Fostering a Top-Notch Customer Experience

As VP of Customer Operations, Amy Vogsland is all about customer experience. She leads a global department of 100 people who have exquisite attention to detail on all matters related to accounts, renewals, invoicing, and licensing. Their goal is to ensure customers succeed by getting the most out of their Fortra cybersecurity and automation solutions. 

How is the Customer Operations team delivering on the Fortra vision?    

The Customer Operations team continually strives to achieve best-in-class customer retention. This is a component of our corporate vision of being tenacious in our pursuit of a stronger, simpler future for cybersecurity. We accomplish this through a customer-focused billing and provisioning strategy that we support through strong product knowledge and cross-departmental collaboration. In fact, we work closely daily with the Sales, Legal, and Finance teams.  

Our product knowledge and strong customer relationships allow our team to quickly and efficiently respond to customer inquiries, which is critical to ensuring timely renewals without any lapse in Fortra services and support. This not only supports our best-in-class retention but delivers a superior customer experience through the entirety of the billing and order fulfillment process.   

What qualities do you believe are essential for success in Customer Operations, and how do you foster those qualities in your team?   

Being detail oriented, caring about our customers, and having a willingness to learn and dig into problems are key personal attributes for success. I am also a big believer in adaptability. I encourage people to continue being curious within their role and strive to pursue excellence by becoming experts within their area. We have an enhancement committee always looking to implement new processes to help streamline tasks. Our team’s documentation committee strives to create and maintain process guides to ensure easier onboarding and cross training. We hold monthly Skill-Up meetings with the team to help educate the full group on our software solutions and new processes being implemented.  

Can you share any role models/mentors who have had a significant impact on your career and how they influenced your leadership style? 

While finishing my B.A. in Management at the College of Saint Benedict in St. Joseph, Minnesota, I was thankful for the professors who took the time to help students like me with career development advice and referrals. I was determined to pass that on in my own career, actively mentoring those on my team to support career growth, and always scouting for budding all-stars and emerging leaders.  

This focus on career advancement is a Fortra hallmark, and I firmly believe that just because a job doesn’t exist today, doesn’t mean it won’t tomorrow. I always love hearing ideas for new positions and projects and working with employees to make them happen.   

What amazes you about your team? What are you most proud of? 

I am always amazed by my team’s attention to detail and true love for customer service. We have CRM super users who excel at digging into the system and looking for answers, often helping our internal and external customers find out-of-the-box solutions to meet customer needs. The depth of knowledge and expertise within our team is truly amazing and is all part of being a cybersecurity ally for our customers.  

During my tenure, I’ve been proud to have played a key role in supporting Fortra’s growth. When I joined Fortra, our department was a team of five, and today we have more than 100 people in 8 countries. Acquisitions are a key component of our growth and, as a centralized function for our organization, Customer Operations has an important role in welcoming and integrating our newly acquired team members. This process entails learning and mapping a newly acquired business’s operational practices to Fortra practices — often leading to the discovery of improvements we may be able to make within our own processes. My team strives for continual process improvement and is always eager to learn from one another. 

I always like to approach these types of change management opportunities in a way that gets new team members excited about the opportunities for growth ahead, even during the early stages of onboarding.  

If you could change one thing about the cybersecurity industry, what would it be?   

I would like to see increased vendor consolidation to reduce complexity for customers. This is something Fortra is actively working on. Companies are starting to understand the benefits of vendor consolidation across their cybersecurity solutions and are pushing to make this a priority. It’s a beneficial change for the industry and one that can greatly improve the customer experience. Having a single cybersecurity vendor as a trusted partner reduces administrative burdens and vulnerabilities, which enables companies to protect their operations and achieve success. 

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