WorkStep

My steps to WorkStep: A story of finding confidence in your knowledge 

Kristina Finn | May 24, 2022

Welcome to our May edition of “My Steps to WorkStep.” Each month we feature a member of the WorkStep team and dive into their role and what led them to it, tips for applicants, and a fun fact about them.

This month we talked to Brooke Lavallee, our Senior Customer Success Manager, who lives and works in Denver, Colorado. She shared how customer success has always been her career focus, how her personal ties to frontline workers really connects her to the WorkStep mission, and the importance of trusting your expertise.

What is your role at WorkStep?

My role is a Senior Customer Success Manager on the RETAIN side of our platform. My role entails a lot, but I am fortunate to work with our clients on a daily basis.

What that involves is everything from onboarding our new clients, getting them launched and sending out check-ins to their frontline employees. Once clients are launched and we’re sending out check-ins to employees I get to partner with them to make sure they understand how to pull insights from the platform so they can take that internally and really start to move the needle and make a difference against any of the retention or turnover goals that they have.

Really in short, I get to work with clients all day, and a little bit of training as well as consulting from the data in the platform we provide. I also get to coach on best practices and share what I’m hearing in the market.

What is your typical workday like?

Every day can be different just based on which clients I’ll be speaking with that day. It can vary from training sessions or launch meetings, to data driven insights calls. But a lot of it does come down to training calls, so making sure if it’s someone new within the company, bringing them up to speed on what WorkStep RETAIN does, how to use it, how to navigate the platform.

Then more on the consultative side, I have clients I meet with on a monthly basis or bi-monthly and we go through the data from the platform and basically present, ‘Hey, these are the top reasons your employees are leaving and what can we do to action plan against that?”

So lots of client calls and interactions, and then supporting them. Sometimes there will be a really email heavy day making sure all their questions are getting answered. And that’s really the majority of it. Just lots of different client interactions.

What was your path to this role like?

Career-wise, if you look on my LinkedIn, I’ve always been in customer success. I went to business school and after I graduated I was working at Compete, a marketing company with competitive analytics. Within that organization I was in business development and then moved to account management and then customer success. So it’s kind of where I’ve always been in terms of previous and current roles.

I used to work with Rachel Bates, WorkStep’s CRO, at Compete in Boston. I worked with her through several different roles. I actually interned with her in college and then got hired on full time after graduation.

After moving to Colorado, I started working at a digital signage communication company in Denver. I had been there for four years and I really liked the people, but I think after Covid I decided I was open to a new opportunity. Rachel was about a year or so in with WorkStep at the time when she reached out saying ‘Hey, this is a great company and we have some open opportunities, I’d love to chat with you.’ I continued that conversation and that’s what brought me to customer success within WorkStep.

After speaking with the WorkStep team and learning more about their mission, I knew it was a fit because of my personal connection to the frontline worker and manufacturing. My dad worked for a packaging and container manufacturing business, Laddawn (now under Berry Global). My aunt and uncle started the business in the late 70s and my dad worked there for 30 years until he retired.

It’s funny, I didn’t seek out WorkStep for that reason, but once I learned more about their mission I was like, ‘Wow, this really does hit home with my dad and my family. We actually have another uncle who owns a plastic bag manufacturing company, so it’s very much in my blood in a sense.’

I don’t share all that very often. But when I go into the platform and see a lot of the comments that are coming in from employees, a lot of it’s like, ‘Oh, that doesn’t surprise me. That was my family’s life – my dad’s life, and my uncle and aunt.’ So it’s really interesting how it’s all tied together. 

Do you have any tips for aspiring WorkSteppers?

One of the main parts of our mission statement is to question the status quo, so I would say don’t be afraid to find your voice and share your feedback based on your expertise. I think we have a lot of intelligent people at WorkStep, and that’s why we’re all hired on. Everyone brings something unique to the organization, and to trust that’s why you’re here.

I think new hires at WorkStep have a really interesting perspective being new, so question why we do things a certain way, or say ‘Oh at my last company we did this, have we ever thought about doing that here?’ So I think just leaning in on your past experiences and expertise where possible.

Don’t be afraid to speak up if there’s something you feel really passionate about, or maybe relates to some of your previous experience. I think all of the leadership, and even coworkers are always open to hearing feedback. Especially with new hires at WorkStep – you have a really interesting perspective being new, so question why we do things a certain way, or say ‘Oh at my last company we did this, have we ever thought about doing that here?’ So I think just leaning in on your past experiences and expertise where possible.

What is something people may not know about you?

I really love to cook and bake, and I think one day in my lifetime hopefully I’ll either own or be a part of a restaurant or bakery. It’s always been something I’ve been really passionate about outside of work.

Favorite recipe? When it comes to cooking I love making chicken parm, or any Italian dish. I love making Italian food. And then for baking, chocolate chip cookies, as simple as that sounds, are usually an easy go-to. Or in the fall I love making pumpkin cookies with the cream cheese frosting, that’s always a crowd pleaser.

It’s funny, I was with some of my past coworkers recently and they were like, ‘Brooke, we really miss all of your baked goods that you would bring into the office!.’ It’s really something that I love doing, just sharing food with others.

What advice would you give to your past self?

Trust the process. Be confident in your expertise and learnings that you’ve gathered over your past working career. Trust that you’re in the right place at the right time and be confident in that.

What do you enjoy the most about being a WorkStepper?

I really like the people here. I think there are a lot of intelligent, hard-working people at WorkStep, which I always appreciate among coworkers. There are also a lot of fun and passionate people here, whether it’s within what they bring to the WorkStep table, or outside of work – everyone has some really cool hobbies.

We are hiring

If you would be interested in learning more about open job opportunities at WorkStep, please visit our careers page. We’d love to hear from you!


Kristina Finn

Kristina Finn, Content Marketing Manager | kristina@workstep.com