every question.
They create better ones.
Instead of showing twelve charts about adoption…
Show one.
Then ask:
“What do you think changed here?”
Instead of explaining every new feature…
Ask:
“If we could solve one workflow for your team this quarter, what would have the biggest business impact?”
Instead of listing risks…
Ask:
“What’s changed inside your organization since we last met?”
Those questions generate insights AI will never discover from data alone.
Because customers don’t buy software to improve dashboards.
They buy software to improve businesses.
Don’t Outsource Your Judgment
AI can summarize.
AI can organize.
AI can identify patterns.
But AI can’t replace judgment.
It doesn’t know which executive is skeptical.
It doesn’t know the politics behind a delayed initiative.
It doesn’t know the conversation that happened in the parking lot after your executive business review.
It doesn’t know which topic will completely change the direction of the meeting.
That’s still your job.
The best Customer Success professionals won’t be the ones who use the most AI.
They’ll be the ones who combine AI’s ability to analyze information with their own ability to lead conversations.
AI should make your QBR shorter, not longer.
Use it to identify the insights that matter.
Then remove everything else.
Because customers rarely remember every slide you presented.
They remember the conversations that changed the way they think.
And that’s what great QBRs have always been about.
Until next week,
Mark
P.S. If we aren’t connected on LinkedIn yet, come join me there
