# Senior Manager, Customer Success

**Company:** [Shield AI](https://hotfix.jobs/companies/shield-ai)
**Location:** Dallas, TX
**Role:** Customer Success
**Salary:** $144k – $216k/yr
**Experience:** 10+ years
**Skills:** Customer Success, Account Management, Program Management, Customer Operations, Team Leadership, Executive Presence, Cross-Functional Leadership, Customer Health Scoring, Success Plans, Escalation Management, Stakeholder Management, Defense Technology, Aviation Operations
**Posted:** 2026-06-29

> Lead and scale the Customer Success function for Shield AI's V-BAT and X-BAT aircraft customers. Manage a team of CSMs, build operating models and critical accounts programs, drive mission value, operational readiness, and executive visibility for defense and commercial accounts.

## Job Description

## What you'll do

### Lead and Scale the Customer Success Function
- Establish and lead the Aircraft Division Customer Success function supporting V-BAT and X-BAT customers across U.S. government, allied defense, and strategic commercial accounts.
- Manage, coach, and develop a team of Customer Success Managers responsible for customer adoption, operational readiness, mission value, and long-term account success.
- Define team structure, roles, responsibilities, account assignments, performance expectations, and career development plans.
- Recruit and onboard Customer Success talent as the customer base and Aircraft Division continue to grow.
- Set team priorities and allocate resources based on customer risk, strategic importance, operational activity, and business needs.
- Establish measurable team and individual goals and conduct regular performance evaluations, coaching, and development discussions.
- Build a culture of urgency, accountability, professionalism, transparency, operational excellence, and customer advocacy.

### Build the Customer Success Operating Model
- Develop and operate a scalable Customer Success model that includes account segmentation, customer health scoring, success plans, engagement cadence, executive business reviews, and lifecycle governance.
- Ensure priority customers have documented success plans tied to mission outcomes, readiness objectives, adoption milestones, training requirements, sustainment needs, and executive stakeholder alignment.
- Establish standards for customer onboarding, operational transition, training coordination, sustainment handoffs, adoption management, and recurring mission-value reviews.
- Create repeatable processes, templates, playbooks, and governance mechanisms that allow the Customer Success organization to scale.
- Define clear ownership and operating rhythms across Customer Success, Deployment Operations, Flight Operations, Training, Sustainment, Program Management, Sales, Product, Engineering, Quality, Supply Chain, and Mission Operations.
- Partner with Aircraft Operations leadership to establish organizational priorities, resource requirements, operating plans, and functional performance goals.

### Lead the Critical Accounts Program
- Own and operate the Aircraft Division Critical Accounts Program for escalated, at-risk, high-priority, or strategically sensitive customers.
- Define Critical Accounts Program entry criteria, severity levels, account-health triggers, escalation paths, executive engagement requirements, and exit criteria.
- Lead cross-functional critical-account reviews with clear owners, recovery plans, decision logs, customer communication strategies, risk-reduction actions, and measurable closure criteria.
- Assign and hold internal owners accountable for recovery actions, commitments, and due dates.
- Ensure the appropriate technical, operational, sustainment, supply, quality, program, and executive resources are engaged based on the severity and mission impact of each account.
- Provide senior leadership with concise, action-oriented visibility into customer risk, mission impact, customer sentiment, commercial exposure, and recovery status.
- Personally support customer engagements involving significant operational risk, executive attention, or strategic importance.
- Conduct post-recovery reviews to ensure root causes are addressed and lessons learned are incorporated into products, processes, training, sustainment, and support.

### Advocate for Customer Mission Success
- Serve as a senior customer advocate for V-BAT and X-BAT customers and ensure Shield AI understands their missions, operating environments, readiness expectations, adoption barriers, and long-term objectives.
- Build trusted relationships with senior military, government, operational, and enterprise stakeholders.
- Translate customer feedback into clear product, support, training, documentation, sustainment, and operational requirements.
- Partner with Product, Engineering, Operations, Quality, Supply Chain, Training, Sustainment, and Business Development to resolve customer issues and implement permanent corrective actions.
- Ensure customer feedback, operational lessons, and recurring issues are incorporated into product and service improvement priorities.
- Support strategic customer engagements, demonstrations, exercises, operational deployments, executive briefings, and business reviews as needed.
- Identify risks and opportunities that could affect customer retention, mission success, future adoption, or account growth.

### Establish Metrics and Executive Visibility
- Own Customer Success dashboards, account-health assessments, risk registers, success plans, Critical Accounts Program reporting, and executive operating reviews.
- Define and track indicators including mission readiness, product adoption, training progress, fleet availability, support responsiveness, issue aging, customer sentiment, renewal or expansion risk, and executive engagement.
- Establish regular reporting cadences that clearly communicate customer outcomes, emerging risks, functional performance, resource constraints, and required leadership decisions.
- Use customer and operational data to identify trends, recurring problems, systemic risks, and opportunities to improve the customer experience.
- Measure the effectiveness of the Customer Success organization and continuously improve team processes, tools, and operating rhythms.

## Required qualifications
- 10+ years of experience in customer success, customer operations, account management, program management, field operations, professional services, aviation operations, defense technology, aerospace, or mission-critical enterprise technology.
- 5+ years of experience leading customer-facing, account management, support, field operations, program management, or Customer Success teams.
- Demonstrated experience hiring, managing, coaching, and developing high-performing teams.
- Experience building or scaling a Customer Success, customer operations, account management, or similar customer-facing function.
- Demonstrated success managing escalated, at-risk, executive-level, or mission-critical customer accounts.
- Experience operating structured escalation, customer-health, critical-account, executive-governance, or customer-recovery processes.
- Strong executive presence and the ability to communicate effectively with senior military, government, enterprise, and internal executive stakeholders.
- Ability to establish strategy while remaining actively engaged in customer execution and issue resolution.
- Proven ability to lead cross-functional teams through ambiguity, urgency, conflict, and high operational stakes.
- Strong understanding of customer lifecycle management, adoption, operational readiness, sustainment, support, renewals, and expansion.

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