Every Role for a Reason: A Conversation with Kevin Garneau, Product Owner @ Coconut Software
In a nutshell 🥥 Kevin Garneau joined Coconut Software as a technical support specialist. Over three years, he has moved across support, Customer Success, and product ownership. Each move helped him build the customer empathy, product knowledge and cross-functional perspective he brings to his work today. Q: You’ve gone from tech support to Customer Success to product ownership at Coconut! Can you walk us through that path? A: It’s been a roller coaster, that’s for sure. Product management and ownership have always been career goals. I really wanted to join the team—primarily because Paul (Sullivan) came over to Coconut first, who said “This is an amazing place to work. You should come here.” It really came down to: How can you best understand the product and showcase it if not to just support it first? So we came up with the idea of me joining the support team to learn the product, build rapport with the teams, and really understand the inner workings. As soon as a support role came out, I applied for it and thankfully was successful. I spent just under two years in that role, always with product management as a goal, and it was really insightful to see the product through the support lens—to really understand what customers needed and where they wanted it to go. From there, a natural progression was: Okay, now you’re supporting the product. How can you take it to meet all the customers’ needs and wishes? That’s where CSM was really well suited for that goal. I transitioned to a Customer Success Specialist, which gave me the platform to take my knowledge from support and go so much further, asking what are your goals, how can we achieve them? I worked with that team for about a year, building those relationships and really understanding what made our customers tick. And then the product owner role was posted. That had always been the goal, so I just tossed my hat in. Having a lot of experience from the support side and the CSM side really played well for the product owner role, because not only did I know how to support the product, I also knew what customers needed and where they wanted it to go. Every little spot I fit in was a natural progression toward the ultimate goal. Q: What kind of support did your managers and mentors give you along the way? A: A big part of my growth comes back to the mentors and managers who believed in me. They were always available, even if it was as small as a quick huddle or making time to provide thoughtful and impactful feedback. There was never a time I didn’t feel fully supported to accomplish the goals set before me. That willingness to make time and create space is one of the things that makes Coconut feel different to me. Q: Why do you choose to stay at Coconut? A: There’s just so much room to grow. Coconut has shown me what it looks like when a company genuinely invests in and cares about the growth of its people. This kind of movement and growth at one place feels unprecedented, and I appreciate it so much. With the ongoing investment from and mentorship of my peers and the leaders here, I am thriving in my role. Q: How did you know you wanted to get into product? A: I’ve always been really passionate about creating something and molding it. I know what I want from the product. And I know the customers feel the same, especially from working with them so directly and seeing the product through their lens. I know that if I can get in there and help shape the product in the way that customers and the support team need, it will be beneficial to the company. Where else can I do that but product? Q: What kind of problems do you love solving? A: Giving customers “aha” moments. Their heads are down working all day, so they don’t think to wonder what new features Coconut has; they don’t have time for that. So being able to show them how something like lobby or Advanced Matching can make their day impactful. We make such a cool product, and being able to talk about it and show customers how we can make their days easier is something I’m really passionate about. Q: What are you unofficially known for at work? A: Not fully sure why but my corn-boy emoji?—and honestly, I have no idea where it came from. It must have been a ‘country folk’ joke since I’m from Kamloops originally. But I feel like once I find out the real story, it’ll be ruined. There are a lot of Kevin emojis and I don’t know the story on most of them. There’s also the half-face. I sometimes take long calls on my couch—in full comfort mode—so it only captures half of me, which somehow became one of many memes. Q: What’s one tiny thing about your workday that makes you weirdly happy? A: I love standup. It is so much fun to talk with your peers and have that daily human interaction, especially if you can start it with a little activity. The engineering team loves to do Scramble and Bandal to start off the day. I feel it’s so important. I understand we all work from home, but when you can break people out of their mold, understand who they are, work together, and care for each other—you get a lot more out of them. If Coconut’s good at one thing, and obviously it’s good at a lot, it’s that they hire the best people. I feel like I’ve met my best friends and best co-workers of my career here, and it’s honestly just a lot of fun to talk to them. Standup is always my favorite part of the day. Q: What do people often get wrong about long tenure at one company?