Meet Your Client Success Manager: Staci Webber
August 18, 2020
Pype’s Client Success Managers (CSMs) come from a variety of backgrounds and with a variety of experiences, but they all work very hard to ensure that every project team finds success when using any of Pype’s products. From onboarding and training, to taking feedback and suggestions for new features, CSMs are the lasting point of contact between our clients and Pype as a whole. To help get to know them better, we sat down with each of them and discussed their experiences, stories, lives, and anything else on their minds.
Tell us a little bit about yourself.
Staci: My name is Staci Webber, and I was born and raised in the great state of “Northern Virginia.” I love to spend time having fun with my friends and family, including going to great restaurants, breweries, wineries, any sporting event (go Nats, Caps, Hokies especially!), and really anywhere that I can meet new people or grow closer to the people I already know. I love every kind of food and will try anything once (including but not limited to Pigeon while I was in Egypt, Guinea Pig when I was in Peru, and a bunch of different street foods in Cuba). Travelling is a big part of my life, and I try to visit a new country at least once a year!
When did you start working at Pype? What was your position like then?
Staci: I was hired in November of 2018 as Pype’s second Customer Success Manager at the time. Looking back, I realize how much I’ve learned about construction over these last two years. When I first started, I was able to tell people what Pype does, of course, but now I have a much deeper insight into how Pype fits into a contractor’s day-to-day and can relieve some of the stress they’re under.
What do you like most about working at Pype?
Staci: Every other job that I’ve had has been just a job. But with Pype, I get to work with and have fun with extremely bright people every day who have become my work family. Beyond the people and the software, I really enjoy the construction industry and the clients I work with. I’ve learned so much from my clients and am always looking forward to learning more!
What do you think is Pype’s value to the construction industry?
Staci: For far too long, the construction industry has tried to tackle problems just by throwing more money or more man hours at them. But with Pype, project teams can automate monotonous, manual, high risk processes while being able to scope out issues earlier on, create logs faster, collect closeout documents more efficiently and reliably, and really find the time to apply their (wo)manpower and expertise instead of spinning their wheels.
Out of all of Pype’s platforms, do you have a favorite? And do you have a favorite feature?
Staci: I was designated the “Closeout Queen” early on, so I have to go with Closeout as my favorite Pype product. It has been a welcome challenge to help manage Closeout on over 160 different projects, and my favorite feature—the new email scheduler—has definitely made the process easier for the project teams I work with. They’re able to customize email cadences to notify their trade partners of outstanding document requirements at different frequencies based on where they are in the project. A lot of the teams I work with will set up Closeout a year in advance and start notifying people once a month to encourage early submissions, then increase the frequency as they approach substantial completion. It’s one less thing for the team to worry about during the course of construction!
What’s something that’s surprised you about how clients use Pype?
Staci: I watch our users find new ways to utilize our products almost every day, but the innovation I’m seeing with how they use SmartPlans is unreal. A lot of clients are pushing the envelope as they use it to help them build procurement logs and do their takeoffs as well.
Do you have any anecdotes or stories from clients you’d like to share?
Staci: This is one of my favorites. I had a client tell me how they used the filters in AutoSpecs to identify over 100 LEED requirements. They knew this wasn’t a LEED project, but since these were in their specs, they decided to discuss the requirements with the design team. Using custom filters, the project team created two separate logs within minutes of each other: one that had just the LEED requirements for the designers to review, and another that had everything except the LEED requirements so the project team could continue to make progress in the meantime. Once they got confirmation back that none of the LEED requirements were necessary to meet, they were able to delete them from their official log without ever having slowed down progress on the project.
What do you want clients to know about you or about working with you?
Staci: I always laugh a little when a client apologizes to me for sharing their wishlist features or suggestions for improvements. Some of Pype’s best innovations have come from user feedback! Please, let us know all of it!
What do you want clients to know about Pype?
Staci: Whenever new babies are born at Pype they are called “Pypers,” and we have custom Pype onesies for them. So far this year, we’ve had three little Pypers born but there’s at least one more on the way!
What’s the one thing you most want clients to understand about the platform?
Staci: Project teams are sometimes annoyed by the overwhelming amount of information that AutoSpecs identifies in its initial run-through. Every project team is different, and so the information they are actually going to utilize is different for every project. That’s why Pype decided to present you with everything we find in your specs, and let your expertise interpret that information. To help you do this, I highly recommend you use the filtering and merging tools to quickly separate the information you don’t want in your logs, and to export an example list of “excess” to show your spec writers to break their habit of recycling specs.