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How to Spot a Growth Stall Early
Episode 72
, published
January 16, 2026
With Ellie Wu
·
Founder and Executive Advisor
,
CSuiteCX
<p>Growth stalls rarely announce themselves. It usually starts with hesitation, mixed signals, and decisions that keep getting pushed to the next quarter.</p><p></p><p>In How to Spot a Growth Stall Early, Alex Raymond sits down with Ellie Wu, Founder and Executive Advisor of CSuiteCX, to talk about what post-sales leaders are quietly dealing with right now. From her vantage point across entrepreneurship and business, Ellie sees the same early warning signs repeat. Teams have tools, data, and ideas, but leadership struggles to choose a direction and commit to it. That indecision shows up long before revenue drops.</p><p></p><p>The conversation challenges the assumption that speed equals progress. What happens when teams move fast but in different directions? What if the metrics look fine, yet the effort behind them keeps growing? Ellie encourages leaders to look beyond dashboards and ask practical questions. Do you understand the level of effort required to deliver value? Where is time going, and does that work actually help customers? AI can reduce friction and surface context, but it cannot replace judgment or alignment. Without clarity, new tools often increase noise instead of easing pressure.</p><p></p><p>They also talk about how slowing growth affects retention, enterprise value, and team well-being. Waiting for perfect certainty tends to raise stress and drain momentum. Clear priorities do the opposite. Clear priorities change how work feels day to day. Teams stop spinning, effort gets focused, and progress becomes easier to see. When leaders choose direction instead of waiting, growth does not have to grind down before anyone notices. There is still time to correct the course, and the work stops feeling quite so heavy in the process.</p><p></p><p><strong>Episode Breakdown:</strong></p><p>00:00 Account Management and Leadership Challenges in Growing Businesses</p><p>01:00 Early Indicators of Business Growth Slowdowns</p><p>02:00 Calibrated Efficiency and Leadership Alignment</p><p>06:00 Why AI Strategies Fail in Account Management and Customer Success</p><p>08:00 Measuring Effort Versus Outcomes in Post-Sales Teams</p><p>10:00 AI Use Cases That Support Human Decision-Making</p><p>14:30 Leadership Decision Frameworks for Cross-Team Alignment</p><p>18:30 Gross Revenue Retention and Enterprise Value</p><p>25:00 The Enablement Gap in Customer Success Teams</p><p>32:30 Building a Business Case for Post-Sales Investment</p><p>37:00 Bias Toward Action in Leadership Decision-Making</p><p></p><p><strong>Connect with Ellie Wu:</strong></p><p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/elliewu/">Connect with Ellie on LinkedIn</a></p><p><a href="https://www.csuitecx.com/">Visit the CSuiteCX Website</a></p><p></p><p><strong>Connect with Alex Raymond:</strong></p><p><a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/">Connect with Alex on LinkedIn</a></p><p><a href="https://amplifyam.com/">Visit the AMplify website</a></p><p></p><p>Podcast production and show notes provided by <a href="http://hivecast.fm"><strong>HiveCast.fm</strong></a></p></div><p class="section-label">Go deeper:</p><a href="https://amplifyam.com/resources/nrr-vs-grr">NRR vs GRR: What's the Difference?</a><script type="application/ld+json">{"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"PodcastEpisode","@id":"https://amplifyam.com/account-management-secrets/how-to-spot-a-growth-stall-early-ellie-wu#episode","name":"How to Spot a Growth Stall 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Raymond","jobTitle":"Founder","worksFor":{"@type":"Organization","name":"AMplify"},"url":"https://amplifyam.com/about","sameAs":["https://www.linkedin.com/in/afraymond/"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"#guest","name":"Ellie Wu","jobTitle":"Founder and Executive Advisor","worksFor":{"@type":"Organization","name":"CSuiteCX"},"sameAs":["https://www.linkedin.com/in/elliewu"],"description":"Founder and Executive Advisor at CSuiteCX at the time of recording."}]}</script><h3 class="section-label">Related episodes</h3><div class="w-dyn-list"><div role="list" class="w-dyn-items"><div role="listitem" class="w-dyn-item"><a href="https://amplifyam.com/account-management-secrets/95-account-management-in-private-equity-how-to-grow-the-customer-base-as-an-asset-and-win-in-the-boardroom-alan-gonsenhauser" class="related-ep-link w-inline-block"><p class="rel-ep-piece rel-ep-num">Episode 95</p><p class="rel-ep-piece rel-ep-sep">: </p><p class="rel-ep-piece rel-ep-title">Account Management in Private Equity: 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