Harish Madhavan
About Harish Madhavan
Harish Madhavan is the Head of Customer Success at Kong Inc., where he has served in an interim capacity since 2022. He has extensive experience in customer success and strategy roles across various technology companies in Asia and Europe.
Work at Kong
Harish Madhavan currently serves as the Head of Customer Success, Worldwide (Interim) at Kong Inc., a position he has held since 2022. In this role, he stepped in as an interim leader for Worldwide Customer Success following the departure of the previous Vice President. His responsibilities include building customer experience teams aimed at enhancing consumption, health, and retention of subscription-based products. He also holds the position of Senior Director - Customer Success, APJ, which he has occupied since 2021.
Previous Experience in Customer Success
Prior to his tenure at Kong Inc., Harish held various roles in customer success and strategic positions across multiple organizations. He worked at VMware as Director of Tanzu Customer Success APJ from 2019 to 2021. Before that, he was with Red Hat as Application Practice Leader for Emerging Technologies, focusing on Kubernetes Platform & Apps in the APAC region from 2018 to 2019. His experience also includes significant roles at i2s Business Solutions and Torry Harris Business Solutions.
Education and Expertise
Harish Madhavan holds a Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.) from The University of Chicago Booth School of Business, where he concentrated on Data Driven Marketing, Technology Strategy, Corporate Finance, and Leadership Capital. He is also a Project Management Professional (PMP) certified by the Project Management Institute and a Certified Scrum Master (CSM) through Scrum Alliance, specializing in Agile Practices. He earned his Bachelor of Engineering in Information Technology from Visvesvaraya Technological University.
Background in Cloud Native Technologies
Harish has a strong focus on Kubernetes and cloud native workloads, which he has been concentrating on for the past four years. He serves as the CNCF Singapore Lead Organiser, contributing to the cloud native community. His experience spans multiple countries, including Singapore, India, the United Kingdom, and various locations in the Asia-Pacific region, where he has developed a comprehensive understanding of customer success in the technology sector.
Leadership and Transformation in Customer Success
Harish believes in transforming post-sales organizations to prioritize customer outcomes and create champions within the SaaS economy. His approach is centered on building effective customer experience teams that drive engagement and retention. His leadership style emphasizes learning from executive leadership and adapting strategies to meet evolving customer needs in a subscription-based model.