Leading with Purpose: Lee Roquet’s Playbook for Customer Experience Excellence
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Your journey is inspiring. How did you get started in customer success, and what’s kept you passionate about it?
Lee Roquet: I started my tech journey by digging around in a dumpster. It is a long story but I was working in the construction industry, and heard an ad on the radio about a new tech company coming to town. I wrote the number on a piece of wood. The clean-up crew tossed it in the dumpster. I got the job in tech support, and that was the start of my CS journey.
I have always been driven to improve CX and business operations. I have been lucky to have a great few mentors who pushed me early always to be looking for the marginal gains, new tech to help efficiency, and care about the customer experience most of all. I read, chase certifications, break things, fix them, and now I vibe code CX apps.
You’ve led big teams and big wins. What’s one leadership lesson that’s stayed with you across roles?
Lee Roquet: So many. We are people helping people — this is at the root of everything I do when building a great culture, designing the proper organization, and focusing on people development. It’s about remembering that behind every job title is a human being with ambitions, challenges, and emotions. That mindset shapes how I think about leadership and team building. I believe in hiring slowly to ensure the right fit and acting quickly when there’s a mismatch, because holding on too long can hurt the team’s progress. The right people in the right seats can make all the difference in driving success.
“Lately, I’ve embraced the idea that it’s ok to build the team you need for the goals ahead — not everyone will be the right fit forever, and that’s simply part of business. People will come and go, and a great manager’s responsibility is to shape the strongest possible team, not necessarily to create a “family.” But even when making difficult decisions, it’s essential to lead with empathy, transparency, and courage, ensuring people feel respected and valued throughout the process. That balance between high standards and humanity is what keeps a team both strong and inspired.” – Lee Roquet.
You’ve boosted NPS, cut churn, and built great CX programs. What do you think most companies still lack when it comes to customer experience?
Lee Roquet: Most companies are broken from the inside out. They overcomplicate their revenue and customer journey, adding too many systems and processes, and ending up with messy, unreliable data. Building a strong foundation for data, processes, teams, and customers is everything. Lately, I’ve noticed that Customer Success (CS) is still treated as the team expected to fix all of a company’s problems, yet they’re not given the authority or resources to make those changes. CS needs to evolve, and companies need to shift towards embracing Customer Experience (CX).
The reality is, the whole company is part of the CX team, just like everyone is part of the revenue team or the business health team. What’s missing in most businesses is a clear focus on what matters: the right team, the right tools, the right processes, and consistent feedback. CS alone cannot fix a poorly defined target customer, a broken sales process, product issues, or a lack of clear business vision and purpose. Those are company-wide responsibilities, not something to dump on one team.
AI is changing the game fast. How do you think the role of support teams will evolve in the next few years?
Lee Roquet: Yes, I see the way companies operate changing. Teams are getting smaller, agents are becoming more efficient, and insights are improving. But with this progress, customer teams need to focus on engagement that’s truly rooted in delivering value. Customer Success is no longer just about answering support questions or pushing feature adoption. Moving from CS to Customer Experience means focusing on the customer’s Jobs To Be Done.
The real goal or problem they’ve “hired” your product to solve, not just the features it offers. It’s about helping them achieve their outcomes, see value quickly, and succeed at what matters most to them. This is what builds loyalty and trust, and what convinces clients to keep investing in your product or service.
The big scenario. In your view, how does CX and customer support really impact business growth?
Lee Roquet:
“CX is, or should be, the foundation of a business. A company’s health depends on balance: new sales, customer retention, and expense management. It’s like a three-legged stool, easy to tip over if one leg is weak. Making CX a core company purpose should be at the heart of why we show up every day.” – Lee Roquet, Strategic Advisor, CXChronicles
AI is breaking down many companies’ competitive advantages because it’s now easier than ever to build and deliver software that solves problems. This means companies must work harder to retain customers, turn them into advocates, and give their teams a strong sense of purpose. CX plays a critical role in ensuring that what is promised and sold is actually delivered. Without that focus, company health will quickly fall out of alignment with the company’s vision.
Summary
Lee’s CS story starts in tech support and grew from a hands-on drive to improve CX and ops. He leads with a “people helping people” mindset, hires carefully, acts decisively, and leads with empathy.
He warns most firms suffer from messy systems and unclear ownership, so CS can’t fix everything alone. With AI, Lee says support will become leaner and more insight-driven, but true retention comes from helping customers achieve their real outcomes.
About Lee Roquet
Lee Roquet is a globally experienced Chief Customer Officer with 20+ years scaling high-performing SaaS and ecommerce customer operations. He’s driven major gains—scaling teams across NA/EMEA/APAC, cutting churn, lifting renewals, and leading M&A expansions—by blending data-driven strategy, AI-enabled automation, and empathetic leadership to turn CX into a growth engine