How do you define leadership in technical support?
It’s not just managing a team—it’s about creating a customer-first culture that empowers engineers to thrive.
Introduction
Technical Support Leadership goes beyond meeting KPIs. It’s about fostering an environment where customer satisfaction is the ultimate goal, and engineers feel supported, motivated, and challenged to grow. Balancing both is key to being a successful leader.
Three Key Elements of Impactful Leadership
1. Set the Culture That Champions Customer Success
This begins with creating a culture that prioritizes customers and empowers your team to succeed. A statement that lies at the heart of my customer-centric approach to technical support is
“We are only as successful as our customers are using our products.”
You may frame it differently, but the goal remains the same: A support team that understands how their work—whether solving issues swiftly or providing exceptional service—drives overall company success is how to start shaping a customer-first culture.
So how do you build this culture? There are multiple ways, and which approach you take really depends on you and your team.
Lead by example by making the customers best interests part of your decision-making process.
Make celebrating wins a normal and encouraged practice. Especially wins where the direct work of your team contributed to a great customer outcome.
Or simply lay it out for them. Show how great support leads to revenue growth, which comes back as investments in support.
2. Set Clear Team Goals
Once the culture is established, the next step is to ensure your team has clear goals that guide their actions. One of the most important things that you can do as a leader in technical support, or really any leadership position, is to set clear goals that your engineers can understand and that drive behaviors that ultimately translate into great customer experiences.
Saying something like “be customer-centric” isn’t enough—you need to provide clear guidance on what they should be focusing on and “Why” this leads to success.
When deciding on which metrics, I would recommend you leave the standard support metrics, such as median time to resolution, average CSAT, etc., to evaluate overall team performance. For individual performance, you instead want them to focus on making every customer interaction a positive experience.
Some of my favorites in this category include
Proactive Communication: Keep customers informed rather than waiting for them to ask for updates. Establish a cadence of meaningful communication required for each ticket priority. I was always a fan of % of tickets that did not receive a meaningful update in the last X number of days. The frequency will depend on your individual use case. With AI, assessing if a customer update is meaningful should be easy to measure.
Validated Solutions: Provide well-documented, thoroughly tested resolutions. Establish standards of what a well-documented solution should look like.
Direct Engagement: Use calls or video chats to resolve complex issues quickly instead of relying solely on ticket exchanges.
When your team understands how their actions impact customer satisfaction, their efforts align naturally with success.
3. Support Your Team and Treat Them Like Professionals
Clear goals set the foundation, but true leadership comes from how you support and empower your team to achieve them. As a leader, your success hinges on your team’s success. Your priority should always be to equip them with the tools, training, and growth opportunities they need. Encourage innovation and recognize their critical role in achieving technical excellence and customer satisfaction. Without their contributions, nobody wins.
Equally important is treating your team like the professionals they are. Trust them to make decisions and give them the autonomy they need to succeed. Your role as a leader is to provide guidance, not control. I’ve always made it clear to my team that they are empowered to make decisions, as long as two principles are followed:
The decision is in the best interest of the customer.
They can explain their reasoning behind the decision.
If these conditions are met, I will always stand behind their choices. And if a decision turns out to be incorrect, we approach it as a learning experience and move forward together. This approach builds trust, accountability, and confidence—key traits of high-performing teams. Treating your team like professionals isn’t just about respect; it’s about creating an environment where they can thrive.
Closing Thoughts
Great technical support leadership is built on culture, clear goals, and team empowerment. These are just a few thoughts from my experience.
What has worked for you as a leader in technical support?
Share your insights below—I’d love to hear your experiences!