3 CS Trends That Will Define 2026 & Kristi’s Next Chapter ft. Kristi Faltorusso

Because the thing that you called out that I think is, is really important for folks is that the minute you start to try to embed all of these systems into things that are going to drive more automation and more productivity in your business, their level of expertise and their experience is going to be critical. And so, you know, I hope that for all the people that are in ops, that they are treated with respect and care because they are going to be mission critical for, I think, long term success in a lot of these companies.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
You’re listening to Unchurned, brought to you by the Gainsight Podcast network. Some conversations are easier when you already know each other very well. Today’s guest is Christy Faltruso. She’s a very close friend of mine. She even flew to London for my wedding this summer. She’s also my former unturned co host and someone I’ve spent years thinking out loud with about customer success. Christie’s here with some big professional news. More than that, we talk about what we’re both seeing as we head into 2026.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
The patterns, the shifts, the things starting to feel different. And if you read this week’s Unchurned substack, these themes will sound familiar. This episode is the conversation behind that post. It’s a thoughtful one and a good place to pause and reflect on where customer success is headed next. I’m Josh Schachter. This is Unchurned. Going right. We’re just going right back into it.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Let’s, let’s we kick it old school. I like that.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
We’re just going right back into it. No prep. Cristy. This is it. This is it. No, no, I mean, everybody, welcome. Welcome to. Stop interrupting me.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Christy, stop. I’m starting the episode. Hi, everybody. I have a very special. If you couldn’t tell from the banter already, we just jumped into it. No prep. 10 seconds in. Christy Falterusso, my old co host, my dearest friend.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Christy, thank you so much for joining me.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Thank you for texting me at 9:15 and asking me if I’d be ready to get on a podcast in five minutes.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Well, we had a cancellation and you were the third person that came to mind. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. We haven’t even checked. The audio is. How’s your. How’s mine sounding? Yours? Okay.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You sound. You sound wonderful. It’s been so long since I’ve had your head in a little box. Next to mine.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah, yeah, exactly. You sound a little distant, but that might just be emotionally, I don’t know. Or the mic is too far away.

Kristi Faltorusso:
All right, I moved a little bit closer. Hopefully.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
That’s better. That’s better. The audience will appreciate that.

Kristi Faltorusso:
There we go.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
And now we can see the mic stand because we know. Know who you are. A beautiful new, new logo there.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Oh, this is actually my old logo. I have some new stuff that’s gonna be revealed in the coming weeks.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Oh, okay. Okay. What else do you wanna reveal? What else do you wanna tell us? Chrissy, what’s going on? We’re filming this right now on January 6th. It’s actually gonna be published tomorrow, so pretty much real time. So what’s going on?

Kristi Faltorusso:
So, Josh, I love cl.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
What?

Kristi Faltorusso:
I know you’re so shocked. So surprised. You never saw that coming. No. After five years with Dave and the team there, I decided to step out of the role and step into something new this year, which I’ve not announced publicly yet what I’m doing until this show.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Everybody, Christy, right now is going to tell us.

Kristi Faltorusso:
I always try to steal my thunder, but yeah. So after five years, I decided that it was time. It was time for me to leave. And I. And I wrote about it in my newsletter this morning. And it’s funny because I’ve gotten a lot of people reaching out after reading that because I think I arch. Like, I think I didn’t get it.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Because I’m not on your newsletter. I’m not on your newsletter. What’s your.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Probably definitely sure.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Or spam. How do I get onto your newsletter?

Kristi Faltorusso:
You go to my website, christyfalteruso.com and you go to newsletter. And you go and enter your email address and that way you’ll get it. And then you would have read the beautiful story about my journey to client success and then leaving. And honestly, it was one of those things where, you know, I kind of wrote about it and I was like.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Why are you leaving?

Kristi Faltorusso:
For all of the. Listen, I’m going to tell you. So for all the other jobs and companies I ever left, it was always clear, right? Like, I had a toxic boss, there was lack of growth, the company didn’t excite me, something new came along. Those reasons were always super clear. And for the first time in my career, I’m sitting in a role that I loved, that was super rewarding and super fulfilling, under a leader who I respected, with a team whom I loved, in a product, in a space that, like, I adored. And I decided it was time to leave. And it’s crazy because I don’t think that a lot of people find themselves in a position where it’s like, everything seems great. Why would you leave?

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah.

Kristi Faltorusso:
And I just got to a place where I think I explored every corner of myself in that role and what was possible for me in that organization. And I decided that, you know, growth doesn’t happen when you’re comfortable. And I was comfortable. Not complacent, but comfortable. And it was time for me to get uncomfortable again.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Well, you’re an entrepreneur. You may not be, you know, going and raising VC money, but you are true and true an entrepreneur in your way, as we can see on your mic stand, and all the brand you’ve created, but. But all the great stuff that you’ve created and are going to continue to create, and I don’t even know what you’re going to do. You’ve kept it really buttoned up. So I’m really exc. For this. This unveil that we’re going to do on the podcast in a couple weeks on my podcast. Oh, okay.

Kristi Faltorusso:
So now I have to come back to your podcast and tell everybody what’s going on.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
It always comes back to me. It always comes back to me, but.

Kristi Faltorusso:
It’S my favorite thing about you.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
What are you going to miss the most about client success?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Honestly, it’s probably going to be Dave.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I knew that.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah. And listen, I love my team, but, like, I still feel like, you know, some of my team members and I had been really close. Some of them worked for me at previous companies. So, like, our relationships withstand the test of time. Right. Like, I know them outside of work, I know them not working together. We. We talk every day, we text.

Kristi Faltorusso:
But Dave and I, like, honestly, it was like frickin frack. For five years, we. We traveled the world together. We.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I thought that’s you and me frickin frack. But.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Well, I’ll come up with a cute other name for us. One that makes me adoring. And you? Josh. Probably just Josh and Christie, but yeah, it saved. Like, we. We did everything together. I talked to this guy every single day. I mean, outside of my husband, he.

Kristi Faltorusso:
He was the other man in my life. Like, we. We did everything together. He didn’t make a decision without me, and vice versa. And I don’t know, like, it takes a. A long time to build that kind of relationship and that depth, like, where he doesn’t even have to say anything. I know exactly what he needs, what he wants and what he wants to do. I know when he’s mad, when he’s sad, when he’s happy.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Like, there was so much depth to the relationship we built, and I think that that’s what I’m gonna miss the most, is, like, having access to him every day. I’ve already texted. I don’t know how to go a day without talking to him.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
So let’s, let’s take, let’s. Let’s make that into a lesson. By the way, I love Dave Blake. Like, he’s one of the just the nicest, kindest, you know, hearted people in the world. Really astute business person, but that’s a dime a dozen. There’s lots of astute business people. He is just a really good human being. How did you build that depth of relationship of trust, of loyalty with Dave?

Kristi Faltorusso:
So that’s a great question. Obviously, communication and transparency was key for us. You know, since day, day one or day zero even, I was always very clear with Dave, with my ambitions were what I wanted to do, what my style was, what my boundaries were, and he was equally transparent with me. And I think that that level of communication, transparency can, can live with any leader, like any boss you have, like anybody. It doesn’t have to be just because we were both in the C suite together. We had built a really strong level of communication and just our dialogue and our style. The second thing I’d think is how I built the trust, you know, if I stay true to just talking about the trust equation, right? Reliability, credibility, intimacy over self orientation. Dave already knew what my motivators were and what I wanted to get out of this role long term and what I, you know, what my ambitions were.

Kristi Faltorusso:
But I made sure that I delivered on everything I promised him I would when I joined, right, as far as reliability, he knew he could trust me. I showed up, I did the work I said I was going to do. I did it the way that I, you know, outlined I would. I knew this space, I knew our customers, I knew our team. I knew what needed to get done. And we had a really beautiful working relationship together. I never treated him as like a boss. And maybe there’s probably lines and limits that other people might want to draw because they’re more comfortable with that.

Kristi Faltorusso:
But for me, I treated Dave like a friend. And I think what made our relationship so beautiful was that I treated him like a friend. I would never disrespect my friends. I would never not show up for my friends. I would never not do the things for my friends, right? I flew across the country to go to Your wedding. I went to your 40th birthday. These are things you do for your friends, right? You show up, you. You’re there with kindness.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You’re. You’re just authentically yourself in a way that makes that relationship really beautiful. And so I think I just. I. I leaned into that really hard, and he responded really well, and I think that was kind of how our relationship grew.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah. Well, congratulations. Congratulations on. On all the great stuff that you guys did together over those. It was about five years, right?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah, just shy of five. Yep.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah, I heard the Rolex was coming at five. You should have stayed a couple of days.

Kristi Faltorusso:
I should have. I should have hung out. Anthony will buy me a Rolex.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah, that’s right. Sorry, Anthony. But now, congratulations. Congratulations on. On. On what you guys accomplished. And congratulations on what’s next. Give us something.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Give us, like a teaser or something to nibble on here. If somebody’s going to DM you, like, what would they DM you about? You know?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Well, I had some interesting DMs come in yesterday, Josh. Like, just for the record, like, there are some people who are acquaintances. I think it’s the best way to kind of categorize them with messages. Not congratulating me, not saying anything else. Where are you going next? Like, literally, that. It. I’m like. I’m like, you’re with a message, and this is people that want you to take anything.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
This. This is people that are. That are more junior to you, that want you to go with you, or this is people that. That are senior that want to take you.

Kristi Faltorusso:
No, this is these. Or just be overly specific about it, but it’s just people in the community who are interested and I think more gossipy and want information rather than it being a genuine curious of where I’m going. Right.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Fair enough.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Which was just really funny to see the different messages that I got. So here’s what I will tell you all. No one will be surprised. And I think that’s the only teaser that I’m gonna. I’m gonna give. I don’t think anyone will be surprised when I make the announcement.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Okay.

Kristi Faltorusso:
I have to give you a cliffhanger, Josh.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I can’t really use it, but we’ll take it. We’ll take it. What? What? So we’re a week into the new year. What. What are you taking with you into the new year? I. I don’t care about your fitness training and. And, like, nutrition and stuff like that. I’m talking about, like, professional.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Like, what. What are. What are. What are your what am I trying to say? What are the themes that you’re seeing? Your. Your prognostications for CS post sales this year?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Oh, gosh. Oof. Okay, so I didn’t know we were doing CS talk here, but okay, Vacation brain.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
But you’re back.

Kristi Faltorusso:
No, no, no, I get it, I get it. Sometimes, to be honest with you, I think we’re going to see some themes continue. I don’t know that there’s going to be like standout, bold new things. I think there’s going to be a lot of continuation of what we saw in the last year. One thing I see that I think is going to happen, we’re going to see a big growth around CSOPs because I think with the evolution of AI and automation and all of the new things that AI can facilitate, you’re going to need people who can build out the systems to go and execute that effectively. So I think that’ll be something different and it may be rebranded and it may have a different sound and different roles, but we’re still going to see that and that’s going to happen. Something else that I think we’re going to see and that’ll be in support of AI, and that’s probably going to be the exhaust. How exhaust AI there is just through the ops.

Kristi Faltorusso:
I think you’re going to see a lot of consolidation around tech stack. To be very honest with you, we saw it a lot over the past two years. I think that’s going to continue really strongly into the new year is that people are thinking about their technology, what they have in front of them. And I think it’s twofold. I think one, you’ve got people that are trying to cut costs and consolidate their budget and streamline things. Then I think you do have other people that want to open up opportunities to bring in new software, probably more in line with things that are going to help them support their AI initiatives. And then the third thing that I’d say for me, you’re going to see just a transformation of roles. I don’t think think that you’re going to see roles go away.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You’re going to see role scopes evolve. You’re not going to see the same JDs that you saw posted over the past 15, 16, you know, 20 years. The customer success role will inherently look very different on paper. Whether that will be true in execution, I don’t know just yet. I think it takes a long time to see that level of change. But I think what people are going to be looking for is going to look Very different than what they were seeking before.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
So CSOPs, the growing importance of CSOPs is number one, the, the consolidation in our tech stack and how that’s going to impact CS and then the evolution of the role of, of the csm. Totally agree. I wrote, you know, so we have our unchurned substack channel right now that we’re, we’re launching this winter. And I wrote an article actually last week, or was it this week that had my kind of trends that I’m seeing and expecting in 2026 coming out of 2025. And those are up there. I mean, I spoke to Cassie Young, she’s a VC at Primary Ventures, and Kyle Poyer, you know, who’s now off on his own as well, but from OpenView. And they’re talking about this err, experimental recurring revenue and there’s like this apocalypse that’s going to come that we, you know, companies have been playing around with all these AI tools and there’s been this bloat for good reason because it’s a fun playground and we know that there’s productivity that we can gain from it and we’re all just kind of learning together. But there will come a point and I think it will be this year and, and who, you know, what do I know? Right? But, but my, you know, my thinking that it’s gonna, and, and you’re gonna see that consolidation greater than in the past.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Not, not just for budgetary reasons, but again because people have been just kind of tinkering and you know, I was talking to our, our rev ops team yesterday. I’m like, how many, how many go to market tools do we have? He’s like, I know, I know, right? And like you, you just alluded to there, you’ve got like the, the young AI companies and, and everybody wants to give it a try and they have outbound emails that, that come to you and you’re like, oh wow, you can do that. And then you realize months later like, oh wait, there’s like 75% overlap in these 10 tools. So I, I think it’s coming. I don’t know how, how, how do you think that’ll affect cs?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Well, I think it’s gonna be interesting. And so I wanted to, just before how that impacts CS though, I, I’d be interested to see how that impacts those businesses because I think that you had a lot of, you had an insurgence of, of revenue coming in, right? People signing new contracts, coming on board to try something there. There’s a lot of potential in A lot of these solutions, but then also what you’re doing is during that time while they’re using it, these big embedded systems that are in the organizations are catching up and innovating twice as fast. Right. And so now they’re releasing similar functionality. So what’s going to happen is that people are going to be like, nope, I already have that functionality and systems that are really embedded into our business. I don’t need these point solutions. So I’m actually curious to see what, what ends up happening to the space of these new platforms, these new products.

Kristi Faltorusso:
We’ll call them not even platforms, but what’s going to happen. Right. Because it won’t even be that we need to consolidate them. There won’t be a need for them because they’ve really focused on features and functionality and they’re not real platforms of transformation.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
It’s going to come from a couple of angles. Right. It’s that it’s the structural thing of like, okay, they’re point solutions, not platforms. The platforms are catching up. It’s going to come from the experimental revenue starting to dissolve. It’s, you know, there’s just natural consolidation across the board in the past half decade. Budgets are still tight, there’s going to be headwinds, it will be interesting, but there’ll be still great companies that, that emerge from all this. The other thing you talk about is ops.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
So I’ve gotten exposed now. I’ve been with Gainsight now for, for just over six months and of course I’m more kind of on the marketing side and the customer facing side. But I’ve now been exposed the closest to our customer success through an initiative that we’re just kind of getting going. We kind of did it a little bit under the radar during the holidays and now we’re kicking it into higher gas is around some AI ification agentification around a really high value activity for our CS team.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Okay.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I won’t say what just yet. We’re going to come out with an article on it soon. And I’ve gotten close to the OPS folks through that engagement, through that project and boy, like that is the most important thing is to have strong OPS people right now to really be able to like to just understand all the tooling to start playing around with, with all these AI playgrounds themselves, these spaces and to. And they also have to be really strong product owners too.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Because now they’re starting to develop these feature, you know, if they can, like they’re now the builders so they need that, that product management instinct. As well. I, I think, I think you’re right. I think having a strong ops person is like if I were building a CS team in 2026, that would be my first hire.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Right. Because all right, the thing that you called out that I think is, is really important for folks is that if these people are already in your organization, they know your tools and systems better than anybody else. So they actually understand how it’s going to work with these other things, these other tools, other systems, workflows. Right. They understand the impact of change. And I just feel like that is not power that’s recognized or realized just yet for a lot of companies. But I’m like the minute you start to try to embed all of these systems into things that are going to drive more automation and more productivity in your business, their level of expertise and their experience is going to be critical. And so, you know, I hope that for all the people that are in ops that they are treated with respect and care because they are going to be mission critical for I think long term success in a lot of these companies.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I think so, Yeah, I think so. And they’re the people that have the DNA anyways that they want to be out there learning about AI, right? Learning how to like vibe code and those sorts of things. The other trend that I’m seeing or in 2025 that I saw was most successful or was a, was a, an attribute of the most successful CS leaders that had the most successful, successful AI adoption and engagements. These leaders, they were leading by example in like diving into AI themselves. They were vibe coding weekends and nights, learning what the different agent spaces are all about, you know, comparing them and being able to really like just not tell their teams but show their teams. And, and it can also start from the bottom up too, right? Those ops people and those CSMs that really are passionate about learning as well, like that’s how you create a groundswell of AI adoption too is from bottoms up. But I also genuinely think that like top down leaders need to show by example and like carve out that time for themselves. Liron Yahalomi, she’s the VP of CS at Aligned, she does a phenomenal job of this.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
We spoke to her months ago and she’s just got like all of her little agents, she calls them her little people I think but like all her agents that, that she just tinkers with on her Fridays and she’s like been able to scale herself and show her team. How’s your vibe coding going? Because I know it’s something that you were Playing around with in 2025.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Oh, my gosh. I built like four different products in 2025, obviously. Well, I won’t say it’s obvious that none of those are coming to fruition, but spoiler alert, none of those are coming to fruition, but they were super cool. In fact, I just went through and consolidated all of my subscriptions because I had one to replit, to lovable, to like every single platform that was available out there. Yeah, I was like, okay, like, let’s go pay for everything and try them all and see what I like and what works. And to be honest with you, it was a lot of fun. I learned a ton. But the thing, like, honestly, I went back to the ones that were most important to me.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Chatgpt Claude, It’s Gamma. I double down into Zapier because of the connect.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
How do you like Gamma? How do you like Gamma? I’ve heard mixed things about Gamma. Really well. Okay. I’ve heard bad things about, from. From like our product marketing director who. Who is like, that’s their job and they’re like a professional.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Okay, fine, fine, fine.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah.

Kristi Faltorusso:
For somebody like me who has to crank out decks all the time, whether that be for proposals for marketing things for like, whatever speaking engagements. Gamma literally has given me days back in my life and I’ve only been using it for a couple months to be able to take all of my content and drop it in and just have slides automatically be created for me with like all of the visuals that I upload into the system with my branding, with my colors. Like, I don’t know. I think if you take some time and really tailor it to what it is that you want it to look like and create your own templates, I think it does a great job. I’ve actually just. Every single person I speak to, I kind of pitch Gamma. So for me, it’s a time saver. I understand that if you are a visual person, if you’re a brand marketer, that you will poo poo all over this product.

Kristi Faltorusso:
But if you’re somebody like me who does a lot of stuff on their own, it’s a game changer.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
You were about to talk about Zapier as well.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah, because I need it to connect all the things, to do the things. So I design really cool actions that I want to be taken and I need something to kind of help me execute and carry them through. I. I’ve been doing a lot of technology cleanup though, so a lot of things that I was working on and putting in place, I had to put some holds on. But any leaders. I’m going to continue to do this.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
No, I. If not, no problem. But any leaders that come to mind that are doing like a really good job from your perspective on their AI enablement.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Listen, I’m sure there is a ton I can’t think of of any top of mind right now because my brain is not functioning properly. But I do believe there’s a lot of people that are very similar style. Like for me, what I was doing, Josh, is I was allocating an hour a day to learning whether that be on YouTube videos or watching TikTok videos on AI. I actually found that TikTok had a lot of really great, timely content because people could mask create content very quickly. So there are some people out there that are producing a lot of fantastic AI content. And if you’re somebody like me with a short attention span, 5 to 10 minute clips at max were like awesome little consumption points. I would write some notes down, try something and then go out about my day. But I would spend an hour a day on either YouTube on these things or even just playing myself and building.

Kristi Faltorusso:
And that was time really well spent and I can, I encouraged my team to do it and a lot of folks on my team embraced it. Some definitely more than others. But I think the ones that did will be, I think some of the breakout stars in, in the organization in the future.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
If there’s going to be a headline for this episode, it needs to be two things actually. First is go to christyfelturuso.com, sign up for her newsletter. Go to unchurned substack.com sign up for our newsletter. The second thing is that as a CS leader, as anybody practitioner of any go to market function, carve out an hour. Do you really do an hour a day? I. I’m going to call BS a little bit on that.

Kristi Faltorusso:
No, I mean sometimes more than hour because sometimes if I, if I find something that’s really cool, if anything it turns into more than an hour because then I start exploring and like playing around with it and then if anything it turns into like two or three.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Hours, then you go to flow mode. Yeah, you’re in the zone.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah, like it’s like once you, once an idea strikes and you’re like, oh my God, that’s so cool and you start to go play with it. Like I’m actually, I find it harder to restrain myself to an hour, but it’s an hour every day because even if it’s not the learning and maybe it’s not an hour block straight, Josh, Because I have a social media problem and I’m always scrolling on TikTok. For me, it’s like, I could be like, I don’t know, half hour in the morning and then another hour plus at night. So it was never not enough time. Uh, it was actually. I wasn’t spending not enough time. I was always spending more than the hour.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
No, I love that. I love that. I. I mean, so that’s the headline. Like, spend an hour a day. If it can’t be an hour, then 20 minutes doesn’t matter. But, like, I would challenge that if.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You’ like every leader can find an hour because it doesn’t need to be an hour block.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Well, okay, there’s context switching and stuff like that. You can’t do 15 minutes here, 15 minutes there. But fine, spend dedicated, focused time learning how to play with AI and vibe coding, even if it’s just for, like your gardening at home. And for some reason, I’ve. I’ve spoken to a lot of people that have gardening stuff that they’ve built with AI. I don’t know what the trend is there, but. Yeah, because it’s like the new mba, right? Like, you don’t need to go to business school to become an executive, you know, in the next decade. I don’t know.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
That’s a pretty sweeping statement. But, like, you need to learn the new era here.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah. I mean, listen, everything from like, fitness. I’ve seen people, like, rebuild their fitness plans using AI. I’ve seen people just go take pictures of their refrigerator and say, like, make me, like, give me a recipe for something based off of what you see in this photo. Like, honestly, like, there’s so many fun, unique ways to use it. So if it doesn’t interest you to, like, dive in and nerd out in your discipline, you probably have a hobby. You probably have something you enjoy doing. Make it fun for you so it doesn’t feel like learning.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You don’t enjoy.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah. The other thing I talk about in that article is find the person similar to leaders. Like, find the person in your organization. Maybe it’s the OPS person. Maybe it’s like a CSM who is ahead of the curve and is doing their own. I’ll say it again. Tinkering and learning how to use all this AI stuff and really elevate them. Like, make them the poster child of the organization.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Encourage them, feed them with the resources they need. Because I think that AI adoption, like, you can’t always force it. You have to really kind of like promote it when it’s coming organically from, from those. And I think every organization has that person. There’s a couple at Gainsight. You know, Kalpana is one, Brady is another, Elliot is another. Right. If they’re listening.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
But like, there’s a few folks that like. And I know every organization has those folks that are really ahead of the curve.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Find those people and champion them.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yeah, I would agree. Like I said, there was definitely some standout folks on my team that spent their nights and weekends doing it because they loved it so much. And I feel like those are the individuals that will find tremendous success in this space long term.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
All right, you’re getting like pinged all over the place. You’ve got your 10 minute calendar coming.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Up for your 11 o’ clock happening right here. You’re laughing. I have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 screens in front of me. If we count my phone, that makes it six. And so that’s six things that are. That are barking at me right now. None of which I want, if I’m being honest. It’s a lot of nosy people.

Kristi Faltorusso:
That’s what’s happening.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
My wife Jess, who you know, uh, we went out to brunch with her friends this weekend at abcv. Do you know abcv? It’s in midtown. It’s a vegetarian restaurant.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Oh, I definitely would not know that. I love some meat. No, thank you.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Okay. Yes. But like, it was delicious anyways. And her friend was telling us about this thing called a brick. Oh, yeah.

Kristi Faltorusso:
And it stops your. It stops all of your. Your device. It basically locks down your device and you have to physically go and tap your device to this brick and release it to actually use your devices.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yes. You need a brick.

Kristi Faltorusso:
I’m honestly like, it’s crazy that we have to live in a world where we have to lock our devices to not use them. That we have so little self control.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Can I buy you a brick? I mean, you know, I’ll do it right now. Like this is the gift for being on the episode. Can I. If I buy you a brick, I’ll.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Just do content around the brick and it’ll. Content will be great because then you’ll get. You’ll get all the credit for the brick.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I’ll get the impressions and. Yeah, yeah, I’ve got your address. You got the holiday card. I’ve got your address. I’m getting you a brick.

Kristi Faltorusso:
A brick would be interesting. Also very sad for me, but yes. No. So one of the things I started doing. So my. One of my personal 20, 26 things. Josh, I. I went back to reading for fun.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Okay. I feel like the past two years, I only read whatever book somebody shipped to me because I felt like I had to. There’s some obligatory reading and it was all business.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
So which Nancy Drew did you read?

Kristi Faltorusso:
It’s. It’s like, basically like Nancy Drew. It’s Rebecca Yarros, which is like. Sure. It’s more like Nicholas Sparks vibes. If I’m giving. If I’m drawing on another author. Love story, romance.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Cheesy, cheeky. Probably very predictable. Although everyone says these two books that I have queued up have a very interesting ending that you do not anticipate. So we will see. But I’m trying to get back into reading at night for fun and just put away my computers for a little bit. Put down the phone and just remember what it was like to read, because I love it.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah, I love that. That’s so funny, Christy. Just yesterday I bought a Kindle. I’ve never been an E reader. And I was browsing LinkedIn. I saw Chad Horenfeld’s post and he was talking about, like, the virtues of E reading and. And this, this website that he subscribes to that it, like, takes all your summaries. Good.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Something like that. I don’t know if that was it. It takes your notes. Right?

Kristi Faltorusso:
Yep. Yeah, I knew it too.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah. Yeah. So I’m. I’m in. We’ll see. We’ll see. I. I’m old school.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
I like, like the paper physical.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Josh is like, I love the. There’s something about. And I still dog ear my pages. And I know that people are exactly anti dog earing, but, like, something about holding the book and like turning pages and seeing how far I am and like, I don’t know.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Yeah, yeah. Just taking your nose, putting it all the way into the crease of the book.

Kristi Faltorusso:
And like, I bend my book. I can’t even do hardcover. I need to, like, bend it and like, crease the whole thing and, like, bend the pages. I’m horrible.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Like, my books look like some coffee stains on it. I know, I know. You can’t do that.

Kristi Faltorusso:
You’re so loved. But the good books that I enjoy, they look loved and I feel like that’s important. So E readers just don’t give me that vibe and they don’t have that smell of a book.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Right, right.

Kristi Faltorusso:
For all those reasons, Sharks, I’m out.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
This was great. Thanks, Christy.

Kristi Faltorusso:
Thanks, Josh.

Josh Schachter [Host]:
Thanks, everybody. Bye.