Delancey Haig / BG-Demo – Check In
Callcompleted
Delancey Haig · 22 Jul 2025 14:45
Check-in with Saskia Mendes: about a dozen of 40 Growth seats are active, an invoices connector went stale after a finance change, and she fears a value question at renewal next summer.
What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Check-in with Saskia Mendes: about a dozen of 40 Growth seats are active, an invoices connector went stale after a finance change, and she fears a value question at renewal next summer.
What happened: Saskia Mendes, Head of Client Operations, joined alone for the 22 Jul 2025 check-in with Daniel Okafor. About a dozen of 40 Growth seats are active, and the planned second rollout wave slid after a restructure of client cover.
Customer view: The invoices source stopped loading after finance tidied permissions, and a director saw stale data. Saskia wants a quick message from BG-Demo before a director notices next time.
Commercial: She worries finance will ask what the seats are for at renewal next summer. Daniel put Growth at £44k a year, running to the start of July next year, and proposed short sessions per group plus an agreed measure of value.
Watch: Adding complaints data would test the Growth connector limit. Daniel owes her a headroom answer by Friday.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Theme
Growth adoption and stale data
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
champion
Who was there
BG-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Daniel Okafor to check connector headroom against the Growth limit and reply to Saskia by Friday.
- Daniel Okafor to join the finance changes channel and send a session plan: client ops in August, finance in September.
- Daniel Okafor to agree with Saskia what to count as value, such as disputes caught early and reviews prepared.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Only about a dozen of 40 Growth seats are active, so finance may question the subscription at renewal next summer.
- The invoices connector went stale after an unannounced finance change and could break again.
- One director remains sceptical and prepares reviews from her own folders.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Short per-group sessions on the customer's own clients could widen use across account managers and finance.
- Adding complaints data would deepen the connector footprint, subject to the Growth connector limit.
Transcript
Daniel OkaforAfternoon, Saskia. Thank you for making the time. I think it's just the two of us today, is that right, or is anyone else joining from your side?
Saskia MendesJust me. Afternoon, Daniel. Sorry, I'm eating a sandwich at my desk, I've had back-to-back things since nine. Can you hear me all right?- Daniel OkaforLoud and clear. Please, eat. I'm in no hurry. How's the week been?
- Saskia MendesOh, funny one actually. One of our client-account directors had a review on Monday with a client who swore blind they'd never been told about a late placement invoice. And she pulled it up in the brain in the room, with the client sat there, and showed the email thread and the invoice date. Done. Silence.
- Daniel OkaforThat's lovely to hear. Was that the director who was a bit sceptical at the start, or a different one?
- Saskia MendesDifferent one. The sceptic is still sceptical, but quietly, which for her is progress. Anyway. That's the good story. I'll give you the honest story too, because I know that's what you're calling about.
- Daniel OkaforI appreciate that. I'd rather have the honest version. So, just to set out what I'd like to cover: how the team is finding it, what the usage looks like from our side, the couple of tickets that came through this month, and then anything you want from us over the next quarter. Does that work?
- Saskia MendesWorks. Go on, start with usage, I'm curious what you see.
- Daniel OkaforGive me a second, I'll share my screen. Mm. There we go. Can you see the usage page?
- Saskia MendesYep, I can see it. Lots of blue.
- Daniel OkaforSo you've got forty licensed users on Growth, and over the last month the number of people actually active on an average day is about a dozen. That's very steady against the quarter before. It's barely moved, up a touch if anything.
- Saskia MendesRight. A dozen out of forty. Yeah. That's about what I'd have guessed, to be fair, and I won't dress it up. We have the directors using it properly, a few of the client ops team, and then a long tail of people who've logged in once and drifted.
- Daniel OkaforThat's a fair read. And I'd say steady isn't a bad place to be, the people who are using it are using it consistently. The question is really about the other twenty-odd seats, whether that's a rollout question or a relevance question.
- Saskia MendesRollout, mostly. We never did the second wave. We said we'd bring in the account managers and the finance team after the directors had bedded in, and then the summer happened, and then a restructure of how we cover clients, and it just slid.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood. And that restructure, is that settled now, or is it still moving?
- Saskia MendesMostly settled. Two teams merged, a couple of people changed manager. Nothing dramatic. But it meant nobody had spare head space for training sessions.
- Daniel OkaforOf course. Can I ask, who is asking the questions in the brain at the moment? Is it spread out, or is it mainly the directors?
- Saskia MendesDirectors, mostly. And me, I'm in there a lot, especially when there's a contractor-invoice dispute brewing. That's the one thing I really want us to catch earlier. If a contractor says they've not been paid and the client says they've paid us, I want to see both sides in one place before anyone picks up the phone.
- Daniel OkaforYes, that's the use you mentioned when we first set it up, if I remember rightly. Has it been working for that?
- Saskia MendesIt's worked a few times. Properly worked. There was one where we spotted the dispute about a week before the client raised it formally. But it relies on the invoice data being fresh, and that's where I think your ticket came from, the urgent one.
- Daniel OkaforRight, let me close the loop on that, because I want to make sure you're happy with how it was handled. There were two tickets in the last month, and one of them was marked as high priority. That was the invoices source not loading overnight, is that the one you mean?
- Saskia MendesThat's the one. A director opened the brain first thing, asked about a client's outstanding invoices, and it was showing her stuff from days before. She was not thrilled. She messaged me, I raised it with your support, and it got picked up.
- Daniel OkaforThank you for flagging it quickly. From what I can see on the ticket, the connector had stopped pulling after a change on the finance side, and once that was reconnected the data caught up. Did anyone on your side change something in the accounting system that week?
- Saskia MendesProbably. Our finance team tidied up some permissions, I think. I didn't know about it until afterwards, which is a bit of my own process failing. They don't tell me when they touch things.
- Daniel OkaforThat's very common, honestly. What I'd suggest, and tell me if it's too much, is that we get a named contact in your finance team so that if something changes at the source we hear about it before the brain goes stale. Would that be easy to arrange?
- Saskia MendesCan we make it simpler? Rather than a named contact, what if I just add you and support to the channel where finance announce system changes? Then nobody has to remember to email.
- Daniel OkaforI like that. If it's a Slack channel, I can join with a read-only role, and I'll let our support team know the same. That's much lighter than what I was proposing.
- Saskia MendesIt is a Slack channel, yes. I'll ask for you to be added. I'll say it's from me, so nobody thinks it's a vendor trying to spy on them.
- Daniel OkaforHa, no spying. Just an interest in the invoices connector behaving. And the other ticket, the lower priority one, that was a how-to, I think, about filtering by client group?
- Saskia MendesYeah, that was one of the account managers. She wanted to see all the clients under one parent group. I think support told her how, and she's been fine since.
- Daniel OkaforGood. That's exactly the sort of thing a wider rollout will throw up more of, so a few tickets like that are healthy, really. It means people are trying things.
- Saskia MendesRight. Which brings me to the thing I wanted to ask you. How do I actually get the other twenty-odd people using it? Because if I'm honest, I'm a bit worried that when we get to renewal next summer, someone in finance looks at forty seats and a dozen users and asks what we're paying for.
- Daniel OkaforI'm glad you said that out loud, and I'd rather we talk about it now than in a renewal meeting. You're paying forty-four thousand a year for Growth, and the value case is strongest when the whole client-facing group is in there. So the seats are a legitimate thing to want to fill, or to be honest about if they're not needed.
- Saskia MendesMm. Okay. So what would you do?
- Daniel OkaforA couple of things. First, I'd stop thinking of it as training everyone and think of it as one short session per group, with their own clients on screen. The account managers see their accounts, finance sees the invoice and dispute view. About forty minutes each, not an afternoon.
- Saskia MendesForty minutes I can sell. An afternoon I can't.
- Daniel OkaforExactly. Second, I'd ask each group what the one question is that they currently answer by hand. Not a list of features, just the one question. Then we make sure the brain answers that well for them.
- Saskia MendesWhat did the client actually say, that's the question for the directors. For finance it's probably which contractor invoices are waiting on a client payment. For account managers, hmm, probably what's open for this client right now.
- Daniel OkaforThose are all good, and all things the brain can already do on your data. It's mostly about showing people the first time. Once they've seen their own client appear, it tends to stick.
- Saskia MendesOkay. And who runs those sessions? You? Because I'd rather not put it on one of my team, they're stretched.
- Daniel OkaforI'd be glad to run them with you, and I'd keep it light. If you can give me the group leads and a time that suits them, I'll prepare the examples beforehand using their real clients, so nobody has to do any homework.
- Saskia MendesThat's good. That's very good. Let me think about timing, because August is going to be patchy with holidays. September might be cleaner.
- Daniel OkaforI won't guess at dates for you, you know your diaries far better than I do. If you tell me which weeks are realistic, I'll fit around them. And if August works for just the directors and the client ops team, we could do those first and leave the others for September.
- Saskia MendesHold on, let me look at something. Sorry, give me a moment.
- Saskia MendesRight. Sorry. So the client ops team, that's fine in August, they're mostly in. Finance, I'd want September. The account managers, honestly I don't know yet, depends on the restructure.
- Daniel OkaforThat's perfectly workable. So client ops in August, finance in September, account managers when you know more. I'll write that down so it's not just in our heads.
- Saskia MendesPlease. Because I'm going to forget, I always do.
- Daniel OkaforNot a problem. Can I ask one thing about the directors? You said one of them is still sceptical. Is it that she doesn't trust the data, or that she doesn't see why she'd change how she prepares for a review?
- Saskia MendesSecond one. She's got her own way of preparing. Spreadsheets, a folder per client, her own notes. It works for her. She's very good, which is part of the problem, she doesn't feel the pain.
- Daniel OkaforMm. That's the hardest sort, the person who's already good. What tends to move people like that isn't being told it's faster, it's seeing something their folder couldn't have told them. A complaint from a different team, or an invoice dispute they hadn't heard about.
- Saskia MendesOh, that's good. I can do that. Before her next review I can look at the client in the brain and see if there's something she'd have missed. If there is, I'll just tell her. No pitch.
- Daniel OkaforAnd if you'd like a hand finding it, send me the client name and I'll have a look at what's in there. I'd be happy to.
- Saskia MendesBrilliant. Okay. That's the adoption conversation, I think I'm feeling better about it. What else is on your list?
- Daniel OkaforA couple of smaller ones. One is the data side. Are the sources feeding the brain still the ones you expect? The CRM, the call recorder, the helpdesk, the accounting system. Has anything been added or swapped on your side in the last few months?
- Saskia MendesNothing swapped. We've talked about bringing in more of the complaints data, because at the moment complaints come in through three different routes and only one of them lands in the helpdesk. But that's a conversation, not a decision.
- Daniel OkaforUnderstood. And that's worth keeping in mind, because Growth has a limit on how many connectors you can have, so if you do add more, we'd want to look at what's already connected before we say yes. I can check where you are against the limit and tell you plainly.
- Saskia MendesYes, please do. I'd rather know now whether it's a quick yes or a conversation about cost.
- Daniel OkaforI'll come back to you by Friday on that. I don't want to promise more than I can see from here, but I can at least tell you what's configured and what the headroom is.
- Saskia MendesFriday's great. Thank you.
- Daniel OkaforThe other thing I wanted to say is about reviews more generally. Growth comes with a quarterly review, and I'd like to make the next one worth your while, with the numbers you can show your leadership team. If anyone asks what the brain is worth, you should have an answer that isn't just a feeling.
- Saskia MendesThat's exactly what I need, to be honest. Rupert's team, sorry, the leadership, they like a number. Hours saved, disputes caught, that kind of thing.
- Daniel OkaforThen let's agree what to count now, so we're not inventing it afterwards. Disputes spotted early is one. Reviews prepared using the brain is another. You could ask the directors to note, just roughly, whether they used it before a review. Nothing heavy.
- Saskia MendesA one-line check after each review. I can do that. What did the client actually say, did the brain help, yes or no. Simple.
- Daniel OkaforThat's perfect. And I'll pull the question counts and the user trends alongside it, so you've got the story from both directions.
- Saskia MendesGood. Can I ask about the contract while I've got you? Just so I know where we stand. We signed last July, so we're a year in. What's the shape of it from here?
- Daniel OkaforOf course. You're on Growth, forty seats, forty-four thousand a year, and that runs to the start of July next year. I'll be in touch well ahead of it, and I'd want us to have this adoption picture sorted long before then, so there are no surprises on either side.
- Saskia MendesOkay. Good. No surprises is what I like. And is the invoicing all fine from your end? I haven't heard anything from finance, which I'm assuming means it's fine.
- Daniel OkaforNothing overdue on our side, and the invoiced amount matches what's in the order form. So all tidy.
- Saskia MendesLovely. Right. Anything else on your list? I have a call at quarter past three that I mustn't be late for.
- Daniel OkaforJust one more, and it's more of a personal one. How is the team finding it day to day, the people who do use it? Is there anything that annoys them, anything they wish it did?
- Saskia MendesHmm. Honestly, the thing I hear most is that people want to ask a question and get the answer with the source underneath, so they can see where it came from. They like it when it shows the email or the invoice. When it just says something, they don't trust it as much.
- Daniel OkaforThat's useful, and I think that's something they'll see more of if they phrase the question around a specific client or contractor. I can show you a couple of ways of wording it that bring the source up. Perhaps that's the thing to put into the sessions.
- Saskia MendesYes. Put that in. How to ask so it shows its working. People will like that.
- Daniel OkaforWill do. Anything else you'd want from us, or from me?
- Saskia MendesNo, I think that's it. Oh, actually, one thing. If the invoices connector goes again, can someone just tell me quickly? Not a long email, just a message. I'd rather hear from you than from a director.
- Daniel OkaforThat's fair, and I'll make sure our support team knows to tell you directly. I can't promise it won't happen again, but you'll hear it from us first.
- Saskia MendesThat's all I ask. Right, I'm going to run. Thank you, Daniel. This was useful, more useful than I expected.
- Daniel OkaforThank you, Saskia. Just to close the loop on what we agreed. You'll ask for me and support to be added to the finance changes channel. I'll check your connector headroom and come back to you by Friday. I'll send you a short note of the session plan, client ops in August, finance in September. And you'll look for something the sceptical director's folder couldn't tell her.
- Saskia MendesThat's it. And you'll send me the wording for asking so it shows the source.
- Daniel OkaforYes, I'll put that in the same note. Good, I think we're done. Is there still time for you to have the rest of that sandwich?
- Saskia MendesHa, no, it's gone cold, it'll be a crisp and a coffee. Speak soon, Daniel.
- Daniel OkaforSpeak soon. Best wishes to the team, and good luck with the director. Bye for now.
- Saskia MendesBye, thanks. Best, Saskia, as I'll be writing it later. Bye.
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